Bert Kalmar

Jewish American lyricist. Born 10 February 1884 in New York City, USA. Died 18 September 1947 in Los Angeles, California, USA. Kalmar and Ruby formed a successful songwriting team until Kalmar's death in 1947. They met while Ruby toured the vaudeville circuit as a pianist with the Bootblack Trio and the Messenger Boys Trio. Their songwriting partnership was portrayed in the 1950 MGM musical "Three Little Words" starring Fred Astaire as Kalmar and Red Skelton as Ruby. Kalmar as a songwriter charted sixty-five times total, with Kalmar and Ruby charting forty-six times of those. Kalmar and Ruby together wrote twenty-four top 10 songs, and forty-two top 20 songs. Kalmar also had chart success writing with Ted Snyder (including his first four charted songs), Pete Wendling (four charted songs), Edgar Leslie (seven charted songs) and others. Inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970.