When you were a kid, did you have a local after school TV clown?

[ohiosmith]

In central Ohio we had Flippo.



I did Syfert's Potato Chip commercials on his show and as an amateur magician appeared with him at the Ohio State Fair a couple of times.

[qnr]

1. We had Bozo in NYC n/t

[quiet.american]

108. Yep! Good old "Bozo, Bozo the Clown...:") n/t

[rug]

127. Channel 9 came in fuzzy so we watched Officer Joe Bolton on 11.

[JackBeck]

2. I can't remember. But I do remember Captain Kangaroo.

Didn't he have a clown? Clarabelle or something like that?

[cmkramer]

33. No, he played Clarabelle The Clown

I think it was on "The Howdy Doody Show" but I don't know for sure.

[AlCzervik]

3. Bozo on the uhf channel in Boston.

[Radio_Lady]

75. Was that Frank Avruch?

http://www.bostonman.com/

[AlCzervik]

97. not when i was a kid but he was a one time "Bozo" Frank has been a tv personality

in Boston for years, he used to host a classic movie show on Sunday nights, i don't know if he's still around but he always seemed like a classy guy.

[Radio_Lady]

106. I'm also a former "child" star in Miami and lived in Boston when Avruch was active.

I gave you the link to Frank Avruch's current web site.
In case you're interested, here it is again:

http://www.bostonman.com/ He's probably retired by now.

This was my first job in 1957 and 1958. I was First Mate Ellen on WTVJ's (Channel 4) Popeye Playhouse LIVE afternoon show from 5PM to 6PM.

Glumbo Despair was our clown. I have never learned what happened to him.
Skipper Chuck died a year ago on January 4, 2006. He did the show from 1957 to 1979. Thanks for the memories.

[AlCzervik]

115. wow! thats neat.

[Hugin]

4. Nah, we had Captain Billy. 'Till, someone shot him...

in the parking lot. x(

[HuffleClaw]

59. with seltzer?

[Hugin]

80. Nope, with a 38 special.

Here's the story:

BEAVIS AND BUTTHEAD creator Mike Judge remembers watching Looney Toons as a kid.
"There was a show in Albuquerque called Captain Billy," Judge recalls. "He was a local guy and he'd show cartoons and you'd go there for your birthday and he got shot because he was fooling around with someone else's wife. I remember my mom trying to explain it to me. I was asking her, 'Why did he get shot?' And she goes, 'Maybe he was just hugging her to say, "good job," and someone walked in and saw it and shot him.' "

From:

http://www.filmvault.com/filmvault/tw/b/beavisandbuttheaddoamerica_f.html

I, like Mike Judge, remember that day quite clearly.

[1gobluedem]

5. We had Alley Cat and Pansy

Cat and dog puppets. The show was hosted by 'Mr. Mayor.' The puppeteer was also the nightly weatherman and was always drunk, we learned years later when Mr. Mayor became an active Dem in our town and knew our parents.

They also showed cartoons and had various games for the kids in the audience. The prize was always a giant SLOWPOKE sucker. When it was time for the cartoon to run the kids would chant "One, two, three...roll 'em Ferndock!"

No clowns though.

[Smooth Operator]

7. We had Admiral and Swabby

Swabby later became our local Bozo the Clown.

[Pendrench]

6. In Maryland we didn't have a clown - we had Captain Chesapeake on Channel 45

In DC, however, they had Bozo the Clown on Channel 20 (played by the same actor who was Captain 20 and Count Gore Deval).

Tim

[seemunkee]

10. Pick Temple in DC

My wife and brother-in-law always talk about Pick Temple. I think he was a cowboy.

[Pendrench]

16. That may have been before/after my prime afternoon TV watching time (during the 1970s) :)

[seemunkee]

20. That was early 60s

I remember Captain 20 and Gore Deval.

[Pendrench]

24. That explains it...I was born in 1965. n/t

[LisaM]

30. OK, when my boyfriend was little he had a Pick Temple album

called "Pick of the Crop". He still speaks of it with misty eyes, apparently it was the BEST ALBUM EVER MADE.

[cmkramer]

34. How about "Lorenzo The Clown"?

Or was he a syndicated character? I remember him from when I ws in the first grade or so back around 1963. He was like an Emmett Kelly-type sad tramp clown. I remember he had a dance called "The Lorezno Stomp" which was done to "Yakety Sax".

