Mike Todd
| Mike Todd | |
|---|---|
Todd at the Jones Beach Theater, 1952
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| Born |
Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen June 22, 1909 Minneapolis, Minnesota |
| Died | March 22, 1958 (aged 48) Grants, New Mexico |
| Cause of death | Airplane crash |
| Resting place | Beth Aaron Cemetery, Forest Park, Illinois |
| Spouse(s) |
Bertha Freshman (m. 1927; d. 1946) Joan Blondell (m. 1947; div. 1950) Elizabeth Taylor (m. 1957; d. 1958) |
| Children | 2 |
Michael "Mike" Todd (born Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen, June 22, 1909 – March 22, 1958) was an American theater and film producer, best known for his 1956 production of Around the World in 80 Days, which won an Academy Award for Best Picture. He is known as the third of Elizabeth Taylor's seven husbands and is the only one whom she did not divorce (he died in an accident a year after their marriage). He was the driving force behind the development of the eponymous Todd-AO widescreen film format.
Todd was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Chaim Goldbogen (an Orthodox rabbi) and Sophia Hellerman, both of whom were Polish Jewish immigrants. He was one of nine children in a poor family, the youngest son, and his siblings nicknamed him "Toat" to mimic his difficulty pronouncing the word "coat." It was from this that his name was derived.
The family later moved to Chicago, arriving on the day World War I ended. Todd was expelled in the sixth grade for running a game of craps inside the school. In high school, he produced the school play, The Mikado, which was considered a hit. (As Mike Todd, he would produce a jazz version of the musical on Broadway in 1939. )
He eventually dropped out of high school and worked at a variety of jobs, including shoe salesman and store window decorator. One of his first jobs was as a soda jerk. When the drugstore went out of business, Todd had acquired enough medical knowledge from his work there to be hired at Chicago's Michael Reese Hospital as a type of "security guard" to stop visitors from bringing in food that was not on the patient's diet.
Todd began his career in the construction business, where he made, and subsequently lost, a fortune. He opened the College of Bricklaying of America, buying the materials to teach bricklaying on credit. The school was forced to close when the Bricklayers' Union did not view the college as an accepted place of study. Todd and his brother, Frank, next opened their own construction company.
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