Obituary : Alan Cross; Believed to Be Nation’s Oldest Vaudevillian

Alan Cross, 98, reportedly the nation’s oldest vaudevillian. He and Harry Dunn had a song and parody act on what was called Keith Orpheum Time, the most prestigious of the vaudeville circuits during the early decades of this century. Dunn would sing “Pennies From Heaven,” one of the popular songs of the 1920s and ‘30s, and Cross would counter with a nonsense version such as “Benny’s From Heaven,” in which a wife was trying to explain a new baby to her husband who had been away for two years. Cross broke into vaudeville with the famed Blossom Seeley and worked with other acts until he and vaudeville retired almost simultaneously. When Edwina Barry died at the age of 102 in 1988 it was believed that George Burns had become the oldest surviving vaudeville veteran, but additional research placed the mantle on Cross. In North Hollywood on Thursday.