[Pendrench]

41. I looked on-line, and it seems that there was a Lorenzo the Clown/Hobo from Philadelphia, so maybe i...

was syndicated (?)....I think I've seen him (and "The Lorenzo Stomp") before - probably a special or documentary about kid shows - because it does ring a bell.

At first I thought that maybe this was another character that Stu Kerr may have played, but apparently not. Speaking of Stu Kerr, I had the good fortune to meet him once - very nice man. I wish there was some way to see the old "Professor Kools Fun Skool" shows again.

Tim

[Pool Hall Ace]

51. Oh, I remember Lorenzo!

My brother once appeared on Cousin Cupcake's show. I was propped up in front of the TV to watch, but unfortunately I was too little to remember it.

[cmkramer]

69. Oh I remember Professor Kool!

"We love school. We love school
Cos it's lots of fun
Singing, laughing, playing games
Blues are on the run.

"We love school. We love school
Love to ring the bell
For our teacher Professor Kool
Let's give him a great big yell!

YAAAAAHHHH!!!!

[Pendrench]

103. I guess you remember Miss Spiderweb, too? She used to scare the heck out of me! n/t

[smtpgirl]

68. WDCA 20 used to have Sir Graves Ghastly too

I met Sir Graves at Capital Plaza in Landover Hills, MD in 1970

The next best thing

Wonderama with Bill McAllister - WTTG channel 5

links:

http://www.sirgravesghastly.com/

http://www.tvparty.com/lostnywonder.html

[spinbaby]

8. Paul Shannon

Adventure Time. Three Stooges. Tom and Jerry. Nosmo King.

Ah, that brings back the memories.

[kwassa]

9. We had Ranger Andy

[enigmatic]

11. Captain Cleveland and Chester and Captain Penny

Good times...

[Dora]

12. Wallace and Ladmo were on in the a.m.

Ho ho, ha ha, hee hee, ha ha, ho ho, ha ha, hee hee, ha ha.

[Beausoleil]

13. In the Dallas area, we had Icky Twerp

Slam Bang Theatre

[ChickMagic]

47. I remember coming to visit my cousins

just to watch Icky Twerp! He also hosted a Sat. night program called Nightmare that I was too scared to watch without my dad.

In Houston we had Kitterick - a woman in a cat suit that dads really liked too. I'm told I was on her show once, but I would only stand behind her. The story goes that she went nuts and was committed to a mental hospital. And it only recently dawned on me that her name was derivitive of the TV station KTRK.

[Beausoleil]

82. Actually, there is a web site maintained by his son

http://www.ickytwerp.net/

Bill Camfield passed away in 1991.

[ChickMagic]

95. Wow

Thanks for that! :woohoo:

[seemunkee]

14. Captain Jinx and Salty Sam in Peoria

Went on the show with my brothers cub scout den. I got to tell a joke but forgot the punchline.

[Critters2]

29. I remember them. We moved to Kewanee in 70. BUt being a Quad City native

I still watched Captain Ernie. We got channels from both Peoria and the QC's.

[Auggie]

15. In Cleveland there was an elf-like man named Barnaby.

[ohiosmith]

39. I remember him. He claimed that Gene Roddenberry got the idea to give Spock

pointy ears from him.

[Auggie]

64. What in hell was Roddenberry ever doing in Cleveland?

[ohiosmith]

88. He was on either Barnaby's or another local show promoting another project he

was associated with.

[enigmatic]

114. Linn Sheldon

He used to push "Storybook Forest" in Ligonier, PA all the time and I finally got my mom and brothers to take me there; ugh, what a letdown..

http://theimaginaryworld.com/stbfPA.html

But Barnaby was cool; he was a Clevo TV fixture for years...

[SeattleGirl]

17. In Seattle, we had J P Patches and his sidekick, Gertrude

J P is on the right:

[LisaM]

31. About ten years ago they showed a video of JP Patches on KIRO

it must have been about 20 years old even then. They showed him crawling on the floor to a raven-haired Harry Wappler, where he tied his shoelaces together.

I'm not originally from Seattle, but wasn't there also Captain Puget and Wanda Wanda?

[KT2000]

111. LOL - the shoelaces

that was why JP was so funny. He wasn't always pushing the morality stuff- he was about being funny.
Once he played the Harlem Globetrotters and he gave them a basket that was too small for the ball to go through and he used a basket that was huge! He won!
I think it was mostly ad lib with the crew adding their part by letting walls fall down on him etc.

