Big Names Turn Out to Toast Ebby Halliday
Pardon me for taking more than 24 hours to write about this event, but it took me that long to recover from my first Tony Orlando experience.
The Branson fixture was the headliner at Wednesday evening’s Roast & Toast to Ebby Halliday, the latest in a series of soirees marking the real estate icon’s 100th birthday. The black-tie affair, held at the Hilton Anatole and benefiting the Foundation Fighting Blindness, also featured the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, who raised eyebrows by thrusting and grooving to AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck.”
Preston Hollow residents who spoke in person included master of ceremonies Ron Chapman, Tom Leppert, Roger Staubach (who referred to the outgoing mayor as “Senator Leppert”), Ross Perot, and T. Boone Pickens. Offering Ebby their congratulations via video were neighbors Mark Cuban, Dirk Nowitzki, and Shawn Marion.
Footage of those Mavericks luminaries was interspersed with a video of Warren Buffett, who jokingly asked if Ebby was into younger men. The 80-year-old investor advised her that, if she was interested, “Boone and Roger have my number.” He then picked up a ukulele and led the crowd in a rendition of “Happy Birthday.”
Ebby is a ukulele enthusiast, so I guess I shouldn’t have been shocked when the Dallas Ukulele Headquarters took the stage. Anybody remember when Eric Nicholson wrote about them in Preston Hollow People back in ’09?
