Her guests included; The Blackpool Tower Circus, The Four Seasons, Peter Lawford, Peggy Lee, Bob Hope, Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers, Kenneth Horne, Claire Bloom, Ella Fitzgerald and Kathleen Harrison.

I found a beautiful “album” of 45s by her the other week, Jo Stafford Sings American Folk Songs, made up of three singles in a box from the days of the 33 v 45 format wars. The songs are orchestrated by Paul Weston, including a lovely Black Is The Colour. It’s odd to hear things like Barbara Allen in this setting when the Joan Baez set have ingrained them in the public consciousness with acoustic guitar arrangements.

Make Love To Me presumably got banned by the BBC or it might have given Jo a couple of Popular placings!

Her voice was “classy” in the best possible way, and most seductive. She’s my Pre Rock heroine.

Not a bad run, though, and a fine career (esp. 1954′s highly controversial #8 hit “Make Love To Me!”). Rest in peace, bonny lass.

(This now leaves Al Martino, Kay Starr and Eddie Fisher as the principal survivors of the early Popular years, though I think at least some of the Stargazers are still with us)

In 1952 Sinatra was still in the doldrums career-wise; his comeback in From Here To Eternity occurred the following year, and he was signed to Capitol shortly thereafter. Although between “Three Coins” and “Strangers” he did score two number two hits (“Learnin’ The Blues” and “(Love Is) The Tender Trap”) and two number threes (“Love And Marriage” and the “All The Way/Chicago” double A-side), his record success in Britain was primarily in the (then nascent) albums market; indeed, Songs For Swinging Lovers was number one in the first ever UK album chart in 1956, and a string of regular top ten albums followed.

Nat “King” Cole was number three in that first singles chart with “Somewhere Along The Way,” and he was also unlucky in that he had many hits, including three number twos (“Pretend,” “Smile” and “When I Fall In Love”), but none that went all the way, though the latter’s parent album Love Is The Thing was a number one in 1957, and had the charts begun before 1952 he would very likely have been listed for “Too Young” in 1951.

Peggy Lee never seems to have had much British chart success – just two major hit singles, “Mr Wonderful” and “Fever,” both peaking at number five.

So in summary it’s to do with (a) week-by-week quirks of the chart and (b) the fact that the number one slot tended to be dominated by a relatively small cabal of acts; for instance, the number one slot in 1953 was occupied for over half a year (27 weeks out of 52) by one artist – Frankie Laine.