Jonathan Winters

Winters was born in Bellbrook, Ohio, the son of Alice Kilgore (née Rodgers), a radio personality, and Jonathan Harshman Winters II, an investment broker. He is a descendant of Valentine Winters, founder of the Winters National Bank in Dayton, Ohio (now part of JPMorgan Chase). Winters has described his father as an alcoholic who had trouble holding a job. When he was seven, his parents separated, and Winters’ mother took him to Springfield, Ohio to live with his maternal grandmother.

At age 17, Winters joined the United States Marine Corps and served two and a half years in the Pacific Theater during World War II. Upon his return he attended Kenyon College. He later studied cartooning at Dayton Art Institute, where he met Eileen Schauder, whom he married in 1948.

Jonathan Winters is a brother of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity (Lambda chapter).

He began comedy routines and acting while studying at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. He was also a local radio personality on WING (mornings, 6 to in Dayton, Ohio and at WIZE in Springfield, Ohio. He performed as Johnny Winters on WBNS-TV in Columbus, Ohio for two years, quitting the station in 1953 when they refused him a $5.00 raise. After promising his wife that he would return to Dayton if he did not make it in a year, and with $56.36 in his pocket, he moved to New York City, staying with friends in Greenwich Village. After obtaining Martin Goodman as his agent, he began stand-up routines in various New York nightclubs. His big break occurred (with the revised name of Jonathan) when he worked for Alistair Cooke on the CBS Sunday morning show Omnibus In 1957, he performed in the first color television show, a 15-minute routine sponsored by Tums.

As a stand-up comic with a madcap wildness, Winters recorded many classic comedy albums for the Verve Records label, starting in 1960. Probably the best-known of his characters from this period is Maude Frickert, the seemingly sweet old lady with the barbed tongue. He was a favorite of Jack Paar and appeared frequently on his television programs. In addition, he would often appear on the The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, usually in the guise of some character. Carson often did not know what Winters had planned and usually had to tease out the character’s back story during a pretend interview.

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