Norbert Pearlroth
Encyclopedia
Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Ripley's Believe It or Not! is a franchise, founded by Robert Ripley, which deals in bizarre events and items so strange and unusual that readers might question the claims...
cartoon panel from 1923 until 1975.
Pearlroth attended university in Kraków
Kraków
Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
, Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
, planning to become a lawyer, but events of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
took him away from his studies. He came to America in 1920. Working in a New York bank in 1923, he learned from a friend that Robert L. Ripley
Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Ripley's Believe It or Not! is a franchise, founded by Robert Ripley, which deals in bizarre events and items so strange and unusual that readers might question the claims...
was looking for a linguist. Ripley needed someone capable of researching foreign newspapers to locate material for his syndicated Believe It or Not!
Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Ripley's Believe It or Not! is a franchise, founded by Robert Ripley, which deals in bizarre events and items so strange and unusual that readers might question the claims...
panel.
Since Pearlroth knew 11 languages, he was hired to do Ripley's research and soon began doing the picture research as well. He usually worked ten hours a day, six days a week in the New York Public Library
New York Public Library
The New York Public Library is the largest public library in North America and is one of the United States' most significant research libraries...
's Main Reading Room. The library estimated that Pearlroth examined some 7,000 books every year, meaning that he researched in more than 350,000 books during decades of work on Believe It or Not!.
Married for more than half a century, Pearlroth and his wife lived in Brooklyn at Newkirk Avenue and East 16th Street. For 52 years, he took the subway into Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
in the morning and worked at his office until noon, answering some of the 3000 letters that arrived each week from readers all over the world. Instead of having lunch, he then went to the library where he worked through the afternoon and evening, taking half an hour for dinner. When the library closed at 10pm, he headed back to Brooklyn. He sometimes worked on Sundays if he fell behind in locating what he called "believe-it-or-nots." His deadline was on Friday, and he always worked several weeks in advance.
By the 1940s, Pearlroth and Ripley had some 80 million readers worldwide. During the first 26 years, Pearlroth simply gave Ripley whatever his research had turned up. After Ripley's death on May 27, 1949, King Features Syndicate
King Features Syndicate
King Features Syndicate, a print syndication company owned by The Hearst Corporation, distributes about 150 comic strips, newspaper columns, editorial cartoons, puzzles and games to nearly 5000 newspapers worldwide...
took over Believe It or Not!, and Pearlroth continued for the next 26 years to work for syndicate editors, who required him to submit exactly 24 items each week. Pearlroth usually worked anonymously, but on Ripley's Believe It or Not! 50th Anniversary Edition (Pocket Books, 1968), he is credited as "Research Director."
For 25 years, Pearlroth also wrote a weekly column, "Your Name," about the origins of Jewish surnames, for the Jewish Post of New York
Jewish Post of New York
The Jewish Post of New York is an independent American newspaper.The National Jewish Post and Opinion was established in Indianapolis in 1933 by Gabriel Murrel Cohen. The Jewish Post of New York traces its origins as an independent publication to 1974 when the New York edition became a separate...
. His son Arthur Pearlroth was the Economic Development Counsel for the South Bronx Development Office.
Although Norbert Pearlroth never missed a deadline, King Features replaced him in 1975. As a freelancer, he received no pension or royalties from the many collections and reprints that sold in the millions, but Ripley did give him a bequest of $5,000 and pay for Pearlroth's son's schooling.
He died in 1983 of heart and kidney diseases at Maimonides Hospital in Brooklyn.