Bob Hope (born Leslie Townes Hope, 29 May 1903 27 July 2003) was one of the twentieth century's most successful entertainers, with a career in film, radio, television and stage that spanned nearly eighty years. He appeared in more than seventy films, headlined decades of his own radio and television specials, and became one of the best-known comedians in the English-speaking world.
Hope's Welsh connection comes through his mother. Avis Townes was a light opera singer born in Barry, Glamorgan, who married English stonemason William Henry Hope in 1891. The couple lived in Barry before later moving to England, where Leslie (as Bob was then known) was born in Eltham, London, in 1903. The family emigrated to the United States in 1908, eventually settling in Cleveland, Ohio, where young Bob grew up.
Hope is best remembered for his long comic partnership with Bing Crosby and Dorothy Lamour in a series of seven "Road to..." films, beginning with Road to Singapore in 1940. He also built a huge following through his radio programmes and decades of television specials, and became famous worldwide for entertaining American troops on USO tours from the Second World War through to the Gulf War.
Although he never won a competitive Academy Award, Hope received five honorary Oscars for his contribution to the film industry and for his humanitarian work, and in 1997 he was named an Honorary Veteran of the United States armed forces by Act of Congress. He died at his home in Toluca Lake, California, in 2003, at the age of 100.