Samuel "Frenchie" Marx (born Simon Marx) was the husband of Minnie Marx, and father of the Marx Brothers.

He met Minnie in New York where he was working as a dance teacher. They married in 1884 and had 6 sons. Their first son, Manfred, born 1885, died in infancy.

Sam became a tailor, although not a very good one. He was a talented cook, often convincing the landlord to delay their rent paytime with a good meal. In his show An Evening With Groucho, Groucho reminisces about Sam Marx:

"My father was a tailor, and a very bad one, and Chico was always short of money, and he used to hock my fathers shears, so whenever my father made a suit, of course it didn't fit, and the shears would be hanging up in the pawnshop on Ninety-first Street." —Groucho Marx

In his last interview, Zeppo also told:

"My father was a very bad tailor but he found some people who were so stupid that they would buy his clothes, and so he'd make a few dollars that way for food." —Zeppo Marx

Sam Marx did a cameo appearance in his four sons' film Monkey Business (1931), sitting on top of luggage behind the brothers on the pier as they wave to the First Officer, the boys having slipped off the ship without being arrested as stowaways.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Marx

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0555675/