Death Of A Pieman

I'm the age where I'm seeing a lot of my heroes pass away. Just over the last few months Hugh Hopper, Chris Connor, George Russell and Les Paul have all left us, and now Soupy Sales.

I don't remember seeing Soupy here in the Washington, DC area as much as he was in other parts of the country but I do remember a Saturday show on ABC and a show on Channel 20 when it first started in the late 60's. I fondly remember the shows though, all the goofy vaudeville jokes, his "dogs" White Fang and Black Tooth, the singing lion puppet Pookie, the hipo jazz and rock music and of course the pies. Watching a fedw clips on YouTube I see his goofy humor still holds up today and that many people have moved to write little tributes to him in the last few hours. He was someone that radiated a sense of fun and whenever I saw interviews with him in recent years he always seemed proud and happy of the work he did and all the people who loved him. Here are a few clips I pulled out from his glory days:

First a rendition of his hit single "Do The Mouse"...



Then Pookie doing Stevie Wonder...




And finally a few minutes with White Fang and "Daniel Boone" star Fess Parker and the classic Soupy finish.