I want to be Cornelius Crane Chase

So recently I've been wondering about Chevy Chase, not just the actor, but the name. I've noticed cities and streets named Chevy Chase, so I figured there had to be more to it than just the actor. I've done some research this morning and discovered the meaning of the name. While I was at it, I discovered some interesting facts about the actor. I'd like to share them with you. He's become such a joke and punchline that I feel like we need to sit back and acknowledge some of his finer points. Enjoy.

- Born into a prominent family

- Chase was born in Lower Manhattan , New York City His father, Edward Tinsley "Ned" Chase, was a prominent Manhattan book editor and magazine writer. His mother, Cathalene Parker ( Browning), a concert pianist and was the daughter of Miles Browning who served a critical role at the Battle of Midway in World War II; she was adopted as a child by Cornelius Vanderbilt Crane, and took the name Cathalene Crane. Chase's maternal grandmother was an opera singer who performed several times at Carnegie Hall . Chase is a fourteenth-generation New Yorker, and was listed in the Social Register at an early age. His mother's ancestors arrived in Manhattan starting in 1624. Among his ancestors are New York City mayors Stephanus Van Cortlandt and John Johnstone ; John Morin Scott, General of the New York Militia during the American Revolution; Anne Hutchinson , dissident Puritan preacher and healer ; and Mayflower passenger William Brewster . Chase's paternal grandfather was artist/illustrator Edward Leigh Chase , and his great-uncle was painter/teacher Frank Swift Chase.

- The name Chevy was a nickname bestowed by his grandmother, derived from the medieval English Ballad of Chevy Chase . As a descendant of the Scottish Clan Douglas, the name "Chevy" seemed appropriate to her.

- Chase's parents divorced when he was four; his father remarried into the Folgers coffee family, and his mother was remarried twice. His mother, who later married Juilliard professor and composer Lawrence Widdoes, is buried at the Artists' Cemetery in Woodstock, New York .

- His middle name, Crane, is from his mother's family, He spent childhood vacations at Crane Castle, his mother's family' vacation home in Ipswich, Massachusetts.

- He was valedictorian of his senior class and entered Haverford College , but was expelled (or 'separated') from it after one semester. He then transferred to Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York , where he studied a pre-med curriculum.

- He was suspended from Haverford for leading a cow to the second floor of his dormitory, knowing full well that a cow will go up a staircase willingly, but not down.

- His brother roomed across the hall from Ted Kaczynski "The Unabomber" at Harvard.

- Chase did not enter medical school ; instead he played drums for a time with the college band The Leather Canary, headed by school friends Walter Becker and Donald Fagen. At the time, Chase called the group "a bad jazz band", but Becker and Fagen went on to success after they changed their band's name to Steely Dan.

- Chase is gifted with absolute pitch .

- He played drums and keyboards for a rock band called Chamaeleon Church, which recorded one album for MGM Records before disbanding in 1969.

- Chase was one of the original cast members of Saturday Night Live , NBC's late night sketch television show. Every show he said the most famous words in late night "Live from New York it's Saturday Night ."

- During one of these skits (during the second season) when he was injured on an unpadded podium, which bruised a testicle and forced him to broadcast two of the show's segments live from his hospital bed.

- In a 1975 New York magazine cover story which called him "The funniest man in America", NBC executives referred to Chase as "The first real potential successor to Johnny Carson " and claimed he would begin guest-hosting The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson within six months of the article.

- Chase was the first member of the original SNL cast to leave the show in 1976, and has said that he regretted leaving after just a year-and-a-half. However, Chase was never friendly with most of the cast

- A rivalry with John Belushi went all the way back to their work on the National Lampoon radio show. By the time he left, early in the second season, Chase couldn't even get along with Lorne Michaels , the show's creator and producer.

- Eventually, Chase was replaced by Bill Murray , who got into a legendary backstage brawl with Chase moments before Chase's scheduled 1978 hosting stint on SNL. Witnesses report that Murray initially provoked Chase about his "hated" status on the show, leading Chase to make fun of Murray's bad skin condition (comparing it to the surface of the moon ). Laraine Newman , discussing the incident for authors Tom Shales and James Andrew Miller in their history of the show, Live From New York , said Murray took a shot at Chase's reported marital problems. Newman quoted Murray as saying, "Why don't you f--- your wife once in a while? She needs it." The two men were pulled apart by Dan Aykroyd and Belushi.

- The role of Eric 'Otter' Stratton in National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) was originally written with him in mind, but due to a scheduling conflict, he had to turn the role down. The role went to Tim Matheson instead.

- Chase narrowly escaped death by electrocution during the filming of Modern Problems in 1980. During a sequence in which Chase's character wears 'landing lights' as he dreams that he is an airplane, the current in the lights short-circuited and arced through Chase's arm, back, and neck muscles. The near-death episode caused Chase to experience a period of deep depression, as his marriage to Jacqueline had ended just prior to the start of filming.

- After joking about Cary Grant being gay in a 1980 television interview, the Hollywood legend sued him for slander, but they later settled out of court.

- He appeared alongside Paul Simon, one of his best friends, in Simon's 1986 second video for " You Can Call Me Al ", in which he lip-syncs all of Simon's lyrics.

- Turned down the role of Buzz Lightyear in Toy Story (1995), he didn't want to as he was interested in the project, but his agent greatly advised him against doing the project.

- In 1998, Chase was offered the lead role of Lester Burnham in the Academy Award-winning drama, American Beauty , but he turned it down, fearing that it would tarnish his family-friendly image. The role went on to win Kevin Spacey the Academy Award for Best Actor .

- Chase visited Cuba in the late 1990s. Afterward, self-proclaimed former Cuban intelligence officer Delfin Fernandez said that Chase's room was bugged with both video and audio recording devices.

- In 2003, he appeared in two television commercials for Cola Turka, a soft drink developed to be in direct competition with both Coca-Cola and Pepsi, while keeping the money in the Turkish economy. The commercials, which were both comic and nationalistic in theme, feature Chase playing a confused American who notices his friend and family using Turkish idioms and exhibiting Turkish customs after consuming the drink. The commercials, exclusively shown in Turkey, were filmed in New York in English, but have Turkish subtitles.