Betty White

White was born on January 17, 1922, in Oak Park, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. She later clarified that "Betty" was her legal name, rather than a shortened version of "Elizabeth" as some people had assumed. She was the only child of housewife Christine Tess (née Cachikis) and lighting company executive Horace Logan White. Her father was from Michigan. White's maternal grandfather was Greek, her paternal grandfather was Danish, both of her grandmothers were Canadians of English descent, and her other ancestry included Welsh. When she was one year old, her family moved to Alhambra, California, and later to Los Angeles during the Great Depression. To make extra money, her father built crystal radios and sold them wherever he could. Since it was the height of the Depression and hardly anyone had a sizable income, he would trade the radios for other goods, which sometimes included dogs. White was educated in Beverly Hills, where she attended Horace Mann Elementary School and Beverly Hills High School, graduating from the latter in 1939. Her interest in wildlife was sparked by family vacations to the Sierra Nevada. She initially aspired to become a forest ranger, but was unable to do so because women were not allowed to serve as rangers at the time. She instead pursued an interest in writing; she wrote and played the lead in a graduation play at Horace Mann School and discovered her interest in performing. Inspired by her idols Jeanette MacDonald and Nelson Eddy, she decided to pursue a career as an actress. She found work as a model, and her first professional acting job was at the Bliss Hayden Little Theatre. After the U.S. entered World War II in 1941, she volunteered for the American Women's Voluntary Services. Her assignment included driving a PX truck with military supplies to the Hollywood Hills. She also participated in events for troops before they were deployed overseas. Commenting on her wartime service, she later said that it was "a strange time and out of balance with everything". == Career ==

1951–1969: Early career and breakthrough After the war, White made the rounds to movie studios looking for work, but was turned down because she was "not photogenic". She started to look for radio jobs, where being photogenic did not matter. In 1949, she began appearing as co-host with Al Jarvis on his daily live television variety show Hollywood on Television, originally called Make Believe Ballroom, on KFWB and then on KLAC-TV (now KCOP-TV) in Los Angeles. The Betty White Show (1952–1954) From 1952 to 1954, White hosted and produced her own daily talk/variety show, The Betty White Show, first on KLAC-TV and then on NBC (her first television, but second show to feature that title). In a first for American network variety television, her show featured an African-American performer, but the show faced criticism for the inclusion of tap dancer Arthur Duncan as a regular cast member. The criticism followed when NBC expanded the show nationally. Local Southern stations in the Jim Crow era threatened to boycott unless Duncan was removed from the series. In response, White said "I'm sorry. Live with it", and gave Duncan more airtime. Initially a ratings success, the show repeatedly changed time slots and suffered lower viewership. By the end of the year, NBC quietly cancelled the series. Life with Elizabeth (1953–1955) In 1952, the same year that she began hosting Hollywood on Television, White co-founded Bandy Productions with writer George Tibbles and Don Fedderson, a producer. Life with Elizabeth was nationally syndicated from 1953 to 1955, allowing White to become one of the few women in television with full creative control in front of and behind the camera. As originally intended, the show, loosely based on the Elmer Rice play Dream Girl, would focus on Vicki's daydreaming tendencies. However, the sponsor was not pleased with the fantasy elements and was pressured to have them eliminated. "I can honestly say that was the only time I have ever wanted to get out of a show", White later said. In July 1959, White made her professional stage debut in a week-long production of the play, Third Best Sport, at the Ephrata Legion Star Playhouse in Ephrata, Pennsylvania. Game and talk show appearances By the 1960s, White was a staple of network game shows and talk shows: including both Jack Paar's and later Johnny Carson's tenure on The Tonight Show. She made many appearances on the hit Password show as a celebrity guest from 1961 through 1975. She married the show's host, Allen Ludden, in 1963. Super Password, and Million Dollar Password. White made frequent game show appearances on ''What's My Line? (starting