best to break the relationship up with a series of publicity-created "ruse romances" involving Columbo and actresses such as Greta Garbo and Pola Negri; it succeeded. (Dorothy Dell died in an auto accident in June 1934--just months before Columbo's own fatal accident.)

The type of singing that was popularized by the likes of Columbo, Rudy Vallee, and Bing Crosby is called crooning.