Yes - there was Captain Puget, Wanda Wanda and Stan Boreson.

[catmandu57]

18. WHIZZO, God rest his soul

He was a tootsie roll
but he's a dead clown all the same.
Standard kid show clown and puppets gags and cartoons plus live kid audience.

[Courtesy Flush]

19. We had a cowboy!

http://www.tvacres.com/child_buckskinbill.htm

[PVnRT]

21. Bozo here

n/t

[BOSSHOG]

22. SALLY STAR IN PHILLY

She wasn't a clown but she hosted a TV show with cartoons. I think it was Sally Star's roundup. I got her autographed picture at some event in town in the early 60's. Wow, talk about pancake makeup.

[Patiod]

35. and Pixanne!

Our Gal Sal left a signed picture for me - she visited my hospital room, but I was knocked out from the anesthesia from having my tonsils out!

[redwitch]

44. Sally Starr was sooooo bee u ti ful!

All that glitter on her western wear. Also, there was Happy the Clown. I grew up in Jersey so we had Philly and NY channels.

[GoneOffShore]

107. She always frightened me

And was sooooo condescending towards kids.

Pixanne was just hot. Believe it or not she's still around - she sings standards and has a couple of CD's out, and she's an art collector. Very classy lady. Name of Jane Norman. She splits her time between Florida and Philadelphia.

[jberryhill]

118. She was drunk most of the time...

First I thought she was a little odd, but it wasn't until I became aware of how people acted when drunk that it became apparent that she was pickled most of the time she was on air.

[GoneOffShore]

123. I never realised that

It explains a lot.

Someone sent me a recent picture of Sally Star, Pixanne and Stella - The Man Eater from Manayunk. I'll see if I can find it and post it - if I can figure out how to post pictures here. (Grrrr) :dunce:

[jberryhill]

119. Did you send your pictures...

...to dear old Captain Noah?

Don't delay,
Send right away.

He probably traded child pictures with Al Alberts who had that awful showcase.

Larry Ferrari - what genius decided an hour of organ music was television programming?

[ashling]

23. In Houston Tx we had Kitirik

The stations call letters were KTRK and it was on Channel 13 the station log, as I recall, was a black cat

The kids show was Kitirick's Cartoon Carousel

[Gold Metal Flake]

67. Remember Don Mahoney and Jeana Clair?

And the Kiddie Troopers? I think it was on channel 39.

Edit: I found a pic!

[ashling]

74. Yes

and Channel 2 had Captain Bob

[BikeWriter]

105. I was in love with Kitirik.

[ashling]

126. unrequited love

it wouldn't have worked out anyway LOL

[mtnester]

25. Flippo and Lucy's Toyshop and Captain Kangaroo

and Fritz the Night Owl and Bowling for Dollars and the 50/50 club and the Donahue Show (before he was anyone) and Chiller Theater on Friday Nights and the live broadcasts from the Ohio State Fair and Kukla, Fran and Ollie and Skinny and Fatty (NO one got out of that without crying) and Soupy Sales and then Dark Shadows and then Luke and Laura ...

YES..I went down the slide on Lucy's Toyshop and said my name...OMG that was amazing for a country kid to go to the big city TeeVee studio and do that.

Oh wait, I maybe just showed my progressive age

Reminiscing gets better when you get older.

On Edit for OP - Dale Durthaler

[ohiosmith]

43. Do you remember, I think it was Aunt Fran and Betty? It was a crafts show for little kids.

Betty died of leukemia at a very young age in the early 60s.

[mtnester]

65. No, I don't recall that one

but I want to thank you for this thread....

In closing

Johnny Quest

[InternalDialogue]

26. Denver had Blinky.

I had a birthday on his show once, along with about a million other kids in Denver in the 1970s.

Now he runs an antique store in town.

[fishwax]

46. I remember blinky from being a kid in Montana

they showed him on the CBS affiliate up there too. I didn't know until recently that the show came out of Denver :)

hap
py
birth
aday
to
you (cha cha cha)

Blinky without the makeup:

[InternalDialogue]

49. Oh, man, the way he sang that song.

Immediate giddy, childhood-memory happiness.