in 1955), To Tell the Truth (in 1961, 1990, and 2015), I've Got a Secret (in 1972–73), Match Game (1973–1982), and Pyramid (starting in 1982). She made her feature film debut as fictional Kansas Senator Elizabeth Ames Adams in the 1962 drama Advise & Consent; in 2004, on talk show Q&A'', host Brian Lamb remarked on White's longevity as an actress besides the fact she was playing a strong female senator in 1962. He and Donald A. Ritchie noted that viewers would have seen the Senator Adams character to reflect Margaret Chase Smith. In 1963, White starred in a production of The King and I at the St. Louis Municipal Opera Theatre, with Charles Korvin co-starring as the king. NBC offered her an anchor job on their flagship breakfast television show Today. She turned the offer down because she did not want to move permanently to New York City (where Today is produced). The job eventually went to Barbara Walters. Through the 1950s and 1960s, White began a nineteen-year run as hostess and commentator on the annual Rose Parade broadcast on NBC (co-hosting with Roy Neal and later Lorne Greene), and appeared on a number of late-night talk shows, including Jack Paar's The Tonight Show, and various other daytime game shows. (from left''): White as Sue Ann Nivens, Gavin MacLeod as Murray Slaughter, Ed Asner as Lou Grant, Georgia Engel as Georgette Franklin Baxter, Ted Knight as Ted Baxter, and Mary Tyler Moore as Mary Richards, 1977 In 1975, NBC replaced White as commentator hostess of the Tournament of Roses Parade, feeling that she was identified too heavily with rival network CBS's The Mary Tyler Moore Show. White admitted to People that it was difficult "watching someone else do my parade", although she would soon start a ten-year run as hostess of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade for CBS. Following the end of The Mary Tyler Moore Show in 1977, White was offered her own sitcom on CBS, her fourth, entitled The Betty White Show '' of 1977, from left: John Hillerman as John Elliot, Betty White as Joyce Whitman, Georgia Engel as Mitzi Maloney White appeared several times on The Carol Burnett Show and The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson appearing in many sketches, and began guest-starring in a number of television movies and television miniseries, including With This Ring, The Best Place to Be, Before and After, and The Gossip Columnist. Due to the amount of work she did on them, she was deemed the "First Lady of Game Shows". The Golden Girls (1985–1992) From 1983 to 1984, White had a recurring role playing Ellen Harper-Jackson on the series ''Mama's Family, In 1985, White scored her second signature role and the biggest hit of her career as the St. Olaf, Minnesota native Rose Nylund on The Golden Girls''. White had a strained relationship with her The Golden Girls co-star Bea Arthur on and off the set of their television show, commenting that Arthur "was not that fond of me" and that "she found me a pain in the neck sometimes. It was my positive attitude – and that made Bea mad sometimes. Sometimes if I was happy, she'd be furious." After Arthur's death in 2009, White said, "I knew it would hurt, I just didn't know it would hurt this much." Despite their differences, The Golden Girls was a positive experience for both actresses and they had great mutual respect for the show, their roles, and the achievements made as an ensemble cast. White was originally offered the role of Blanche in The Golden Girls, and Rue McClanahan was offered the role of Rose (the two characters being similar to roles they had played in Mary Tyler Moore and Maude, respectively). Jay Sandrich, the director of the pilot, suggested that since they had played similar roles in the past, they should switch roles, Rue McClanahan later said in a documentary on the series. White originally had doubts about her ability to play Rose, until Sandrich explained to her that Rose was "terminally naive". White says "if you told Rose you were so hungry you could eat a horse, she'd call the ASPCA." The Golden Girls ended in 1992 after Arthur announced her decision to depart the series. White, McClanahan, and Getty reprised their roles as Rose, Blanche, and Sophia in the spin-off The Golden Palace. In that episode, titled "Here We Go Again", a parody on Sunset Boulevard, a diva-like White convinces Larroquette to help write her memoir. At one point, Golden Girls co-stars McClanahan and Getty appear as themselves. Larroquette is forced to dress in drag as Bea Arthur, when all four appear in public as the "original" cast members. She also began a recurring role in ABC's Boston Legal from 2005 to 2008 as the calculating, blackmailing gossip-monger Catherine Piper, a role she originally played as a guest star on The Practice in 2004. In 2009, White starred in the romantic comedy The Proposal alongside Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds. Also in 2009, the candy company Mars, Incorporated launched a global campaign for their Snickers bar; the campaign's slogan was: "You're not you when you're hungry". White appeared, alongside Abe Vigoda, in the company's advertisement for the candy during the 2010 Super Bowl XLIV. The advertisement became popular, and won the top spot on the Super Bowl Ad Meter. 