She grew up in Jamestown, N.Y., where her father, an electrician, died when she was just three. At 15 she began making forays to New York City to try to break into show business. She had little luck as an actress but worked as a model before moving to Hollywood in 1933 for a part in the chorus of Roman Scandals. Strikingly pretty, with chestnut hair dyed blond (until MGM hairdressers, seeking a more distinctive look, turned it red in 1942), she landed bit parts in B movies and moved up to classy fare like Stage Door, in which she held her own with Katharine Hepburn and Ginger Rogers.

Buster Keaton, the great silent clown working as a consultant at MGM, recognized her comic gifts and worked with her on stunts. She got a few chances to show off her talent in films like DuBarry Was a Lady (with Red Skelton) and Fancy Pants (with Bob Hope) but never broke through to the top. By the end of the 1940s, with Ball approaching 40, her movie career was all but finished.

It was her husband Desi — a Cuban bandleader she married shortly after they met on the set of Too Many Girls in 1940 — who urged her to try television. CBS was interested in Ball, but not in the fellow with the pronounced Spanish accent she wanted to play her husband. To prove that the audience would accept them as a couple, Lucy and Desi cooked up a vaudeville act and took it on tour. It got rave reviews ("a sock new act," said Variety), and CBS relented.

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May 26, 1952

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