Chubby Checker Fought for Interracial Love with Beauty Queen—They’re Grandparents of 7 after 58 Years Together
Chubby Checker’s music won hearts, but a beautiful queen stole his. After 58 years, they’re still married.
Chubby Checker had 34 hits and impacted the 1960s dance craze. Only he has five albums in the top-12 at the same time. During one of his Dick Clark auditions, they called him Chubby Checker after Fats Domino, and the name stuck. Checker was captivated by a beauty in a polka-dot swimming suit in January 1962 while performing in the Philippines.
She was a real beauty queen. 1962 Miss World Catharina Lodders was Dutch. When he met Loddars, the musician planned marriage. She wooed him. Love bridged their cultures. Race-mixed marriage was still illegal. Earnest Evans (Checker) was born in South Carolina in October 1941. At seven, he relocated to Philadelphia to attend school. His mother made him sing and perform at church.
Chubby, his high school nickname, worked slaughtering chickens and met a music industry friend through his boss. “The Class” was Checker’s 1959 Cameo-Parkway debut. “I got my big break from Mrs. Dick Clark,” Checker stated of his music career. She saw my specialness.”
Checker’s version of Hank Ballard’s “The Twist” topped the Billboard Top 100 in 1960 and again in 1961 after an appearance on the “Ed Sullivan Show” thanks to Dick Clark of “American Bandstand.”