Sept. 5: Songwriter, folk singer, humorist, and actor Loudon Wainwright III is 64 today.

Loudon was born in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He is the father of musicians Rufus Wainwright, Martha Wainwright and Lucy Wainwright Roche, and the former husband of the late folk singer Kate McGarrigle. He is a direct descendant of Peter Stuyvesant, the last Director-General of of what us now known as New York State.

Wainwright's career began in the late 1960s. One of early songs he is remember for is the 1972 novelty song Dead Skunk (in the Middle of the Road). He also played Captain Calvin Spalding (the "singing surgeon") on the American television show, M*A*S*H in its third season during 1974-1975.

Daughter Martha

Wainwright has recorded over twenty albums on eleven different labels. Two of his albums have been nominated for Grammy Awards: I'm Alright (1985) and More Love Songs (1986). Wainwright has also wrote songs for and appeared in a number of films, including small parts in The Aviator, Big Fish, Elizabethtown, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up and the television series, Undeclared and Parks and Recreation.

With his son Rufus

Wainwright has claimed that he was inspired musically by seeing Bob Dylan at the Newport Folk Festival in 1962. He was one of many young folksingers tagged as the "new Dylan" in the early 1970s, a fact that he later satirized in his song, "Talking New Bob Dylan", from History (1992).

With daughter Lucy 

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