Last Tonight Show with Johnny Carson ► A Day In History
Dateline May 22, 1992 – Johnny Carson made his final appearance as host of the Tonight Show after nearly 5,000 shows. Here’s how that show opened:


Johnny Carson gave so many comedians their start.  A case in point: Ellen Degeneres:


Carson started in magic and particularly loved magicians. Here is The Great Flydini:


Few people realize that Michael Caine got his start doing stand up for Johnny Carson:


In 1982 Eddie Murphy jokes about the first Black president:


You’d never know who or what you would see on the Carson show:


And that included Tiny Tim:


Johnny Carson’s last television’s appearance was a cameo:

It hardly seems like 20 years since he’s been gone from the air. There has never been another one like him and there never will be.

About Headly Westerfield

Calling himself “A liberally progressive, sarcastically cynical, iconoclastic polymath,” Headly Westerfield has been a professional writer all his adult life.