Bill Cosby

An American actor, comedian, television producer, and activist, William Henry "Bill" Cosby, Jr. Ed.D was born on July 12, 1937. He got his start at various clubs, landing with a vanguard role in the 1960s action show I Spy. An expert stand-up performer, he later starred in his own series, The Bill Cosby Show, in the late 1960s. One of the major characters on the children's television show for its first two seasons, he created the humorous educational cartoon series Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids. Cosby also acted in many films, none receiving the acclaim of his television work.

During the 1980s, Cosby produced and starred in one of the decade's defining cultural sitcoms, The Cosby Show from 1984 to 1992. The sitcom featured an upper-middle class African-American family without resorting to the kinds of stereotypes previously seen among African-Americans in prime-time television.

Early life:
A class president, Cosby was also the captain of the baseball and track & field teams at Mary Channing Wister Elementary School in Philadelphia. At Fitz-Simmons Junior High, Cosby began acting in plays as well as continuing his loyalty to sports. He went on to Central High School, but his full schedule of playing football, basketball, baseball, and running track, more importantly his dedication to joking in class, made it harder for him. In addition, to help out the family, Cosby was working before and after school, selling produce, shining shoes, and stocking shelves at a supermarket.

I Spy
Cosby achieved a first for African-Americans In 1965, costarring with Robert Culp in I Spy, an adventure show reflecting cold-war America's apparently endless desire for James Bond-style spying fantasies. But Cosby's presence as the first black star of a dramatic television series made I Spy unique. Only four stations in Georgia, Florida, and Alabama rejected the show at the opening of the 1965 season, otherwise it became one of the ratings hits of that television season.

The Bill Cosby Show and the 1970s
He still pursued a variety of television projects: as a regular guest host on The Tonight Show and the star of an annual special for NBC. He returned with another series in 1969, The Bill Cosby Show, a situation comedy that ran for two seasons. Cosby played a physical education teacher at a Los Angeles high school (he had actually majored in physical education at Temple University); while only a modest critical success, the show was a ratings hit, finishing eleventh in its first season.

The Cosby Show and the 1980s
With the debut of The Cosby Show, Cosby's greatest television success came in 1984. He insisted on and received total creative control of the series, and was also involved in every aspect of the series. Not surprisingly, the show had parallels to Cosby's actual family life:

In the 1990s and 2000s:
Cosby boarded on a number of other projects in 1992 after The Cosby Show went off the air. Those projects included: revival of the classic Groucho Marx game show You Bet Your Life (1992-1993) along with the ill-fated TV-movie I Spy Returns (1994) and The Cosby Mysteries (1994). He also made appearances in three more films, Ghost Dad (1990), The Meteor Man (1993); and Jack (1996); being interviewed in Spike Lee's 4 Little Girls (1997), a documentary about the racist bombing of a Birmingham, Alabama, church in 1963.

Personal life
Cosby met his wife Camille while performing stand-up in Washington D.C., in the early 1960s, and she was a student at the University of Maryland. They married on 25 January 1964, and had five children: daughters Erika Ranee, Erinn Chalene, Ensa Camille, and Evin Harrah, and son Ennis William. His son Ennis was shot to death while changing a flat tire on the side of a Los Angeles freeway on 16 January 1997.

Honors:
Cosby received an Honorary Degree of Doctor of Humane Letters from Carnegie Mellon University at its 2007 commencement ceremony, where he was also the keynote speaker. Cosby received an Honorary Degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the University of Cincinnati during the 2001 graduation season.

Cosby received an Honorary Degree in 2003 presented by President William Harjo LoneFight from the Sisseton Wahpeton College on the Lake Traverse Reservation for his contributions to minority education. Cosby received an Honorary Doctorate from West Chester University of Pennsylvania during the 2003 graduation ceremony. Cosby received an Honorary Doctorate from Baylor University (September 4, 2003 "Spirit Rally"). In a British 2005 poll to find The Comedian's Comedian, he was voted amongst the top 50 comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy insiders.

He received Kennedy Center Honors in 1998,
He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2002.
He received an Honorary Doctor of Music Degree from Berklee College of Music during the 2004 commencement ceremony. Cosby was also a speaker at the school's 60th anniversary concert in 2005.
He won the 2003 Bob Hope Humanitarian Award.
In 1969, he received the third in a long line of prestigious "Man of the Year" awards from Harvard University's famed performance group, the Hasty Pudding Theatricals.

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