Sidney Skolsky was a renowned columnist, born in New York City in 1903. He graduated from New York University and became a Broadway press agent before moving to newspapers, becoming a Broadway columnist in 1929. Skolsky's column, "Times Square Tintypes," featured typewriter-written caricatures of Broadway's leading lights.
Skolsky left New York in 1932 for Los Angeles, where he made Schwabb's drugstore famous through his nationally syndicated gossip column. He became a premier entertainment reporter, dishing out celebrity scoops and confabulations. His column appeared in the New York Post and the Los Angeles Herald, as well as many other newspapers.
Skolsky's work extended to the silver screen, where he co-wrote the story for "The Daring Young Man" (1935) and produced "The Jolson Story" (1946) and "The Eddie Cantor Story" (1953). He also made cameo appearances in films such as "Sunset Boulevard" (1950) and "The Legend of Lylah Clare" (1968).
In addition to his film work, Skolsky worked in radio and television, hosting "Sidney Skolsky's Hollywood" and contributing to the TV series "Hollywood: The Golden Years" (1961). He played a significant role in Marilyn Monroe's rise to stardom in the early 1950s, helping her secure better roles and even planning a Jean Harlow biopic with her.
Skolsky's greatest claim to fame is arguably his contribution of the nickname "Oscar" to the Academy Award. Although the Academy does not attribute the nickname to a specific person, it does cite Skolsky's use of the term in a 1934 column, which tagged the name "Oscar" to Katharine Hepburn's first Academy Award. Skolsky claimed that his use of the term referenced an old vaudeville joke.
Skolsky published his memoirs in 1975, using the title "Don't Get Me Wrong, I Love Hollywood" from his columns. He died in 1982, and his widow donated his papers to the Academy Library, which is named after fellow Oscar "namer" Margaret Herrick.
