30 Facts About Mike Todd

Mike Todd was the third of Taylor's seven husbands, and the only one Taylor did not divorce.

Mike Todd died in a private plane accident a year after they married.

Mike Todd was the driving force behind the development of the eponymous Todd-AO widescreen film format.

Mike Todd was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Chaim Goldbogen, and Sophia Hellerman, both Polish Jewish immigrants.

Mike Todd was one of nine children in a poor family, the youngest son, and his siblings nicknamed him "Tod" to mimic his difficulty pronouncing the word "coat".

Mike Todd was expelled in the sixth grade for running a game of craps inside the school.

Mike Todd dropped out of high school, and worked as a shoe salesperson and store window decorator.

Mike Todd began his career in the construction business, where he made, and subsequently lost, a fortune.

Mike Todd opened the College of Bricklaying of America, buying the materials on credit to teach bricklaying.

Mike Todd he owned with his brother went bankrupt when its financial backing failed in the early days of the Great Depression.

Mike Todd married the former Bertha Freshman on February 14,1927, and was the father of an infant son with no home for his family.

Mike Todd got his first taste of Broadway with the engagement and was determined to find a way to work there.

Mike Todd visited Grover Whalen, president of the 1939 New York World's Fair, with a proposal to bring the Broadway show to the Fair.

Mike Todd ultimately produced 17 Broadway shows during his career, including the immensely successful burlesque revue Star and Garter starring Gypsy Rose Lee and Bobby Clark, The Naked Genius written by Gypsy Rose Lee and starring Joan Blondell, and a 1945 production of Hamlet starring Maurice Evans.

Mike Todd floated the idea of holding the 1945 Major League Baseball All-Star Game in newly liberated Berlin.

In 1952, Mike Todd made a production of the Johann Strauss II operetta A Night in Venice, complete with floating gondolas at the then-newly constructed Jones Beach Theatre in Long Island, New York.

In 1950, Mike Todd formed Cinerama with the broadcaster Lowell Thomas and the inventor Fred Waller.

Mike Todd was created to exploit Cinerama, a widescreen film process created by Waller that used three film projectors to create a giant composite image on a curved screen.

At age 19, Mike Todd married Bertha Freshman in Crown Point, Indiana, on Valentine's Day 1927.

Mike Todd had been interested in Freshman since his mid-teens, but needed to develop confidence before asking her out.

Mike Todd and Taylor had a daughter, Elizabeth Frances Mike Todd, born on August 6,1957.

Five days before the crash, Mike Todd flew on this plane to Albuquerque, 78 miles east of the crash site, to promote a screening of Michael Mike Todd's Around the World in 80 Days.

Mike Todd paid for the installation of two extra fuel tanks in his leased Lodestar aircraft; this made it weigh more than its official rating when all the tanks were full.

Mike Todd was on his way to New York to accept the New York Friars Club "Showman of the Year" award.

Taylor wanted to go with him, but stayed home with a cold after Mike Todd overruled her pleas to come along.

Just hours before the crash, Mike Todd described the plane as safe as he phoned friends, including Joseph Mankiewicz and Kirk Douglas, in an attempt to recruit a gin rummy player for the flight: "Ah, c'mon," he said.

Mike Todd was buried in Forest Park, Illinois, at Beth Aaron Cemetery in plot 66, which is part of Jewish Waldheim Cemetery.

The bag containing Mike Todd's remains was found under a tree near his burial plot.

The bag and casket had been sealed in Albuquerque after Mike Todd's remains were identified following the 1958 crash.

Mike Todd's remains were again identified by dental records and reburied in a secret location.