2010–2021: Career resurgence gala|alt=Photograph of an elderly white woman laughing Following the success of the Snickers advertisement, a grassroots campaign on Facebook called "Betty White to Host SNL (Please)" began in January 2010. The group was approaching 500,000 members when NBC confirmed on March 11, 2010, that White would in fact host Saturday Night Live on May 8. The appearance made her, at age 88, the oldest person to host the show, beating Miskel Spillman, the winner of SNLs "Anybody Can Host" contest, who was 80 when she hosted in 1977. In her opening monologue, White thanked Facebook and joked that she "didn't know what Facebook was, and now that I do know what it is, I have to say, it sounds like a huge waste of time." White and Jean Smart are the only actresses to have wins in all three comedy Emmy categories. In June 2010, White took on the role of Elka Ostrovsky, the house caretaker on TV Land's original sitcom Hot in Cleveland along with Valerie Bertinelli, Jane Leeves, and Wendie Malick. Hot in Cleveland was TV Land's first attempt at a first-run scripted comedy (the channel has rerun other sitcoms since its debut). White was only meant to appear in the pilot of the show but was asked to stay on for the entire series. In 2011, she was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her role as Elka, but lost to Julie Bowen for Modern Family. The series ran for six seasons, a total of 128 episodes, with the hour-long final episode airing on June 3, 2015. '' co-stars Valerie Bertinelli, Wendie Malick, and Jane Leeves at the Hollywood Walk of Fame in August 2012 White also starred in the Hallmark Hall of Fame presentation of The Lost Valentine on January 30, 2011 (this presentation garnered the highest rating for a Hallmark Hall of Fame presentation in the previous four years and according to the Nielsen Media Research TV rating service won first place in the prime time slot for that date), and from 2012 to 2014, White hosted and executive produced ''Betty White's Off Their Rockers'', in which senior citizens play practical jokes on the younger generation. For this show, she received three Emmy nominations. A Betty White calendar for 2011 was published in late 2010. The calendar features photos from White's career and with various animals. She also launched her own clothing line on July 22, 2010, which features shirts with her face on them. All proceeds go to various animal charities she supported. White's success continued in 2012 with her first Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Recording for her bestseller If You Ask Me. She also won the UCLA Jack Benny Award for Comedy, recognizing her significant contribution to comedy in television, and was roasted at the New York Friars Club. A television special, ''Betty White's 90th Birthday Party'', aired on NBC a day before her birthday on January 16, 2012. The show featured appearances of many stars whom White worked with over the years as well as a message from then sitting president Barack Obama. In January 2013, NBC once again celebrated White's birthday with a TV special featuring celebrity friends, including former president Bill Clinton; the special aired on February 5. in the Oval Office, June 2012 On February 15, 2015, White made her final appearance on Saturday Night Live when she attended the 40th Anniversary Special. She participated in "The Californians" sketch alongside members of the current SNL cast as well as Bill Hader, Taylor Swift and Kerry Washington. In the memorable sketch White ends up kissing Bradley Cooper. She was featured in the 2017 HBO documentary ''If You're Not in the Obit, Eat Breakfast.'' On August 18, 2018, White's career was celebrated in a PBS documentary called Betty White: First Lady of Television. The documentary was filmed over a period of ten years, and featured archived footage and interviews from colleagues and friends. The other toys she shared a scene with were named and played by Carol Burnett, Carl Reiner, and Mel Brooks. White commented that "It was wonderful the way they incorporated our names into the characters ... And I'm a sucker for animals, so