The Captain is one of my very first television memories. I can vaguely remember dream-like snowy images of Howdy Doody and the theme song, although I wonder if I really remember it or I am remembering some later footage of the program. Same for Miss Francis and her Ding Dong Bell and the trip up to Tree Top House. Just blurry fleeting pieces of memories.

But not so for the Captain. I remember him vividly. I remember the theme song and can hum it pretty convincingly, except near the end there...I can't quite get the end. I remember the big coat with the giant pockets (although it wasn't until a few years ago that someone pointed out to me that the big pouch like pockets were like a kangaroos pouch.

Ouf! Call me dim.

I remember fondly the sound of she rattling keys that began the show prior to the beginning of the theme song, although I think he stopped doing it when the show went to color. It probably cost too much to shake the key ring in "living color."

I remember the screwed up cranky assed rabbit who hoarded the carrots and Mr. Moose who made ping pong balls drop on the Captain's head every freaking show. And that sleeping Grandfather clock. Mr. Greenjeans was kind of creepy, and the Captain was some kind of dancing fool wasn't he? I mean when the magic screen went to work, the Captain just danced his pockets off in the studio there.

Come to think of it, I don't think I really enjoyed Captain Kangaroo all that much.

Now don't go all ballistic on me! I didn't hate him or anything, but it just made me uncomfortable to see this grown man make his living talking to puppets. I knew my own father would rather chew glass than talk to puppets, so it made me a little uncomfortable. I did enjoy Tom Terrific though. And hearing the Captains theme, and seeing the old video clips makes me feel kinda warm and fuzzy. But I often grew antsy during the slow paced silly show. Not that I had anything better to watch.

Actually another one of my childhood television habits died this week. Ray Raynor. I enjoyed him a bit more for a couple of reasons. For one thing, compared to the Captain, Ray was a crack head. Maybe he was just an employed schizophrenic. He yelled, he sang show tunes, he was chased around the studio by a duck. He conducted invisible orchestras to piped in music, he marched to Souse, just marched around and around his little craft table (at which he mangled every project attempted) while failing miserably at twirling a baton. He created the Post-It note. Perhaps not in the legal sense, but he wore sticky notes all over his jumpsuit (I have NO idea why he wore the jumpsuit) which had his "to do" notes, and as he completed each one, he pulled it off and dropped it on the floor. When his notes were gone, the show was over. How brilliant was that?

One day when I was far too old to be watching Ray Raynor, he became my hero. I was in High School (!) Our football team had just won the State Championship. SO the entire team and cheer leading squad were invited to appear on the Ray Raynor Show. It was really a big deal. It wasn't like it is now, with 5000 stations and 250 local cable access programs. No, we had Ray in the morning and Bozo at noon. Anything else was news or game show or Virginia Graham (in a class of her own).

So anyway, the team (who already had swollen heads) and the cheerleaders (whose heads were nearly as large as their boobs) were walking around the school like they were REAAAALLLLLLYYYY big deals. Oh yeah, they were headed for television! Yup. Big Ray. So everyone tries to stay home to watch the Ray Raynor Show in the morning (Gosh, I think it was a Friday). And finally. FINALLY! The team is introduced and it really was a big deal, I mean this was amazing to see people I knew on the television, I mean this is WAAAAYYYY before the VCR. So, after making some mandatory chit chat with a few of the guys, Good Ol' Ray decides it would be GREAT fun for them to JOIN him for his daily march.

OH SWEET JESUS SAY AMEN!

So the music starts up, and Ray begins marching...just marching around this little table in a studio barely big enough for the equipment necessary for broadcast, and he is trying to encourage about 20 very reluctant ego busted hulks around along with 10 so-perky-they-don't-get-it airheads who are smiling like the idiots they, pumping their pom poms up and down to the beat as they lift their knees proudly. With each step I swear they heard our howls of laughter and felt our streaming tears of hysteria at their plight. And the very coolest thing was that it wasn't lost on Ray at all. He knew how humiliated they were, and he kept encouraging them and laughing at their discomfort (ok, maybe not but it seemed like it and it made me feel better).

The team and cheer squad arrived back at school later in the day, not the media heroes they'd hoped to be. Apparently the cheerleaders were informed on what they hadn't realized in the bus on the way home. They made a very quiet entrance back into school and pretty much played down the entire event. And for at least that day, they were reduced to humans, like the rest of us.

R.I.P. Ray and Captain.

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