Paul Kengor: Remembering Bob Hope at Christmas

This Christmas season, let’s remember Bob Hope, a truly special American.

As pretty much anyone over 60 would attest, Hope was a household name once synonymous with Christmas in America. His annual holiday special on NBC was a must-see. He did comedy skits, sang songs in the snow with leading ladies of the day, cracked jokes with celebrities, presented the college football All-Americans and closed sentimentally with his signature song, “Thanks for the Memories.”

His show included highlights from his USO tours, when the wonderful Hope — God bless him — brought Christmas to lonely U.S. troops abroad. Those were soldiers who, to borrow from Hope partner Bing Crosby, wished “I’ll Be Home for Christmas.” Alas, they were stuck overseas.

Today, sadly, Bob Hope isn’t anywhere on the radar of young Americans. I recently had that reaffirmed when watching a Hope Christmas movie with a group of young people, including several who know a lot about old movies and history. We watched “The Lemon Drop Kid.”

For the record, “The Lemon Drop Kid” isn’t a very good movie and not even much of a Christmas film, though it includes a splendid scene in which Hope (dressed as Santa Claus) and his romantic interest, played by actress Marilyn Maxwell, stroll through the streets of a city bedecked with Christmas lights and snow and beautifully sing “Silver Bells.” The scene doubly resonates with me personally because it looks like Pittsburgh in the era, with the two walking by stores that resemble Gimbel’s or Kaufman’s. And indeed, the song’s co-writer, Jay Livingston, was from McDonald, Pa., and his images were inspired by downtown Pittsburgh at Christmas time. Hope and Maxwell walk arm in arm and croon, “Strings of streetlights, even stoplights, blink of bright red and green … . Silver bells, Silver bells, it’s Christmas time in the city.”

Great lyrics, great feel.

I should add that Bob Hope had Pittsburgh connections. My wife and I every year do a Christmas getaway to Pittsburgh, where we spend the night at the classic William Penn Hotel. (Another song, Bing Crosby’s “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas,” has a line about “there’s a tree in the grand hotel,” which always reminds me of the huge Christmas tree in the William Penn lobby.) There’s a designated “Bob and Dolores Hope” ballroom at the William Penn.

Returning to my theme of the forgotten Bob Hope, I was very surprised to learn as we watched “The Lemon Drop Kid” that none of the young people knew who Hope was. I proceeded to ask my students about Hope. I got a bunch of blank stares.

How could Bob Hope be so quickly forgotten? His career and TV shows and USO tours spanned well over a half-century, from the 1940s to the 1990s. He lived to be 100. If you were putting together a list of the top names in entertainment in the 20th century, Hope would surely make your top 10.

And so, I have a suggestion: For Christmas this year, grab some young people in your life and pull up on YouTube an old Bob Hope Christmas special. No doubt, they’ll find some of the broadcasts corny, foreign, even weird at times. Nonetheless, that was history. Bob Hope was a great American and history they should know.

Thanks for the memories, Bob. Merry Christmas, everyone.