[trackfan]

27. We had Hobo Kelly

[begin_within]

48. I loved Hobo Kelly. For years I wasn't sure if Hobo Kelly was a man or woman.

Here's a great 90-second story about her in Real format:

http://www.tvparty.com/kidsounds/hobonews.ram

[Critters2]

28. Not a clown, a steamboat captain--Captain Ernie

I grew up on the Mississippi (Davenport, IA). The after school show was "Captain Ernie's Cartoon Showboat" and took place on the Dixie Belle. Brought to you by Highland Potato chips--"the chippiest chips around". Perhaps the first real trauma in my life came on my 5th birthday. My mom took me and tons of my friends to be on the show. And then I learned the awful truth--THERE WAS NO BOAT! My beloved Dixie Belle was a couple of pieces of painted cardboard! Oh, the humanity!

It did prepare me for the "there is no Santa" event, though. And we got free chips.

[Jeff In Milwaukee]

122. I grew up with Captain Ernie

Ernie Mims was a pretty cool guy -- in broadcasting for years and did damned near everything there was to do at a television station.

When I was in high school and participating in the "High School Bowl" quiz show on WOC, our team momentarily lost its concentration when we saw the old Dixie Belle pilot house stashed in the corner of the set where they were taping the game. It understand its now in the Putnam Museum in Davenport.

[Sequoia]

32. Mr. Doohickey

in Asheville, NC (ancient days of 1961). Don't recall the normal guy, but Doohickey was a proffessor type with a white lab coat, frizzy hair and wire rim glasses. They'd give the on-set children loaves of Sunbeam Bread.

[mitchum]

53. Hey, I was on the Mr Doohickey and Mr Monty Show when I...

was a kid (1965) in Greenville, SC. By that time, the swag included Bunny Bread, a cake from Strossner's Bakery, and a 6 pack of Coke!

[Sequoia]

55. Yes, you are so right. Taped in Greenville.

Mr. Monty. Boo hoo...how simple was the life back then.

[underpants]

36. No no no ohiosmith what was his name-not a clown but he had Capt. Wendy

oh man what was his name??? He gave away a pony one year and I SWEAR I saw my entry envelope on top.

It was out of Cincinnati and it came on before that daytime talk show with Bob _____ which lead into Donahue

I've got to call my brother he'll know

[underpants]

37. UNCLE AL

my brother knew

[NewWaveChick1981]

38. Not a clown, but we had Officer Don, Mr. Pix, and Tubby and Lester

:rofl: Atlanta TV was ripe with quality educational TV for kids in the early 70s... :rofl: Tubby and Lester were cheesy Laurel and Hardy ripoffs, Officer Don was a congenial police officer, and Mr. Pix was a clown without the suit or the funny nose. :rofl:

[evlbstrd]

40. We had Whizzo.

I seem to be drawn into clown threads today.

[puerco-bellies]

42. In L.A. we had Bozo, and Hobo Kelly

Any one remember the "Cram-it clown!"?

[Ghost in the Machine]

45. We had Bozo the Clown in Miami...

Now we just have this Bozo:

[babydollhead]

50. we had a large kid, who had failed 3x

wayne Dauk...as in dick dock cuckoo clock. he smelled like puberty and always had a hardon and we were just in 5th grade.

[Bjornsdotter]

52. Chicago area

We were lucky...

We had Ray Rayner in the morning before school, Bozo at lunch and Andy Star (played by Bob Bell also) after school who would show Three Stooges shorts.



Cheers

[dysfunctional press]

84. don't forget "Cartoon Town" with B.J. and Dirty Dragon...

[carly denise pt deux]

54. according to my school friends...I was the after school clown

Carly

[Dervill Crow]

56. Rusty Nails in Portland

I watched his show from 1958 to 1960. I saw Rusty at Johnson Creek Fred Meyer about a year ago. I had to get close enough to hear his voice and see if it was really him. I ended up buying his book, which is basically about his walk with the Lord, and he autographed it for me. My youngest son, 15 at the time, was squirming because he could not believe his mom would go get a hug from a guy in a clown suit, especially a CHRISTIAN guy in a clown suit, since I tend to run in different "circles."

It was great seeing someone from my childhood, since my whole family is gone. Very nice man.

[Roon]

57. In Denver we had a before school clown...Blinky

[conscious evolution]

58. we had bozo where Igrew up

Also had,in the morning,Romper Room.

Anyone remember'Cram it clown'?

[HuffleClaw]

60. those of us in broadcast range of detroit in the 1970s had

Oopsy the clown. you can't tell from this pic but his outfit was mostly green.




