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how many fathers are consumed with the desire for their sons to excel at sports, whether the boys are physically equipped for it or not? It is difficult to imagine life before the dissemination of such ‘‘ideal’’ images was technologically possible, but in the great scheme of things, it was not all that long ago that photography was invented, or that improved printing technologies made possible the distribution of photographic images to an enormous audience. It was not so long ago that the phonograph allowed people to spend less time person- ally playing musical instruments or singing to one another and instead become fans of other people who could sing or play better. Not so long ago, sports began to change from mere games to big business, while radio came along and allowed huge audiences to simultaneously hear music or enjoy other forms of entertainment. Con- sider how relatively recent an innovation is the motion picture, and try to imagine how exciting its novelty must have been for people in the movies’ formative years. Today’s students even must rely on their imagination to picture life without televi- sion, but some of their older professors can remember it well. When today’s stu- dents age a while and have children of their own, these offspring in turn will have to imagine life before the Internet and the changes this newer medium has wrought. Without pictures, still or moving, celebrity culture could not have burgeoned, but the two biggest factors in its growth unquestionably have been movies and tele- vision. The movie star is and has been, like his or her image on the theater screen, larger than life. The movie star rather quickly replaced the wealthy, aristocratic, and fashionable with a new kind of celebrity hero and heroine. For many Ameri- cans, the major movie star became the very pinnacle of celebrity, someone to be looked up to just as when we sit back in our theater seat and literally look up at the large, elevated screen. Boys and adult males wanted to be like the suave leading men, the urban tough guys, or the Western heroes who could shoot the gun out of the outlaw’s hand, then ride off into the sunset, ready for the next adventure. Girls and women wanted to look as seductively glamorous as the goddesses of the big screen. Then, in the 1950s, for most Americans, came television, with its dramas, Westerns, variety shows, and sitcoms. Again, most fans secretly wanted to be like those people on the screen, but there was a difference. The new television celebri- ties did not evoke quite the same level of awe as did the big-screen movie stars, but instead they were people with whom we were more likely to form imaginary bonds of ‘‘friendship’’ or ‘‘intimacy.’’ The friendship and intimacy were specious, of course, but they seemed real enough if not thought about in a rational manner and we were glad to feel, not think. This was true when television was a new medium, and it is probably even more true today. Rock-and-roll pioneer Jerry Lee Lewis sang in the 1950s about a ‘‘whole lot of shakin’ going on,’’ but at a deeper level, there was a whole lot of feelin’ going on. Thinking simply wasn’t, and isn’t, as easy or as much fun as feeling, and our preference for feeling various emotions is per- fectly catered to by movies, television, and, intermingled with both those media, popular music in its many forms. If anything, music is likely the most personal me- dium of them all. And as if these offerings were not enough, sports developed as another highly organized, profitable kind of public entertainment that also could be celebrated on the movie screen and brought to us regularly by television, radio, and xvi | Introduction