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Gobel graduated from Chicago's Theodore Roosevelt High School in 1937. Initially a country music singer, he appeared on the National Barn Dance on WLS radio and, after service in World War II, turned to comedy. During World War II, Gobel served in the United States Army Air Forces as a flight instructor in AT-9 aircraft at Altus, Oklahoma and later in B-26 Marauder bombers at Frederick, Oklahoma. In a 1969 appearance on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, Gobel joked, "There was not one Japanese aircraft got past Tulsa.

LIMA, Peru (AP) — Lonesome George, the late reptile prince of the Galapagos Islands, may be dead, but scientists now say he may not be the last giant tortoise of his species after all. Researchers say they may be able to resurrect the Pinta Island subspecies by launching a cross-breeding program with 17 other tortoises found to contain genetic material similar to that of Lonesome George, who died June 24 at the Pacific Ocean archipelago off Ecuador's coast after repeated failed efforts to reproduce.

..."This morning the park ranger in charge of looking after the tortoises found Lonesome George, his body was motionless," the head of the Galapagos National Park, Edwin Naula, told Reuters. "His life cycle came to an end." George was believed to be around 100 years old and the last member of a species of giant tortoise from La Pinta, one of the smallest islands in the Galapagos, the Galapagos National Park said. BREAKScientists had been trying to get George to mate since 1993, when they introduced two female tortoises of a different subspecies into his pen. They laid eggs twice,...