 This is the SF Productions podcast network Why don't you be my neighbor from the pop culture bunker and I'm mark you can check out our audio podcast How I got my wife three comics on itunes or on our website SF podcast network comm We recently visited Pittsburgh and the Heinz History Center. Yes. We went specifically To see yes the original sets and props from mr. Rogers neighborhood They have a lot of other nice exhibits, but that was why we were there Love the show as a child. So did I it went national on PBS when I was four years old So I was in really the first generation of the audience. I Think it it came the year I was in kindergarten Fred Rogers Actually worked for NBC radio Behind the scenes in his early years. So he worked for commercial tell the commercial radio at the time The voice of firestone the hit parade and the Kate Smith hour He was lured back to Pittsburgh, which was his hometown He was actually born in La Trobe about 40 miles away by new station W QED one of the first educational stations He was the puppeteer Composer an organist of the children's hour in 1954 and that was a local local show I'm in Pittsburgh right and most of the regular puppets from mr. Rogers neighborhood made their first appearance there Daniel stripe tiger X the owl King Friday the 13th Henrietta Pussycat Lady Elaine Fairchild were all It all created for that show. I think X the owl or maybe Henrietta Pussycat was my favorite. I like King Friday Of course, of course, I did and During the run he while he was doing the show He also earned a degree in child development and became a Presbyterian minister. Yes, because apparently Public television doesn't pay that well. No, no And in 1963 the CBC the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation Asked him to come to Canada and create a show for them called mr. Rogers all one word all one word Not two Rs in the middle mr. Rogers and this was his first appearance actually as a host Before then he was mostly behind the scenes are doing puppetry So Rogers acquired the rights to the show in 1966 and then returned with his family back to Pittsburgh So he created a show for a regional educational network EEN which was prior to PBS's existence called mr. Rogers neighborhood I didn't know that PBS ever didn't exist. Oh, yes. Oh, yeah Okay, and so this was the puppet segments from the CBC show along with additional material created in Pittsburgh It was actually cancelled in 1967 due to lack of funding But Sears Roebuck stepped in to fund the show for the new National educational television any tea the predecessor to PBS. Okay All right. So the first national show was in February 1968 when I started watching the show PBS replaced any tea and then inherited the show by 1970 it was produced between 1968 and 76 and then sent 1979 to 2001 and what's interesting here is while they were cranking out like about 130 episodes in the first pass between 68 and 76 the second run They only produced a handful of new episodes each year that they added in with the reruns Because the audience was two to five years old. Yeah, so you would you know outgrow them, right? And then pretty quickly and so they could rerun and rerun and rerun and rerun Now I can't believe that anyone watching our show doesn't know this but just in case The opening credits showed what looked like an HO scale town like like an old train layout with various buildings and it pan to Rogers coming into his home taking off his coat for a cardigan taking off his dress shoes for sneakers all while saying hello and Singing to the kids at home. And you know, we saw that set that he came into at the museum and it's so much Smaller. Oh, yeah, then it looked like on TV. Oh, yeah. Well, that's not all TV sets look like that Yeah, but you know as a kid it was like I really thought he was at home Now one of the cardigans he used is actually now in the Smithsonian. We saw it the Smithsonian. Yes At the end of the show he would reverse the whole process again with a song So Rogers spoke directly to the camera and then really to the kids watching the show Yes, you said you really felt like he was talking directly to you I Distinctly remember some things in his in his home in this set. Yes the traffic light the change colors Picture picture the framed picture on the wall that said hi at the beginning The track for the neighborhood trolley Yes, which would take you to the neighborhood of make believe which was the public puppet segment of the show and Mr. McFeely with his speedy delivery So segments also included trips to various local places in the Pittsburgh area like factories stores You know so you could learn about what more about the world. Yes Rogers would sometimes talk about various serious topics and explain to the kids He did a segment that was actually I I don't know who was actually on on video or just I could only find a sound record of it after the 2001 attacks to try to explain to the kids what's going on and That was actually one of the last things he did in terms of that of playing that Character if you can call it a character and So he would use the puppet segments to emphasize his points And he wanted to make sure the kids felt good about themselves, but he never talked down to them. Yes And in the second run he would have a whole week of shows on a single topic. Hmm. So I don't remember that I didn't watch well. Yeah much after I was right. Yeah, this started like 79. Yeah, and so You would have this one week of new shows and then it would be okay And then the rest of it would all be reruns because they were only doing literally like 10 15 20 episodes a season they'd throw in Rogers wrote and produced the show throughout its run he composed 200 songs for the show The show incorporated jazz, which was unique for a kid show to have jazz Couple things here and you can find these on YouTube and I highly recommend you do so Rogers effectively saved public broadcasting in the United States after he appeared in front of a Senate hearing in 1969 and There is this There's this senator that keep going back to at the beginning. He is just like yeah. Yeah, whatever Yeah, what is your deal and all that and by the end, you know, he basically says, you know I think you just got your 20 million. He just he literally changes the senator's mind during this during this this Few minutes you wonder if that could even happen now. No, they wouldn't even be listening to him, you know, right Rogers was inducted into the television Hall of Fame in 1999 Look this up online. Have a tissue ready. Okay. You really do Fred Rogers died in 2003 shortly after acting as Grand Marshal in the Tournament of Roses Parade like like a month later he passed away and In 2007 PBS stopped showing the reruns at the national level So they didn't they stopped syndicating it to all the stations But a lot of stations just continue to play them. Yeah regardless because it there's absolutely still a market now You can say well, it may be a little outdated, especially the older shows apparently at one point in the 80s. They They By the late 80s, they had enough of the second set To have a real set and they dropped the earlier episodes, which by that point were pretty dated because they went back to like 76 Rogers company is still around the Fred Rogers company. It now produces three shows on PBS Dan Daniel Tigers neighborhood an animated show Pagan Cat, which apparently is a math show also animated and Odd Squad, which is a live-action show Mm-hmm. All of these of the course one awards And you can see a lot of this there's a couple places other than just finding it on YouTube or somewhere like that PBS kids org slash Rogers and at Fred Rogers org This is you know, everybody Grows up with a show that it's like the one they watched as a kid a lot of my younger friends Remember Sesame Street with fondness or oh, yeah, absolutely This is definitely my show where I was you know in that my formative years watching and I loved him And I learned a lot I think right and so I urge everyone to go out and look at these links and watch mr Rogers again Yep, or go to the museum right and see the displays right and Meantime you can check out our audio podcast So I got my wife Tweet comics on iTunes or on our website a sub-podcast network From the pop culture bunker and Mickey and I'm Mark. Thanks for watching