Has THIS been a bad week! RIP...

[Rudy]

Here's a list of recent deaths. In the past couple of days, we've lost:

1. Arranger, composer and bandleader Billy May (1/22);

2. Renowned fashion/glamour photographer Helmut Newton (1/23);

3. Trombonist Milt Bernhart (1/22);

4. Bob Keeshan (Capt. Kangaroo) (1/23);

5. Ray Rayner (Chicago-area TV personality) (1/22).

And we thought 2003 was bad...

 

[Dave]

Here's a list of recent deaths. In the past couple of days, we've lost:

1. Arranger, composer and bandleader Billy May (1/22);

2. Renowned fashion/glamour photographer Helmut Newton (1/23);

3. Trombonist Milt Bernhart (1/22);

4. Bob Sheehan (Capt. Kangaroo) (1/23);

5. Ray Rayner (Chicago-area TV personality) (1/22).

And we thought 2003 was bad...

Well, it seems funny how we've had FIVE deaths in the same month. And the year is just starting, too. I bet before January has ended, there may be at least one more...

Dave

 

[W.B.]

Here's a list of recent deaths. In the past couple of days, we've lost:

1. Arranger, composer and bandleader Billy May (1/22);

2. Renowned fashion/glamour photographer Helmut Newton (1/23);

3. Trombonist Milt Bernhart (1/22);

4. Bob Sheehan (Capt. Kangaroo) (1/23);

5. Ray Rayner (Chicago-area TV personality) (1/22).

And we thought 2003 was bad...

And let's not forget actress/singer/dancer Ann Miller (1/22) . . .

 

[bob knack]

I had the pleasure of working with Ray Rayner during the seventies. He was one of the nicest men you'd ever want to meet. For those who saw him on TV, he was just the same in person. In his spare time, he would take the lead in plays like "Fiddler on the Roof" and "The Music Man". He was the last of my childhood heroes from WGN...Bob Bell (Bozo), Ned Locke (Ringmaster Ned), Roy Brown(Cookie), and Frazier Thomas. Even Lloyd Pettit, the best hockey announcer ever, died last year.

As for Milt Bernhart, I read once that he made only thirty-five dollars for that famous bone solo on the 1956 Sinatra gig, "I've Got You Under My Skin". He also played the famous lead, I believe, on Kenton's "Peanut Vendor".

PS: It's Bob Keeshan

 

[DAN BOLTON]

I had the pleasure of working with Ray Rayner during the seventies. He was one of the nicest men you'd ever want to meet. For those who saw him on TV, he was just the same in person. In his spare time, he would take the lead in plays like "Fiddler on the Roof" and "The Music Man". He was the last of my childhood heroes from WGN...Bob Bell (Bozo), Ned Locke (Ringmaster Ned), Roy Brown(Cookie), and Frazier Thomas. Even Lloyd Pettit, the best hockey announcer ever, died last year.

As for Milt Bernhart, I read once that he made only thirty-five dollars for that famous bone solo on the 1956 Sinatra gig, "I've Got You Under My Skin". He also played the famous lead, I believe, on Kenton's "Peanut Vendor".

PS: It's Bob Keeshan

Bob, my aunt lives in Chicago; and when I was a kid, we'd go to visit a lot...I remember Frazier Thomas and Bozo very well. I wonder if you remember a guy named Bill Jackson, who had a show called CLOWN ALLEY...he had the Mickey Mouse Club in Indianapolis before going to Chicago. He was an artist extrordinare, and a puppet master, with The Four Thumptwangers and Fergy and Morty the Martian Twins...the time would have been mid '60's...I only saw him once in Chicago, and wonder whatever became of him...

Dan, remembering his childhood...

 

[andywithaz]

I grew up watching reruns of Captain Kangaroo so his death made me very sad. I was also saddened by the death of Shari Lewis and Lambchop

 

[Captain Bacardi]

Bob Bell (Bozo), Ned Locke (Ringmaster Ned), Roy Brown(Cookie), and Frazier Thomas. Even Lloyd Pettit, the best hockey announcer ever, died last year.

I didn't know about Pettit. He was the voice of the Blackhawks when I was growing up. And Frazier Thomas - I watched his show Garfield Goose & Friends all the time growing up. Is he gone as well? He also hosted Family Classics, which was sort of a Sunday movie of the week on WGN. That was another staple for my family back then. Damn I'm gettin' old...



Capt. Bacardi

 

[LPJim]

As if that wasn't enough, don't forget ex-'Tonight Show' host Jack Paar.
JB

 

[Captain Bacardi]

As if that wasn't enough, don't forget ex-'Tonight Show' host Jack Paar.
JB

Yup, I posted that in FAO when he died.


Capt. Bacardi

 

[LPJim]

Another one to add to the list:
Mary Ellis-Bunum, creator and producer of reality TV shows like MTV's "Real World" and Fox's "Simple Life." She died of breast cancer at age 57.
JB

 

[bob knack]

You are talking about Bill Jackson of "BJ and Dirty Dragon Fame". My ex-wife was one of the producers on that program as was another great talent at 'GN, Allen Hall. It started on channel 32, now Fox, and came over to WGN.

As I recall, it turned out to have such high production values that it got to be a little bit much to handle. I don't know what became of him, but the Museum of Broadcast Communications in Chicago has a web site you might look at. BJ's puppets appeared at the now re-locating museum.

Another great local talent, Roy Leonard, replaced Frazier on Family Classics.

Yes, Pettit was the greatest. I have some tapes somewhere of his calls of those great Hawk teams from the sixties with Hull and Mikita. He married a well-to-do lady in Milwaukee and they build a rink up there called the Pettit Center.