"'Take the radio show to March Field? A captive audience with military police guarding the gates so they can't get out? He said yes and I said yes and it's one of the happiest yesses in my life. If I had said no I would have missed twenty-five of the greatest road shows any performer ever got to make, a quarter century of overseas trips to entertain U.S. servicemen around the world. A chance to work with some of the most talented and beautiful artists in the business. We went ... not just me but scores of entertainers because there were kids there who needed a show. And television gave us a chance to do something that hadn't been done before. It made it possible for us to show the faces of thousands of kids in combat areas to the families back home--mothers, fathers, wives and children. To prove to them that their kids were alive and not too skinny and best of all still capable of laughter. I'm not too sure I'm too happy about this, but a lot of reviewers said that the faces of the audiences were the best part of the show.' So March Field in Riverside, California, in 1941 with Hope's weekly show started it all off. For the next five years the show was broadcast from military bases every week. Then in 1942 to Alaska and in 1943 the first Christmas trip overseas to England, Africa, Sicily and Iceland. Just the places that Bob Hope and his troupe visited in twenty-five trips would fill the space on this jacket. The names of the entertainers who went along, the huge camps, the tiny outposts, the ships and the airbases--and the units of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines entertained--would fill a book. They do fill a book, because they're all here, woven into a story of three decades that is part of American history. The fun is here, the sadness too, the danger, the narrow escapes from death and the frantic efforts involved in getting as many as seventy people organized, hastily rehearsed and in the air to places some of them had never heard of, all in a few hectic days. It had to be set down for the record, for all time, and it's been done magnificently. The anecdotes about the stars, the athletes, the band members, the writers, the prima donnas and the ordinary people are hilarious. The best of the skits and the monologues are here too. And there are moments that will bring a lump to the throat of the reader. Awards? Hope has had hundreds. Criticism? Plenty. But as Hope says, it was all worth it just to see the faces of the kids and hear the laughter, the cheers and the wolf calls at the pretty girls. When you read this book you will understand."--Dust jacket.