“Not to excess,” she replied.
“The Hollywood Squares” was wildly popular throughout the late 1960s and ’70s, with episodes syndicated in prime time for virtually all of the ’70s.
But in 1976, NBC switched the show’s daytime time slot, which hurt ratings. After four moves in as many years, NBC canceled the show in 1980 to make room for an experimental daytime program, “The David Letterman Show.”
Mr. Letterman’s show proved unpopular with daytime audiences and was soon canceled. Mr. Marshall did not return to NBC, but he continued to host the syndicated “Hollywood Squares” for a year before it left the air.
Peter Marshall was born Ralph Pierre LaCock on March 30, 1926, in Clarksburg, W.Va., and lived in Wheeling until he was 10, when his father, a pharmacist also named Ralph, died.
Mr. Marshall stayed with his extended family in Huntington, W.Va., while his sister, Letitia, moved to New York City with their mother, Jeanne LaCock, a costume designer. His mother got a job at Macy’s, and his sister became a model under the name Joanne Marshall. Mr. Marshall joined them, and by 14 he was working nights as an usher at the Paramount Theater in Times Square..
He also worked as a page at NBC Radio, where he learned how to be a disc jockey and got his first job in show business, as a singer with Bob Chester’s band, when he was still a teenager. According to an account in The Huntington Quarterly, the bandleader suggested that Mr. Marshall change his name from LaCock, so he adopted his sister’s modeling surname. (His sister later took the name Joanne Dru and became a successful actress before marrying the singer Dick Haymes.)
Read More: Peter Marshall, Longtime Host of ‘The Hollywood Squares,’ Dies at 98
