He was a strange man. There is really no other way to put it. Herbert Buckingham Khaury, known to the world as Tiny Tim, was a high-pitched, ukelele-strumming anomaly who seemed to have fallen out of a different century. He wore pancake makeup, carried his instrument in a shopping bag, and sang 1920s show tunes in a vibrato that could shatter glass. But despite his eccentricities—or maybe because of them—the question of who did Tiny Tim marry became one of the biggest cultural flashpoints of the 1960s.
It wasn’t just a wedding. It was a televised fever dream.
On December 17, 1969, over 45 million people tuned in to The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. To put that in perspective, that’s more people than watched the first moon landing earlier that same year. They weren't there for political commentary or slapstick comedy. They were there to see a middle-aged, eccentric icon tie the knot with a teenager he called "Miss Vicki."
The Girl in the Department Store: Who was Miss Vicki?
Her real name was Victoria Budinger. She was just 17 years old when she met Tiny Tim at a department store book signing in New Jersey. Tiny Tim was 37. By today’s standards, the age gap and the power dynamic feel deeply uncomfortable, but in the hazy, experimental twilight of the 1960s, the public viewed it as a fairytale between two social outcasts.
Tiny Tim didn't date like a normal person. He didn't do anything like a normal person. He lived in a world of chivalry and extreme religious devotion. He called her "Miss Vicki" because he believed in a formal, almost Victorian level of respect for women. He once famously said he didn't even want to see her without her makeup on until they were married. He was obsessed with purity, hygiene, and a specific brand of old-world romance that felt totally alien to the "Summer of Love" generation.
They got engaged very quickly. Johnny Carson, seeing a golden opportunity for ratings, offered to host the wedding on his show. Tiny Tim agreed. It was a match made in television heaven, even if the marriage itself was destined for something much more complicated.
The Night Television Stood Still
If you look back at the footage, the set of The Tonight Show was transformed. It was covered in thousands of tulips—Tiny Tim's favorite flower, immortalized in his hit "Tiptoe Through the Tulips." The air was thick with the scent of flowers and the nervous energy of a live broadcast.
Tiny Tim wore a suit that looked like it belonged on a silent film star. Miss Vicki wore a traditional white gown, looking remarkably young and perhaps a bit overwhelmed by the bright studio lights.
The ceremony was conducted by a minister, and it was entirely legal and binding. There was no irony in Tiny Tim’s eyes. He wasn't playing a character that night. He was a man deeply, perhaps obsessively, in love with the idea of being a husband. He sipped honey and water from a cup. He beamed.
When people ask who did Tiny Tim marry, they are usually looking for the name Victoria Budinger, but what they’re really asking about is the spectacle. That night remains one of the highest-rated episodes in the history of late-night television. It was the peak of "Event TV" before the term even existed.
Life After the Tulips: A Marriage in Trouble
Reality is a cold shower. After the cameras stopped rolling and the tulips wilted, the couple moved into a world that wasn't designed for Tiny Tim’s eccentricities. They had a daughter, Tulip Victoria, born in 1971. But the domestic bliss was short-lived.
Tiny Tim was a difficult person to live with. He had intense phobias about germs. He would spend hours in the bathroom cleaning himself. He had a diet that was restricted and bizarre. More than that, he was a perpetual performer. He didn't know how to "turn off" the Tiny Tim persona, which made intimacy and normal household life nearly impossible for a young woman like Victoria.
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By 1972, they were living apart.
Victoria eventually moved back to New Jersey. She tried to live a private life, though the shadow of the "Miss Vicki" persona followed her for decades. They finally divorced in 1977. It wasn't a bitter, tabloid-fueled war, but rather a slow fading out of two people who never really belonged in the same reality. Victoria later remarried and tried to distance herself from the ukelele-playing ghost of her past.
The Second and Third Acts: Jan and Sue
Most people stop the story at Miss Vicki. They assume that was the end of Tiny Tim’s romantic life. It wasn't. The man was a romantic at heart, even if his version of romance was eccentric.
In 1984, Tiny Tim married Jan Alweiss. Jan was a fan, someone who understood his quirks better than the teenage Vicki ever could. They stayed married for about a decade, though their living arrangements were often unconventional. Tiny Tim often lived in hotels or separate apartments. He needed his space to maintain his rituals and his "purity." They divorced in 1995, but they remained on relatively good terms.
Then came the final chapter.
In 1995, he married Susan Marie Gardner, a fan who had followed his career for years. He called her "Miss Sue." She was with him until the very end. On November 30, 1996, while performing at a gala in Minneapolis, Tiny Tim suffered a massive heart attack. He died with Miss Sue by his side.
A Quick Look at the Three Wives
- Victoria Budinger (Miss Vicki): Married 1969, divorced 1977. The "Tonight Show" bride. Mother of his only child, Tulip.
- Jan Alweiss (Miss Jan): Married 1984, divorced 1995. A more private relationship during his "comeback" years in the 80s.
- Susan Marie Gardner (Miss Sue): Married 1995 until his death in 1996. She was a devoted supporter of his legacy.
Why We Are Still Obsessed
Tiny Tim was a Rorschach test for the American public. To some, he was a freak show. To others, he was a brilliant performance artist who stayed in character for 40 years. To his wives, he was likely a mix of both—a kind, gentle soul trapped in a psyche that couldn't handle the mundane details of a 9-to-5 world.
When we look at who did Tiny Tim marry, we see a man trying to find a tether to the real world. He used marriage as a way to ground himself, even if his personal habits made that ground very shaky.
He didn't care about being cool. He didn't care about being modern. He just wanted to sing his songs and find someone who would call him "Herbert" behind closed doors.
Moving Beyond the Ukelele
If you're researching Tiny Tim today, don't just stop at the YouTube clips of him singing in a falsetto. To truly understand the man behind the weddings, you have to look at his encyclopedic knowledge of American music. He was a walking archive of the Tin Pan Alley era.
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If you want to dive deeper into his life, here is what you should do:
- Listen to his debut album, God Bless Tiny Tim. It’s not just a joke record. The production by Richard Perry is lush, and it shows the range of his actual voice, which was a rich baritone when he wasn't doing the "falsetto" bit.
- Watch the 2020 documentary Tiny Tim: King for a Day. It uses his personal diaries (voiced by Weird Al Yankovic) to show the darker, more tragic side of his fame and his marriages.
- Research his performance at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival. He performed for 600,000 hippies and turned them into fans. It’s perhaps the greatest example of his raw power as an entertainer.
Tiny Tim wasn't a joke. He was a man who lived his truth at a time when that was a very dangerous thing to do. His marriages were public, strange, and often misunderstood, but they were a vital part of a life lived entirely in the spotlight.
To understand Tiny Tim, you have to accept the contradictions. He was a devout conservative who looked like a drag queen. He was a virgin until his late 30s who became a sex symbol for a very specific, very confused segment of the population. And he was a man who, despite everything, just wanted someone to tiptoe through the tulips with him.
The best way to honor his memory is to recognize that he was a serious artist who happened to be wrapped in a very peculiar package. Whether it was Miss Vicki, Miss Jan, or Miss Sue, each woman saw a side of Herbert Khaury that the rest of the world, distracted by the makeup and the ukelele, completely missed.
Start by listening to his rendition of "I Got You Babe" where he sings both the male and female parts. It tells you everything you need to know about his duality.