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Mark Goodson was born in Sacramento, California on January 14, 1915. His parents, Abraham Ellis and Fannie Goodson, were immigrants from Russia that came to America in the early 1900s. As a child, Goodson acted in amateur theater with the Plaza Stock Company. The family later moved to Hayward, California. Goodson attended the University of California, Berkeley. Originally intending to become a lawyer, he financed his education through scholarships and by working at the Lincoln Fish Market. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1937 with a degree in Economics. That year, he began his broadcasting career in San Francisco, working as a di
Mark Goodson was born in Sacramento, California on January 14, 1915. His parents, Abraham Ellis and Fannie Goodson, were immigrants from Russia that came to America in the early 1900s. As a child, Goodson acted in amateur theater with the Plaza Stock Company. The family later moved to Hayward, California. Goodson attended the University of California, Berkeley. Originally intending to become a lawyer, he financed his education through scholarships and by working at the Lincoln Fish Market. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1937 with a degree in Economics. That year, he began his broadcasting career in San Francisco, working as a disc jockey at station KJBS. In 1939 he joined radio station KFRC, where he produced and hosted a radio quiz show called "Pop the Question" in which contestants threw darts at multi-colored balloons that contained dollar amounts, which could be won by answering questions correctly.
In 1941, Goodson married his first wife, Bluma Neveleff, and moved to New York City, where he teamed up with partner Bill Todman. The pair's first radio show, Winner Take All, premiered on CBS Radio in 1946.
Goodson and Todman produced some of the longest-running game shows in US television history. Their first television show, Winner Take All, debuted on CBS television on July 1, 1948. The long list of Goodson-Todman productions includes Beat the Clock, Family Feud, Match Game, Password, Tattletales, The Price Is Right, To Tell the Truth, I've Got a Secret, What's My Line?, and Card Sharks. Because of Goodson's sharp eye for production and presentation, the shows endured through the decades and sometimes over multiple runs.
The company proved itself to be masterful at games, but were not as successful when they tried other fieldsprog of television rams, including the anthology dramas (The Web and The Richard Boone Show), a talk-variety show (The Don Rickles Show), and what was possibly the company's biggest failure, a sitcom titled One Happy Family.
Goodson-Todman Productions were also involved with three westerns: Jefferson Drum (1958–1959), starring Jeff Richards as a newspaper editor in the Old West; The Rebel (1959–1961), starring Nick Adams as an ex-Confederate soldier who traveled to the West after the Civil War; and Branded (1965-1967), starring Chuck Connors as a soldier who had wrongly been given a dishonorable discharge from the Army.
Outside of television production, Goodson and Todman went on to own several newspapers in New England as well as radio station KOL in Seattle, Washington. Bill Todman died in 1979, as a result of a heart conditon, and in the early 1980s the Goodsons acquired the Todman heirs' portion of the company. In 1982 the company was renamed Mark Goodson Productions.
Goodson died of pancreatic cancer on December 18, 1992 in New York City, New York. He is buried at Hillside Memorial Park in Culver City, California, where the inscription on his gravestone is designed to resemble the Goodson-Todman/Mark Goodson Productions logo.
Goodson had two children, Jill and Jonathan (1945–), by his first wife Bluma, and a daughter, Marjorie (who was a prize model on Classic Concentration from July 1987 until it's finale in September 1991), by his second wife Virginia McDavid. In the early 1970s, he married his third wife, Suzanne Waddell, who had once been a guest on What's My Line?. Goodson also had a brother, Marvin (November 6, 1918–July 7, 2007), who was an attorney.
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