Bob LeMond, TV announcer, 94
bway...@gmail.com
2008.
Here's an obit from TVGameShows.net, which also posted a photo.
Bob LeMond, Announcer Legend Passes at 94
Bob LeMond did not have a recognizable face....but anyone who
watched television over the past 60 years definitely knew his voice.
LeMond, who was the voice of at least one television game show and
some of TV's classic sitcoms, died Sunday of complications from
dementia at his home in Bonsall, Cal. He was 94.
Born in Texas in 1913, LeMond's family later move to southern
California, where he was raised. He started a radio career in the
early 1930s and polished it in Armed Forces Radio before World War II.
He hit the jackpot for the first time as the announcer on Lucille
Ball's radio show My Favorite Husband. LeMond was the announcer for
the pilot for I Love Lucy, a film feared lost before years until it
was rediscovered in the last decade by the widow of Pepito the Clown
(who appeared in the episode). CBS eventually aired the pilot,
complete with LeMond's introductions and narrations.
In television's pioneer years, LeMond was one of the announcers who
weekly said: "...and Jerry Mathers as The Beaver." In addition to
Leave It to Beaver, he was also an announcer for ABC's Ozzie and
Harriet, Our Miss Brooks, The Red Skelton Show (prior to Art Gilmore)
and Bat Masterson.
LeMond also did the voiceovers for CBS's Do You Trust Your Wife?,
the Tuesday night game show with Edgar Bergen as host.
The man with one of television's purest voices retired from show
business in 1971 and turned his focus to real estate interests in
Bonsall.
He is survived by three sons, five grandchildren and a great
grandchild. His wife of 59 years, Barbara, preceded him in death in
2005.
Brad Ferguson
<0817010e-73e9-4a4d...@e25g2000prg.googlegroups.com>,
<bway...@gmail.com> wrote:
> LeMond was the announcer for
> the pilot for I Love Lucy, a film feared lost before years until it
> was rediscovered in the last decade by the widow of Pepito the Clown
> (who appeared in the episode).
It wasn't really "rediscovered." Desi Arnaz had given the actor who
played Pepito a print of the pilot because the actor had worked for
basically nothing, and Desi was grateful. The actor (and, later, his
widow) showed the film every year at the family's Christmas party. The
widow saw a Lucy retrospective special that characterized the pilot as
"lost," and the rest is (rather remarkable) history.