the tiger was perfect!" It features a cast of friends including Ryan Reynolds, Tina Fey, Robert Redford, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Clint Eastwood, Morgan Freeman, Jay Leno, Carol Burnett, Craig Ferguson, Jimmy Kimmel, Valerie Bertinelli, James Corden, Wendie Malick, and Jennifer Love Hewitt. In addition to the planned documentary, People magazine featured her as the cover story of its January 10, 2022, newsstand publication and a separate commemorative edition to celebrate the anticipated milestone, which were released days before her death. Following White's death, producers Steve Boettcher and Mike Trinklein of the event distributors Fathom Events announced in a Facebook post that the pre-filmed production would be going ahead as scheduled. ==Achievements and honors==

White won five Primetime Emmy Awards, two Daytime Emmy Awards (including the 2015 Daytime Emmy for Lifetime Achievement), and received a Los Angeles Emmy Award in 1952. White was the first woman to have received an Emmy in all performing comedic categories, and also holds the record for longest span between Emmy nominations for performances—her first was in 1951 and her last was in 2014, a span of over 60 years. In 2015, she received the Lifetime Achievement Daytime Emmy. She also won three American Comedy Awards (including a Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990), and two Viewers for Quality Television Awards. She was inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 1995 and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at Hollywood Boulevard alongside the star of her late husband Allen Ludden. In 2009, White received the TCA Career Achievement Award from the Television Critics Association. White was the recipient of The Pacific Pioneer Broadcasters Golden Ike Award and the Genii Award from the Alliance for Women in Media in 1976. In 2009, White and her Golden Girls cast mates Bea Arthur, Rue McClanahan, and Estelle Getty were awarded Disney Legends awards. White was inducted into the California Hall of Fame in December 2010. In 2010, she was chosen as the Associated Press's Entertainer of the Year. On November 9, 2010, the USDA Forest Service, along with Smokey Bear, made White an honorary forest ranger, fulfilling her lifelong dream. White said in previous interviews that she wanted to be a forest ranger as a little girl but that women were not allowed to do that then. When White received the honor, more than one-third of Forest Service employees were women. In January 2011, White received a SAG Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series for her role as Elka Ostrovsky in Hot in Cleveland. The show itself was also nominated for an award as Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series, but it lost to the cast of Modern Family. She won the same award again in 2012 and later received a third nomination. In October 2011, White was awarded an honorary degree and a white doctor's coat by Washington State University at the Washington State Veterinary Medical Association's centennial gala in Yakima, Washington. A 2011 poll conducted by Reuters and Ipsos revealed that White was considered the most popular and most trusted celebrity among Americans, beating the likes of Denzel Washington, Sandra Bullock, and Tom Hanks. In 2017, after 70 years in the industry, White was invited to become a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. At age 95, this made her the oldest new member at the time. In 2025, the United States Postal Service unveiled a new stamp that features White on it. It is a Forever stamp and features White with the words "Forever USA" under her. ==Personal life==

in 1963 While volunteering with the American Women's Voluntary Services, White met Air Force P-38 pilot Dick Barker. After the war, they were married in 1945 and moved to Belle Center, Ohio, where Barker owned a chicken farm; he wanted to embrace a simpler life, but White did not enjoy doing so. They returned to Los Angeles and divorced within a year. She married Hollywood talent agent Lane Allen in 1947, On June 14, 1963, White married television host Allen Ludden, whom she had met as a celebrity guest on his game show Password in 1961. Her legal name was changed to Betty Marion Ludden. Writer John Steinbeck was in White and Ludden's group of high-profile friends, and White wrote about the friendship in her 2011 book ''If You Ask Me (And of Course You Won't)''. Ludden had attended the same school as actress Elaine Anderson (Steinbeck's future wife) and Steinbeck later gave an early draft of his Nobel Prize in Literature acceptance speech to Ludden as a birthday gift. The couple also had a close friendship