By Phil Roberts, 6-22-2024
Several times during my teaching years, I would assume today’s students would recognize names of famous American celebrities from the past. Early on, in my History of Wyoming class, I would mention that comic/filmmaker Charlie Chaplin was once married to a star of silent movies from Cheyenne. Everyone would nod in recognition, until one day when I told the anecdote, looked over the class, and saw only blank stares–no one knew who Charlie Chaplin was!
And it became even more pronounced as years passed. Worse, some would completely confuse names from history. I told the story of my brush with celebrity. “I sat next to Hoagy Carmichael in a bar once.” I found out after the bar singer pointed out that every song she had sung that night was written by Hoagy Carmichael as she pointed to the man sitting next to me who stood to take a bow. I always noted that the famous composer of “Stardust” and “Georgia on My Mind.” played “Jonesy,” the hired hand in the TV western, “Laramie” in the late 1950s. Then, one day, a student introduced me to a friend in the Student Union. :”This is Dr. Roberts who, as I told you the other day, sat next to STOKELY Carmichael in a bar once.” A new historical myth began that day!