Cal Worthington

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Calvin Coolidge Worthington (November 27, 1920 – September 8, 2013) was an American car dealer, best known in Southern California and other locations along the West Coast of the United States for his offbeat radio and television advertisements for his Worthington Dealership Group, a car dealership chain that covered the western and southwestern U.S. at its peak, and later for his minor appearances and parodies in a number of movies.

Worthington first rose to fame for his unique radio and television advertisements for the dealership group, most of which began with the announcement "Here's Cal Worthington and his dog Spot!", though "Spot" was never a dog. Instead, Spot would be, for instance, a tiger, a seal, an elephant, a chimpanzee, or a bear. In one ad, "Spot" was a hippopotamus, which Worthington rode in the commercial. On some occasions, "Spot" was a vehicle, such as an airplane on whose wings Worthington would be seen standing while airborne. While "Spot" was officially retired in the mid-1980s, he was mentioned occasionally in later commercials.

According to a profile published in The Sacramento Bee in 1990, Worthington grossed $316.8 million in 1988, making him at the time the largest single owner of a car dealership chain. His advertising agency, named Spot Advertising, had Worthington as its only client and spent $15 million on commercials, the most of any auto dealer at the time. He sold automobiles from 1945 until his death and owned a 24,000-acre (9,700 ha; 38 sq mi) ranch located in Orland, California, north of Sacramento.