By Den Ardinger 32° KCCH

Irving Berlin (1888-1989) was born Israel Beilin on May 11, 1888, in Tyumen, Siberia, Russian Empire. His family moved while he was still a baby to what is today the city of Tolochin in Belarus.  He was one of eight children of Moses Beilin and his wife, Lena Lipkin.  He came to the United States through Ellis Island in 1893 at the age of five.  They were one of many Russian Jewish immigrants living in poverty while searching for a better life.  Once in America, the family changed their name to “Baline”. 

Irving left school around the age of thirteen and made a meager living walking from bar to bar in the Bowery of New York City singing to customers.  Berlin soon became a songwriter and sold the publishing rights to his first song, “Marie from Sunny Italy” in 1907 at the age of 19 for the price of 33 cents.  His first of many international best sellers, “Alexander’s Ragtime Band”, was sold a few years later in 1911 under the name of “I. Berlin”.  In his spare time, he taught himself to play the piano.

In 1912 he married twenty-year-old Dorothy Goetz at the age of 24.  She was the sister of songwriter E. Ray Goetz.  During their honeymoon in Havana, Cuba, she contracted typhoid fever and died later that year.

Irving Berlin was a prolific songwriter and was already famous by 1917 when World War I broke out for the Americans.  He was inducted into the Army and one newspaper had the headline, “Army Takes Berlin”.  Before the end of war in 1918, he had written hundreds of songs.  One song was held back unpublished until twenty years later.  It became the smash hit called “God Bless America”.  He not only wrote his own songs but wrote the lyrics to other composer’s melodies.  He is considered by some to be the greatest American songwriter who has ever lived.

His first really big hit, which he considered one of his “big guns” was “A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody” written for the Ziegfeld’s Follies of 1919.  It became the musical’s lead song and brought him great acclaim.

In 1926, Berlin married Ellin Mackay, an author, and they had four children. Their marriage was a “successful love affair”.  Ellin died in July 1988 at the age of 85.

When the United States was attacked in 1941 and entered World War II, Irving Berlin wrote patriotic songs and traveled to entertain the troops.  He was often at the front lines.  He always personally sang the song, “Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning”.  He traveled three and a half years and donated all proceeds to the Army Emergency Relief Fund while taking no salary or expenses.

After the war in 1946 he wrote what is considered his best musical theater score called “Annie Get Your Gun”.  In it, he had the song, “There’s No Business Like Show Business” which became Ethel Merman’s trademark.

It is estimated he wrote 1,500 songs in his lifetime including twenty original Broadway shows and fifteen original Hollywood films.  His songs were nominated for eight Academy Awards.  His music, which remains popular even to this day, included “Blue Skies” (1926), Puttin on the Ritz” (1928), “White Christmas” (1942), and “There’s No Business Like Show Business” (1946). “White Christmas” won him the Academy Award for Best Music in an Original Score.  It became one of the most recorded songs in history.

He died in his sleep of a heart attack at the age of 101 at his home in Manhattan on September 22, 1989.  He is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.

His awards and honors are legendary including the Army Medal of Merit, an Academy Award in 1943, a Tony Award in 1951, Congressional Gold Medal in 1954, Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970, Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977, Jewish-American Hall of Fame in 1988, American Theater Hall of Fame and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1994.

Berlin was a Freemason and a member of Munn Lodge No. 190 in New York City (now Munn Lodge No. 203).  He was also a member of the Scottish Rite and of the Mecca Shrine Temple of New York.

Irving Berlin, more than a man, a Scottish Rite Mason.