Walter Winchell

"At the height of his popularity, in the late 1930s, 50 million people—two-thirds of American adults—read Winchell's syndicated column and listened to his Sunday-night radio broadcast."

"Hated, feared, and revered, he presided over Table 50 of the Stork Club on East 53d Street in Manhattan, creating and destroying celebrities at the drop of his trademark gray snap-brim fedora."