Cliff "Ukelele Ike" Edwards

With his cheery tenor voice and ever-present ukulele, Cliff "Ukelele Ike" Edwards was a major vaudeville star of the 1920s who branched out into record-making (selling a reported 74 million discs), film-making (appearing in as many as 100 films), radio, and television. He introduced such songs as "Fascinating Rhythm" and "Toot, Toot, Tootsie! (Goo'bye)," and scored his biggest record hits with the chart-toppers "I Can't Give You Anything but Love" and "Singin' in the Rain," but it was as the voice of Jiminy Cricket in the animated film Pinocchio, singing "When You Wish upon a Star," that he achieved immortality. Edwards began playing the ukulele to attract attention as a newspaper boy. In his teens, he moved to St. Louis and became a performer, working his way up to the vaudeville circuit. He and his then-partner Bob Carleton introduced Carleton's novelty song "Ja-Da" in Chicago in 1918; it subsequently was recorded for a hit by Arthur Fields. Around this time, Edwards was dubbed "Ukelele Ike" by a waiter who couldn't remember his name. Splitting from Carleton, he formed an act called "Jazz As Is" with Pierce Keegan, a singer and dancer. In 1920, comedian Joe Frisco took him to New York as part of his troupe. Edwards crossed over to the legitimate stage, making his Broadway debut in The Mimic World of 1921, which opened on August 15, 1921, and ran for 27 performances. After several unsuccessful tries, he finally made his recording debut as the kazoo player on "Virginia Blues," recorded by Ladd's Black Aces on February 25, 1922. The same year, he introduced Ted Fiorito, Robert A. King, Gus Kahn, and Ernie Erdman's "Toot, Toot, Tootsie! (Good'bye)" in vaudeville, but lost out on the song when the far more prominent Al Jolson began singing it. Edward was signed to Pathe...