December 5, 1964 – Lorne Greene Hits #1 with “Ringo” On this day in music history, Lorne Greene — best known as the steady, dignified patriarch Ben Cartwright on NBC’s hit western Bonanza — rode straight to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 with a most unlikely chart-topper. His spoken-word narrative “Ringo” became the number one song in America, making Greene only the second Canadian solo artist (after Paul Anka) to reach the top of the U.S. pop charts. The song told the moody, dramatic tale of

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