When country music star Mary Chapin Carpenter made raising awareness and support of CARE part of her current concert tour, she joined a line of celebrity backers that dates back to Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and the relief group's founding 50 years ago.
"I think it all comes down to how good an organization is, how solid their work is," said the singer of such hits as "I Feel Lucky" and "Shut Up and Kiss Me." "CARE is utterly nonpartisan. It's not fraught with controversy. It's not anything but an organization that works for the best."Carpenter is donating proceeds from her souvenir tour book to CARE, and the book and her compact disc booklet urge support of the relief and development organization. Her tour sponsor, Starbucks Coffee, has for years been a corporate contributor to CARE.
A CARE celebrity scrapbook would include Whoopi Goldberg, Alec Baldwin, Jamie Lee Curtis and mom Janet Leigh, Woody Allen, Marlon Brando, Ingrid Bergman, Lauren Bacall, Bob Hope, Danny Kaye, Marlene Dietrich, Joan Crawford and Bing Crosby and Douglas Fairbanks.
Fairbanks, who served in the Navy during World War II, returned home with accounts of "just great suffering I saw, over vast territories all through Europe."
The star of film classics such as "Gunga Din" and "The Prisoner of Zenda" met with a friend, New York banker Paul French, to discuss how best to marshal relief to postwar Europe. That helped lead to 22 charity, labor and business groups coming together to form CARE on Nov. 28. 1945.
"How time flies!" said Fairbanks, now 85. "I'm just very proud to have been able to do anything at all. I'm very glad that it all came off."