Dean Martin was born Dino Paul Crocetti to Italian-American parents in the town of Steubenville, Ohio in 1917. His first language was Italian and didn’t learn how to speak English until the age of five.

He dropped out of school at age 15 to become a boxer under the name “Kid Crochet.” At the same time, he began to work with local bands, calling himself “Dino Martini” after the Metropolitan Opera tenor Nino Martini. In the early 1940s, he began to sing for bandleader Sammy Watkins, who later asked Dino to change his name to “Dean Martin”. He worked for various bands in the early 1940s, while also performing in various nightclubs.

Martin formed a friendship with Jerry Lewis and the act of Martin and Lewis eventually became an iconic comedy duo, and both eventually signed a deal with Paramount Pictures in 1949, for a radio show. The duo performed in many Hollywood films, but Martin and Lewis’s act eventually broke up in 1956, 10 years to the day of the first teaming.
Martin found some success as a Hollywood actor while keeping up his singing career at the same time. Martin, along with other famous singers, such as Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr., formed the The Rat Pack, performed together while also appearing in movies, most famously Ocean’s 11.
He later hosted many television shows, such as The Dean Martin Show, and The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast.

Martin continued his career for some years and was married 3 times to 3 separate women. He was a heavy smoker, was diagnosed with lung cancer at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in September 1993, and died at the age of 78 in 1995 from acute respiratory failure resulting from emphysema.