In the post-war years, there was nothing quite so
American as TV.

Over time, The Tonight Show
hosts—Johnny Carson, Jay
Leno, Conan O’Brien, Jimmy
Fallon—have become
household names, their
self-titled programs popping
up in TV guides and while
channel surfing. But the
tradition of titling the show
after the host began with one
man: Jack Paar.

“I played an unsympathetic part—myself,” quipped Oscar Levant in
a 1946 interview about his role in Humoresque, a film in which he
portrayed an accompanist and sidekick.