"On November 5th, 1956, ""The Nat King Cole Show"" debuted on television. Nat King Cole started his career as a jazz pianist in the late 1930s, when he formed his own jazz group, The King Cole Trio, which was the top-selling group (and only black act) on Capitol Records in the 1940s. Starting in 1950, Cole decided to become a solo singer, and faced intense racial discrimination throughout his career. In 1956 and 1957, Cole hosted his own variety series, ""The Nat King Cole Show"", which became the first nationally broadcast television show hosted by an African-American.
FUN FACT: Nat King Cole's Christmas album was the best-selling Christmas album of the 1960s, and featured the hit, ""The Christmas Song"". In 2022, ""The Christmas Song"" by Cole broke the record for longest journey to the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100, when it peaked at number nine nearly 62 years after it debuted on the chart. "
