Gene Tracy (born Ivan Eugene Morris) (April 8, 1927 – November 3, 1979) was an American
comedian
A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing
Amusement is the state of experiencing humorous and entertaining events or situations while the person or a ...
,
emcee and
recording artist
A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who wri ...
.
Life
After leaving home at an early age, Tracy (still called Morris) secured employment as a promoter for a regional
circus
A circus is a company of performers who put on diverse entertainment shows that may include clowns, acrobats, trained animals, trapeze acts, musicians, dancers, hoopers, tightrope walkers, jugglers, magicians, ventriloquists, and unicyclist ...
called, "The Paul Miller Carnival." Tracy's duties included traveling ahead of the rest of the show to post promotional bills on the telephone poles in the towns the carnival was to perform.
Tracy's comedy career began after he was asked to perform at an event where the featured guest had failed to appear. Tracy filled in by relating a few of the jokes he had overheard in the various
truck-stops he frequented while traveling. A
radio station
Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radio ...
executive
Executive ( exe., exec., execu.) may refer to:
Role or title
* Executive, a senior management role in an organization
** Chief executive officer (CEO), one of the highest-ranking corporate officers (executives) or administrators
** Executive dire ...
was present, and subsequently helped Tracy find bookings at other clubs in the
Charlotte, N.C. area as "Gene" Morris. These appearances soon led to his second "discovery," this time by
record producer
A record producer is a recording project's creative and technical leader, commanding studio time and coaching artists, and in popular genres typically creates the song's very sound and structure.Virgil Moorefield"Introduction" ''The Producer as ...
Jerry Pettus, who signed Morris, and who suggested Morris' new "
stage name
A stage name is a pseudonym used by performers and entertainers—such as actors, comedians, singers, and musicians. Such professional aliases are adopted for a wide variety of reasons and they may be similar, or nearly identical, to an individu ...
" of "Gene Tracy."
Gene Tracy went on to record dozens of comedy albums in his career, selling more than 20 million albums, a vast majority of them on the then-popular 8-Track cartridge format. Tracy also appeared in several radio, television and film roles. He died of a heart attack in
El Paso, Texas
El Paso (; "the pass") is a city in and the county seat, seat of El Paso County, Texas, El Paso County in the western corner of the U.S. state of Texas. The 2020 population of the city from the United States Census Bureau, U.S. Census Bureau w ...
at the age of 52. Tracy was interred in Sunset Memory Gardens, a Tampa, Florida cemetery dedicated to
circus folk.
References
Gene Tracy Bio: www.genetracy.co
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tracy, Gene
20th-century American comedians
1979 deaths
1927 births