- this was before 'Poltergeist' and 'IT' instilled a deep fear of clowns in me.

[HuffleClaw]

61. ya just HAD to pick the 'john wayne gacy' looking clown ?

brrrrrrrrr. guess i'll be sleeping with the lights on tonight.

[Poiuyt]

62. We had this guy:

[hellbound-liberal]

63. Does Soupy Sales count?

[ohiosmith]

98. reureh!

[Arugula Latte]

66. Flippo? ... *shudder*

:scared:

[ohiosmith]

92. Flippo aka Bob Marvin aka Marvin Fishman was a pretty cool guy.

He and the guy who's show followed his would get a little sauced before air time and sit around telling dirty jokes. They always included me in the joke telling.

The best thing was they never treated me like a kid but rather an equal.

[Arugula Latte]

93. That's good.

He looked a little scary in the photo, is all.

Sorry, Flippo! :hi:

[philosophie_en_rose]

70. Not really. We had Ranger Charlie & Roscoe, though.

:bounce:

[michreject]

71. We had Milky the Clown

in the Detroit area in the 50's. Sponsored by Twin Pines Milk, for home delivery.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

72. Minneapolis

Casey Jones:



Axel and His Dog



Clancy the Cop:

[Eugene]

73. Boston - Willie Whistle on a UHF channel n/t

[Wapsie B]

76. NE Iowa we had Mombo

and the Dr. Max Show

[LouisianaLiberal]

77. In New Orleans, we were lucky. We had Morgus the Magnificent!

How I miss Momus Alexander Morgus and his deformed henchman, Chopsley. Way ahead of its time. Brilliant writing and acting.

(Chopsley you idiot!! was one of Morgus's standard lines as his intricate plans were destroyed at the last minute by the mute Chopsley)




Morgus was said to have descended from a long line of scientists dating back to Morgus the First, who was the architect of the first pyramid in Egypt. He mastered calculus at 5 years of age, and his mother and father (both scientists) sent him to the Vasco Da Gama Medical school (the finest in the Caribbean) where he graduated with honors. He is reported to have an I.Q. "in the 300s".

His assistant Chopsley was a former medical school classmate, and an early experiment in "face transplant" surgery. Unfortunately this left him without a face when he sneezed during the operation. As a result he wears a full head mask at all times (with a zippered mouth to eat through).

Dr. Morgus also has a computer known as E.R.I.C. (The Eon Research Infinity Computer), essentially a human skull connected to a molecular integrated circuit which holds all the knowledge of the universe in his memory banks (thanks to the oversight of the Higher Order - see below), and whose sepulchral voice introduced the segments and frequently agreed with Morgus with a deep, resonant "Yes, Master". E.R.I.C. is also known for his sharp wit, and sometimes cutting remarks at Morgus.

Mrs. Fetish is Morgus' long-time (and long-suffering) landlady, who often forgets that scientific endeavors do not provide rent money on a regular basis. (From Wikipedia)

[Art_from_Ark]

78. KFSA (now KFSM) TV, Ft. Smith, Arkansas had Bozo, I think

KTUL-TV in Tulsa Oklahoma didn't have Bozo as far as I know, but they did have "Mr. Zing and Tuffy", with "Tuffy" being an oversized Tiger (kind of like the "Banana Splits" characters), and his animal pal, Shaggy the Dog.

[u4ic]

79. I have no idea

I would have been outside playing...

I didn't watch a lot of tv as a kid. :hi:

[Heidi]

81. Around Tulsa, we had Uncle Zeb.

It always seemed to me that Uncle Zeb didn't like kids too much. :shrug:
http://tulsatvmemories.com/zeb.html

[Z_I_Peevey]

85. And before him, don't forget Mr. Zing

and his pals Tuffy the Tiger, Shaggy Dog and Beep-Beep the puppet alien.

[Heidi]

87. I don't remember Mr. Zing and pals.

But I do remember one very particular Zoo Day on Uncle Zeb's cartoon camp. :rofl:

"Most vivid Zeb memory was on Zoo Day when a spider monkey climbed atop my hat and peed from there down into my boot and sh*t carrot chunks all at the same time, live, on the air. Mike Denney was directing that show and captured all the action." -- Carl Bartholomew (Uncle Zeb)

[Z_I_Peevey]

89. Well, I'm showing my age.

Mr. Zing was John Chick, now deceased. He was great. He was a friendly zookeeper character who played guitar, sang orginal songs like "Don't Ever Leave the Yard Without Telling Mother," (I can still remember all the lyrics!), and rode a unicycle.