with blind musician and motivational speaker Tom Sullivan, whom they had met in 1968 while Sullivan was singing in a small club at the same time that White and Ludden were performing in a play on Cape Cod. White and Ludden had no children together, though she was the stepmother of his three children with Margaret McGloin Ludden, who had died of cancer in 1961. During an interview on Larry King Live, she was asked why she never remarried after Ludden's death. She replied, "Once you've had the best, who needs the rest?" When asked by James Lipton on Inside the Actors Studio in 2010 what she would like God to say to her if Heaven exists, she replied, "Come on in, Betty. Here's Allen." White attended the Unity Church, part of the New Thought movement. ==Death==

On December 25, 2021, White suffered a stroke. On the morning of December 31, she died in her sleep at her home in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles at the age of 99. Her remains were cremated. White's death was met with statements of sympathy and tributes from many people and organizations around the world. The United States Army released a statement, as White had volunteered with the American Women's Voluntary Services during World War II. The Martin Luther King Jr. Center also offered their condolences and praised White for her early support of racial equality. There were additional tributes from numerous media organizations, entertainers, political commentators, sports teams, politicians, and other public figures. White's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was flooded with flowers and tributes within hours of the announcement of her death. White's two California homes in Brentwood and Carmel were sold in April and June 2022 respectively, with her personal belongings sold at auction that September and the proceeds donated to several charities. Her estate also donated a substantial portion of her television memorabilia to the National Comedy Center, including wardrobe pieces, annotated notes, and five of her Emmy Awards. == Causes and advocacy ==

Animal welfare White was a pet enthusiast and animal welfare advocate, who worked with organizations including the Los Angeles Zoo Commission, The Morris Animal Foundation, African Wildlife Foundation, and Actors and Others for Animals. Her interest in animal welfare began in the early 1970s while she was producing and hosting the syndicated series The Pet Set, which spotlighted celebrities and their pets. As of 2009, White was the president emerita of the Morris Animal Foundation, where she served as a trustee of the organization beginning in 1971. White served as a judge at the 2011 American Humane Hero Dog Awards ceremony. White served as a judge alongside Whoopi Goldberg and Wendy Diamond for American Humane's Hero Dog Awards on the Hallmark Channel on November 8, 2011. Racial equality In 1954, as The Betty White Show became national across the United States, White was criticized by many in the Southern states for having Arthur Duncan, a Black tap dancer, on her variety show and was asked to remove him. In the 2018 documentary Betty White: First Lady of Television, White recalled threats to take the show off-air "if we didn't get rid of Arthur, because he was Black." She refused, saying "he stays, live with it". In 2017, sixty-three years after the show was canceled, Duncan appeared as a surprise guest on the series premiere of the reality talent series Little Big Shots: Forever Young, where he performed and reunited with White, later thanking her again for her support. LGBT rights A supporter and advocate of LGBT rights, White said in 2010, "If a couple has been together all that timeand there are gay relationships that are more solid than some heterosexual onesI think it's fine if they want to get married. I don't know how people can get so anti-something. Mind your own business, take care of your affairs, and don't worry about other people so much." In a 2011 interview, she revealed that she always knew her close friend Liberace was gay and that she sometimes accompanied him to premieres to help him hide it. == Discography ==

In September 2011, White teamed up with English singer Luciana to produce a remix of her song "I'm Still Hot". The song was released digitally on September 22 and the video later premiered on October 6. It was made for a campaign for a life settlement company, The Lifeline Program, and it is her only commercial single to date, peaking at number 1 on the Dance Club Songs chart. White also covered songs on her live television shows, such as "Nevertheless I'm in Love with You", "It's a Good Day", "Getting to Know You" and "A 'No' That Sounds like 'Yes'". ==Filmography==