It is certainly interesting what memories are triggered, at least to my feeble mind, by a chance discovery of a relic from the past. I was looking through some old slides (yes, once we actually took photos on transparency film) and found some slides of me when I was a TV western movie extra in 1978. The film was
Will Rogers: Champion of the People with Robert Hays as Will Rogers, before his big hit in 1980 as Ted Striker in
Airplane! The film featured Jack Elam, Walker Edmiston, and Gene Evans. Who in the heck were they, you ask? Well, they were in a lot of movies and TV shows from the '40s through the '90s. Edmiston was famous for his voice characterizations in scores of animated movies, and Elam for his crusty and comical characters.
I was especially interested in talking to Gene Evans who had played the father on
My Friend Flicka, one of my favorite TV westerns as a kid. The show was in syndication when I saw it in the late 50s early 60s. I was able to bother him for about 15 minutes and, of course, tell him how I liked him in the show. He became reflective and talked a bit about Anita Louise, another of my favorites, who played the mother on the show. He had nothing but high praise for her acting and off-screen life. I remember his words clearly, "She was a lovely, beautiful woman." Johnny Washbrook, his TV son, Ken, was a good kid he said. That "good kid" is 67 years old today.
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| Here I am with Gene Evans on set. Why didn't I smile? |
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| Walker Edmiston, me and Jack Elam. |
Along with
My Friend Flicka, my other favorite TV westerns were
Fury, The Rifleman and
The Roy Rogers Show. As a tween, I loved to imagine myself being a character on the shows as either a brother or best friend of the juvenile leads on the shows: Johnny Washbrook (67), Bobby Diamond (68), and Johnny Crawford (66 on Mar. 26). I waisted many a happy hour in those pursuits. Whenever I saw children on television shows or in movies, I would want to be a child actor or at least one of the Mouseketeers. At age ten, I wrote a letter to Roy Rogers telling him all the great things I could do and what a good actor I would make and asking if he could put me on his show. My mother never mailed the letter. I thought Roy had snubbed me. My fantasy acting was as close as I came to my childhood career dream.
I have collected a few of Johnny Crawford's songs from his early recording career in the age of the "Golden Oldies." This is one of the best. I probably sang this song to myself after Susan Josephs turned me down when I asked her out on a movie date in 1963. I didn't ask another girl out again until senior prom in '65.
Of course, I was always a sap for the old teenie-bopper ballads. And I took the message of the following song to heart and did just that.
He is still singing with his orchestra: The Johnny Crawford Dance Orchestra.
My 2012 goal, lose 65 pounds by age 65, report: I have lost 18 pounds since January 1st. Seven months and 47 pounds to go!
