AUBURN, Maine — Vaughn Meader, who gained instant fame satirizing the presidency of John F. Kennedy in the multimillion-selling album “The First Family,” only to have his star plummet when the president was assassinated, died Friday.
He was 68.
Meader, who had battled by chronic emphysema and other ailments, died at his home in this central Maine city after refusing to be taken to the hospital, his wife, Sheila, said.
When it came out in late 1962, poking gentle fun at JFK’s wealth, large family and “vigah,” “The First Family” became the fastest-selling record of its time, racking up 7.5 million copies and winning the Grammy for album of the year.
Compared with today’s bare-knuckled political humor, the satire was tame, but it tickled the funnybone of the Kennedy-obsessed public.
The Maine native, recruited to play the president on the album after he began throwing Kennedy impressions into his musical act, had to tweak his own New England accent only slightly to sound just like the Massachusetts-bred president.
“I couldn’t believe what it meant to people,” Meader said in an Associated Press interview last year.
“I was just doing my act. I’m a singer and piano player. I just stumbled onto a voice.”
Picked by Mr. 50s.