Chevy Chase

:This article is about an American comedian; Chevy Chase is also a 16th century ballad about the battle between Earl Douglas and Earl Percy and a town in Maryland.

Background

Early years

He was raised in affluence as part of the Crane plumbing fixture family. His middle name, Crane, refers to Crane Castle, his childhood vacation home in Massachusetts, where he liked to spend his summer and other vacations at a castle on a beautiful beach in Ipswich, Massachusetts.

Related Topics:
Massachusetts - Ipswich, Massachusetts

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Chevy was actually a childhood nickname -- possibly based on the Maryland suburb -- bestowed by his grandmother. The Chase family was affluent and distinguished, and Chevy was listed in the Social Register at early age. His paternal grandfather was painter/teacher Frank Swift Chase; his father, Ned Chase, was a prominent Manhattan book editor and magazine writer. His mother was descended from the Crane plumbing-fixture family.

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His parents divorced when he was four, and his father remarried into the Folgers coffee family, while his mother's third marriage was to Juilliard School professor/composer Lawrence Widdoes.

Related Topics:
Folgers - Juilliard School

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High school

Chevy Chase was also the valedictorian of his high school class. He was a long-time class clown expelled from private schools like New York City's Dalton but did well at Stockbridge School in Massachusetts. He was expelled from Haverford College after bringing a cow into the third floor of a campus building. He then transferred to Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, where he dated actress Blythe Danner and graduated in 1967. He also attended Riverdale Country School in New York City.

Related Topics:
Dalton - Haverford College - Bard College - Blythe Danner

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Aspirations

He really wanted to be a doctor and was pre-med in college. Besides an actor, he says he was also a writer, a rock drummer, a jazz drummer, a pianist, a truck, cab and motorcycle driver, a construction worker, a fruit picker, a waiter and bus boy, the head of produce in a supermarket, an audio engineer, a salesman in a wine store and a theater usher.

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He was the drummer a couple of times for what he called "a bad jazz band" - the college band "The Leather Canary". The band also included Walter Becker and Donald Fagen. That band became Steely Dan. He has perfect pitch, which is a musical ability to remember the exact frequency of a note.

Related Topics:
Walter Becker - Donald Fagen - Perfect pitch

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