• How Bob Newhart’s smash 1960 comedy album launched his career

    How Bob Newhart’s smash 1960 comedy album launched his career

    In early 1960, a 30-year-old unknown comedian with no stand-up experience walked onto the stage of a Houston nightclub to record an album. On Aug. 1, “The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart” reached  No. 1 on the Billboard charts, the first-ever comedy album to do so, launching Newhart’s storied 60-year career, including the iconic CBS …