Aaron Spelling, the biggest big-shot in the history of television, was born in Dallas to poor immigrant parents on April 22, 1923.
An Ellis Island clerk changed his father’s name from Spurling to Spelling the day the Polish Jew entered the country. The new arrival found a Russian-born mate with the same ethnic roots and moved halfway across the continent to Texas.
Aaron grew up in a small frame house down the street from Fair Park that was not built for a family of six. Reflecting on the poverty of his upbringing, he revealed in a 1996 interview, “I still have nightmares about being in a $6,000 home in Dallas, Texas. “Wall-to-wall people (and) one bathroom. I was the one to go to the local bakery a block away on Saturday to get the day-old stuff.”
