October 22, 1903 - January 18, 1952
Curly Howard, the one with the shaven head which Moe referred to as "looking like a dirty tennis ball," was the most popular member of the Three Stooges and the most inventive of the three. His hilarious improvisations and classic catch-phrases of "N'yuk- n'yuk-n'yuk!" and "Wooo-wooo-wooo!" have established him as a great American cult hero.
His real name was Jerome Lester Horwitz, born to Jennie and Solomon Horwitz on October 22, 1903, in Bath Beach, a summer resort in a section of Brooklyn, He was the fifth and youngest of the Horwitz sons and weighed eight and a half pounds at birth. He was delivered by Dr. Duffy, the brother of Moe Howard's six-grade school teacher. Curly- Jerome, to complicate matters, was nicknamed "Babe" by his brother Moe.
Curly was a quiet child and gave his parents very little trouble. Moe and Shemp made up for him in spades. Moe recalls one mischievous incident when Curly was an infant: "We took his brand-new baby carriage, removed the wheels, made a pair of axles from two-by- fours and built our own version of a `soap box racer. We put Curly in it and dragged him all over town. It was a lucky thing we didn't kill him. When our parents found out we had the devil to pay.
When Curly was about four, Moe and Shemp started to instill in their brother the idea of becoming a comedian. Quite frequently they would stage small theater productions in the basement of their friends' homes; the cast would usually consist of Shemp, Moe and Curly. There was a charge of two cents for admission, but the ventures could not have been very lucrative, as the boys had to split the take three ways. It is believed that during these performances Curly got his first taste of comedy.
Moe also recalled that Curly was only a fair student in school. A boyhood friend, Lester Friedman, remembers that he was a fine athlete, making a name for himself on the elementary school basketball team. Though Curly never graduated from school, he kept himself busy doing odd jobs, following Moe and Shemp wherever they went.
As a young man, Curly loved to dance and listen to music, and he became an accomplished ballroom dancer. He would go regularly to the Triangle Ballroom in Brooklyn, where on several occasions he met George Raft, who in the early days of his career was a fine ballroom dancer. Curly also tried his hand at the ukulele, singing along as he strummed. As Moe once said, "He was not a good student but he was in demand socially, what with his beautiful singing voice." Moe continued to influence his kid brother's theatrical education, taking him along with him to vaudeville shows and the melodrama theaters, but Curly's first love was musicals and comedy.
Curly Howard is gone and one can only wonder what it would have been like if he had lived and worked with the Stooges through the 1960's. Imagine Curly starring in full- length features in color and black-and-white. Stooges cartoons could have been voiced with the original Curly "N'yuk-n'yuking" and "Wooo-woooing." Television audiences could have realized the true genius of Curly Howard on talk and variety shows. When the Stooges' popularity suddenly burgeoned in 1959, Curly could have been around to take the bows with Moe and Larry.
Hopefully, if there is a Stooges' heaven Curly will be there watching, seeing his talent, his art of comedy and his contributions as a Stooge continue to be enjoyed by millions throughout the world.
Thats right the Southside Gang is up to something, what could it be?
Another companion cache, you must find Curly Howard and Larry Fine to be able to find Moe Howard.
Good luck and have fun N-yuk N-yuk N-yuk.
Moe Howard GCP3GA
Larry Fine >GCP438
Larry Fine had to be archived due to problems. PM me for the North Coords to Moe Howard. The West Coords are in this cache. Good luck and happy caching. big-reb.
Congratulations to the First to Find!!
PrOzAc