Carol Channing at "The 2002 Tony Awards Party hosted by Jo Anne Worley" where The Julie Harris Award for Lifetime Achievement was presented by Walter Cronkite to Carol Channing.
CNN  — 

Here’s a look at the life of award winning actress and singer Carol Channing. Her most famous stage roles are Lorelei Lee in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” and Dolly Gallagher Levi in “Hello, Dolly!”

Personal:
Birth date: January 31, 1921

Death date: January 15, 2019

Birth place: Seattle, Washington

Birth name: Carol Elaine Channing

Father: George Channing, a newspaper editor

Mother: Adelaide (Glaser) Channing

Marriages: Harry Kullijian (2003-2011, his death); Charles Franklin Lowe (1956-1999, his death); Alexander Carson (1949-1956, divorced); Theodore Naidish (1942-1944, divorced)

Children: with Alexander Carson: Channing Lowe, 1953

Education: Attended Bennington College, 1938-1941

Other Facts:
Was known for her wide eyes, platinum blonde wigs and speaking with a lisp.

Nominated for four Tony Awards and won one. She was also presented with two honorary Tony Awards.

Nominated for one Academy Award.

Nominated for one Grammy Award.

Performed the role of Dolly Levi more than 5,000 times, missing only one performance due to food poisoning.

She said she was proud to be included on President Richard Nixon’s enemies list.

Recovered from uterine cancer diagnosed in the late 1960s.

Timeline:
1941-1946 - Understudy for Eve Arden in “Let’s Face It.”

1948 - Broadway debut in the Marge and Gower Champion production of “Lend an Ear.”

1949 - Opens as the lead, Lorelei Lee, in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” on Broadway.

January 16, 1964 - “Hello, Dolly!” opens on Broadway.

1964 - Channing wins a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical for “Hello, Dolly!”

1968 - Receives a Special Tony Award.

1971 - Named Hasty Pudding Theatricals’ Woman of the Year by Harvard University.

1995 - Receives a Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement.

2002 - Receives the Actors Fund Julie Harris Award for Lifetime Achievement.

2002 - Her book “Just Lucky I Guess: A Memoir of Sorts” is published.

2005 - Co-founds the Dr. Carol Channing & Harry Kullijian Foundation for the Arts (now the American Foundation for Arts Education), with Harry Kullijian.

October 2005 - Opens a new cabaret act in New York City, “The First Eighty Years Are the Hardest.”

September 13, 2007 - Channing’s luggage containing her rhinestone-studded costume from “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” is stolen from the Hollywood Renaissance Hotel in Los Angeles. The dress is worth at least $150,000 and had been promised to the Smithsonian; it is found the next day.

2009 - Releases an album entitled “For Heaven’s Sake.”

2012 - The film ”Carol Channing: Larger Than Life” is released.

January 20 2014 - As part of a year-long 50th anniversary celebration of “Hello Dolly,” Channing makes an appearance at Broadway’s historic Town Hall in New York.

January 15, 2019 - Channing dies of natural causes at the age of 97.