[Heidi]

90. Oh, I remember John Chick!

He was kind of a legend. Remember those muscular dystrophy carnivals that kids could have in their yards to raise money for muscular dystrophy research?

I'm 43 and showing my age, too. Blow a kiss to my home state for me, wouldja? :hi:

[Art_from_Ark]

113. It's Mr. Zing and Tuffy time

So come along with me
Come along and don't be late
We'll all have fun, you'll see
There's Mr. Zing, and Tuffy
And all their friends so great
So come right here with us on Channel 8

Speaking of John Chick, I heard that he was the Indian who did the KTUL sign-off, by the KTUL tower. Do you know anything about that?

[Whoa_Nelly]

120. And in OKC, we had HoHo the Clown, and Foreman Scotty and the Circle 4 Ranch!

HoHo!

Met him several times...a real sweetheart...really loved kids.


http://tulsatvmemories.com/gb072002.html


And Foreman Scotty!

NixoBilly!

http://foremanscottyskids.com/

[GalleryGod]

83. Super Thread! Thanks!

:bounce:

[ohiosmith]

86. my pleasure

[Arugula Latte]

91. Our clown, "Rusty Nails" partially inspired "Krusty the Clown"

Rusty has been working in Portland for decades, and is still working here. My children saw one of his shows not long ago.

Wikipedia:

"The character was partially inspired by real-life clown "Rusty Nails" whom Simpsons creator Matt Groening watched as a child while growing up in Portland, Oregon. In one episode, Bart references this inspiration ("Rusty the Clown? Springfield gets the lamest balloons"). Castellaneta based his voice characterization on Chicago television legend Bob Bell who portrayed WGN-TV's Bozo the Clown from 1960-1984. Krusty, with his 'Krusty Burger' chain, is also a parody of Ronald McDonald, the famous fast-food clown of the McDonald's burger chain. Krusty's off-camera personality, particularly his treatment of his show staff was reportedly modelled after David Letterman by ex-Late Night writers who went on to write for The Simpsons. Homer Simpson himself was in an inspiration for creating Krusty, as said in DVD commentary, "Krusty is pretty much Homer in clown make-up." This is proven in the episode, "Homie the Clown", where Homer becomes a clown and looks nearly identical to Krusty, often being mistaken as him."

[sakabatou]

94. No

We had afterschool room, where we playes board games and watched videos.

[bikebloke]

96. In DC

Bozo and Cousin Cupcake. Both played by Willard Scott.

There was also Captain Tug and Ranger Hal.

[OllieLotte]

99. In LaCrosse, Wisconsin it was Bozo. n/t

[noonwitch]

100. In Grand Rapids, we had Bozo and we had "Captain Woody"

the Captain hosted the 4:00 cartoons on WOOD. Bozo was on Channel 13, and his daughter went to my high school. Poor girl, went through school being called "Bozo's daughter".

[Crabby Appleton]

101. Same - Flippo - Columbus

RIP Flippo

[Lumily]

102. The Old Rebel in Greensboro, NC.

He wasn't really a clown, but he had a local show, called The Old Rebel Show. The show may have had a clown on it, but I don't remember.

[Vidar]

104. We had a Bozo.

[KT2000]

109. J.P. Patches

and he is still around!!

He lived at the City Dump. He also had an ICU2 TV set where he could see the kids who had birthdays!

A most beloved person - to this day.

Too bad they don't still have the local shows for the kids.

[InvisibleTouch]

110. When we first moved to Ohio...

...there was an afterschool show that had "Duffy the Dog" (oddly earless) and Dr. Creep - but I don't remember if there was a clown too.

I met Dr. Creep once at an air show, got his autograph - and my mom threw it away. Argh!

[mondo joe]

112. I recall Bozo in Buffalo, but also Commander Tom.

[July]

125. Hey, Rocketship 7!!

Wasn't that Commander Tom's show? With Promo the Robot (the name I now find hilarious, didn't get it back then)? And wasn't Dave Thomas (aka Dave Roberts, father of David Boreanaz) on that show as some kind of astronaut? Ah, the memories.

[The_Casual_Observer]

116. Engineer Bill & Diver Dan

Red Light/Green Light!

Bozo was in the morning I think.

