Sonny Tufts

Who was Sonny Tufts?

Sonny Tufts was a United States film actor.

Tufts was born into a prominent banking family, whose patriarch had supposedly sailed to America from England in 1638. He broke with the family banking tradition by studying opera at Yale, where he was a member of Skull and Bones. After graduating from college in 1935, he auditioned with the Metropolitan Opera in New York but eventually worked on the Broadway stage. In 1942, Tufts went to Hollywood. He attained some fame during World War II, principally because, due to an old college football injury, he was one of the few handsome male actors not serving overseas in the war. In 1944 he was voted the number one "Star of Tomorrow" by exhibitors.

He was married to Spanish dancer Barbara Dare from 1938 to 1953, and a relative of Charles Tufts, for whom Tufts University is named.

Tufts was a brother of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity.

In a non sequitur on the cartoon show Rocky and His Friends, in the Jet Fuel Formula story arc, Bullwinkle J. Moose becomes very upset when Boris Badenov steals his autographed picture of Sonny Tufts. Also, Tufts is mentioned in the last sentence of the third sketch of the 48th show of the second season of the Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, which was first aired on May 13, 1961.