Toast of the town

It should come as no surprise that one of Chester Gould’s earliest television appearances was on Toast of the Town, Ed Sullivan’s popular variety show broadcast live each Sunday night on CBS affiliates. Sullivan and Gould shared something very special in common—they both worked for the Chicago Tribune-New York News Syndicate and both men’s work had been published in the New York Daily News since 1931. Though he’d be later known for his successful television program, Sullivan penned a popular newspaper column focused on Broadway and, later, Hollywood for the Syndicate and, like Chet, was hired by Captain Joseph Medill Patterson.

Chet traveled to New York City in September, 1950 to make his first appearance on the program, joining Victor Borge, Frankie Laine and Smith & Dale on the finale of the show’s third season. His second and future appearances would coincide with his annual attendance of the American Newspaper Publishers Association convention each April. So successful did the show become with Sullivan as its host that CBS changed the program’s name to The Ed Sullivan Show in September, 1955.

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