[Indy_Dem_Defender]

117. Indianapolis had

Cowboy bob's Corral and also Janie.

Janie was a local music teacher who some of my cousins had in school, I guess a whole of lot of her former students thought she was a bitch.

[GenDem]

121. In the Rochester TV market we had "Skipper Sam"

I can't remember if he was a clown or just an old salty dog at the helm of a ships wheel. Popeye was one of the cartoons in heavy rotation.

And there was always some local kid talent -- baton twirling, tap dancing, and the likes.

[wildhorses]

124. fred kirby

Biography
The career of Fred Kirby proves that a performer who finds the right regional basis can sustain a lengthy career and be incredibly influential without leaving town. His accomplishments are a bit like an extremely slow motion version of a winning one-two punch combination. On one hand, there is the early Kirby career as a talented cowboy singer and string band player in the historic days of both the recording and broadcast industry. There are fine Kirby recordings that have been reissued from this period, with and without his Charlotte-based colleagues the Briarhoppers, a long-running string band institution that seems to have involved about a third of the old-time musicians in the state. As a songwriter, his material seems to have an appeal as indestructible as some of the subjects he wrote about, including both divine and atomic power. The latter theme was one of his favorites, resulting in not only the famous song "Atomic Power," but the ominous "When the Hellbomb Falls." His courage, or perhaps his bad taste, in singing about such subjects resulted in renewed attention to his work as the years went on. His songs showed up on the soundtracks to films such as Atomic Café and the PBS documentary Race for the Superbomb, and he even had his songs covered by modern-day punk rowdies such as Jello Biafra and Mojo Nixon, all part of an enormous catalog of recordings of his songs by other artists that are quite often credited incorrectly. One credit he did get would probably be enough to satisfy any country songwriter: not just one, but two cuts on a Little Jimmy Dickens release. By the time Biafra got around to "Atomic Power," Kirby was secure in the second phase of his career, that of an adored Charlotte television personality. Adored by who? Kids. Although his film career in the early days could hardly be said to have taken off with the gallop of his trusty horse, Calico, Kirby took to the small screen and the live audience of children like a tired cowpoke to a pot of steaming chili. For the record, his one film credit was the 1951 Kentucky Jubilee, also featuring fellow Briarhoppers member Claude Casey, but scholars should be advised the cowboy singer tends to get credit for every appearance by any actor named Fred Kirby, of which there are a few, including one with a small part in the ghastly Olivia Newton-John vehicle Xanadu. At any rate, folks who grew up during the '60s, '70s, and '80s in the Southeast, especially in the Carolinas, will no doubt have grown up on Kirby, unless they were barred from the television. He was a major fixture on Charlotte's channels WBT and WBTV, as well as a star on the WLS Barn Dance. As an older man, he spent most of his last years performing as a summer attraction for kids in the Appalachian mountains rather than even consider retiring. In 1998, UNC-TV reminded many viewers of the glory days of kiddie television with a documentary retrospective entitled Stay Tuned Boys & Girls: Kiddy TV Shows of the Past, proudly advertising a cast of "hometown heroes" such as Kirby, the Old Rebel, Joey the Clown, and Uncle Paul. The most unique aspect of these programs was the way in which youngsters could go down to the local station and be on their favorite show, which had to be an absolute thrill for any child.

As an early country performer, Kirby recorded for the best labels, including Bluebird, Columbia, Decca, MGM, and others. For many years, these 78s and 45s were the stuff record collectors butt heads and chins over, a situation rectified by the superb Cattle, which released an excellent Kirby CD. In addition, he shows up on vintage recordings by the Briarhoppers, most of them taken off original radio broadcasts. The Kirby recording repertoire included a smattering of hard-to-find cowboy songs, such as "Where the Longhorn Cattle Roam," "Night Time on the Prairie," and "Get Along Old Paint, and the superb but much less well-known answer to "Home on the Range," simply entitled "Home." His talents as a writer of country, patriotic, and gospel songs fill out the balance of his song material, including "Hang Your Head in Shame," "Heartaches and Flowers," "When That Love Bug Bites You," and "The Old Country Preacher." His country songwriting and kiddie shows seem to have truly worked hand in hand, at least in terms of knocking out influential musicians of the future. The Charlotte media payed several large tributes to Kirby following his death in 1996, but not surprisingly, the man had created his own best epitaph in a song title: "I'm Sorry, That's All I Can Say." ~ Eugene Chadbourne, All Music Guide