Frankie Avalon and Dick Clark
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After years of glamorous teen rebels, making teen idols was one of the ideas behind the celebrity machine that Chancellor Records created in the late fifties. Two of the chosen boys - Frankie Avalon and Fabian -were white, Italian, likable, easy going teens from the same South Philadelphia neighborhood. Avalon was Chancellor's first success. His initial releases in 1957, "Cupid" and "Teacher's Pet," were bombs. His third release "DeDe Dinah" (1958), an innocuous ditty that even Avalon had no feel for, sold a million copies, and was the first of six top ten hits. Avalon soon left Philadelphia