O Captain my Captain
Posted at 5:07 AM on January 28, 2009
by Dale Connelly
(21 Comments)
On my desk this morning I found a piece of salty parchment held down by the point of a rusty dagger. Scribbled in a jagged, angry hand were these words:
Ahoy there. I ain't gonna quibble over what delights there was on telly vision when you was young, but I does take great offense when, under th' giddy influence of yer "blog", you an' yer associates begins to wantonly heap loads of praise on such low characters as "Captain" Ken, "Captain" 11, and the worst of 'em all ... "Captain" Kangaroo. They was imposters. Not a single one of 'em was a genuine captain, an' presentin' theirselves as make-believe captains in order to influence the minds of children is a horrible crime, in my humble opinion. Therefore, I demands that in the future, whenever reference is made to the aforementioned, it is clearly stated that Kangaroo an' his ilk is, and ever was, "so-called" captains, an' not actual captains what has ever been responsible for the welfare of a sea goin' vessel. There is more to the job than showin' a few cartoons. The title of captain is one what has t' be earned. An' my boys agrees with all that I says. Beware them what has earned their rank with ease! We has the means to punish offenders. Obey this order or suffer th' consequences.Sincere best wishes fer you an' yours,
Captain Billy of the Muskellunge
This raises some serious questions, primarily about security here at the office.
But I can't take on the challenge of checking the credentials of every kiddie TV show and cereal box captain that comes along.
And besides, taking the helm of a kid's TV show is not something that can be done casually. The job had to be earned and often carried grave responsibilities. I'm thinking of Donna's description yesterday of "Captain 11", from Sioux Falls:
Kids ... were briefly interviewed and permitted to flip the colored jewels on the captain's time converter control panel. He wore a blue jumpsuit, gold boots, and headphones. Here's the rest of the opening narrative: "One man in each century is given the power to control time. The man chosen to receive this power is carefully selected. He must be kind. He must be fair. He must be brave. You have fulfilled these requirements; and, we of the Outer Galaxies designate to you the wisdom of Solomon and the strength of Atlas. YOU are CAPTAIN 11!"
"The wisdom of Solomon and the strength of Atlas." That's a heavy load for anyone to carry. Contrary to what Captain Billy believes, I think the Cartoon Captains of prehistoric kiddie TV earned their rank with every show.
Are there any still working today?
If not, what would a modern Cartoon Captain be like? Can we describe her?
She would need a name, a super power (controls time, cures hives, emits sparks) and a mission (fights crime, saves lives, trains goats).
And a sidekick? And a costume?
Comments (21)
My goodness! What a thrill to hear "Trouble" this morning. Thank you Dale and Mike.
I think the sidekick (or even the Captain) should be able to play AWESOME slide steel guitar, to get the magic and the power going.
the Captain would certainly be a throat singer - the greatest in the world.
thanks for Huun Huur Tu!!
The captain of a public school needs to be equipped with a cache of educational jargon, such as, " Absolutely, all this testing is essential. It's what drives your instruction and enables you to move your students forward. It's what makes our school the envy of all the others in our city, and our district the envy of of the state!" ....AND the captain has to maintain complete composure while delivering this rhetoric. She must be intelligent. She must be stoic. She must own a suit. She must carry a whistle. She is CAPTAIN ADMINISTRATOR!
Yes! I don't know about this what captain is this or what captain is that; I think Captain Billy and The Boys should take over the station, gently hold Dale hostage and then we will see what a REAL captain can do over the AIR waves!!!
Arg and Ahoy,
Tami Spry
I think our super hero needs to be an uber chic computer geek with hipster glasses. ;-)
Apparently, I'm not a thorough comment reader, as I missed the reference to Captain 11. I was on that show in Sioux Falls as a girl... that show and Romper Room. Donna, we have memories in common.
Captain Ken came to my elementary school for a fair. He drew a picture of a sleepy man with really messy hair. He asked for a show of hands...whose dad looks like this first thing in the morning? You must have on red socks to win! I had already raised my hand, quickly looked down and saw that I had on red socks. I won! How exciting! I got the picture as my prize, but I have no idea what happened to it. I don't have it anymore. But, it is a fond memory for me. Perhaps the super hero should have messy hair and red socks, in honor of Captain Ken!
Maybe a super-power we'd all be envious would be the ability to see The Present.
After all, it doesn't take much to see The Past and as far as The Future, well, we spend too much time thinking about it ourselves. And if some "so called" Captain Future came about, they'd just be burdened with a talk show anyway.
The ability for someone to show us the importance of The Present, now that's something!
Captain 11, aka Captain one-one! Just tuned in to hear you talk about Captain 11. My, my, the memory dust in swirling. Yep, me too, grew up with him, him being Dave Dedrick, quite the KELO TV personality.
Thanks for being here every morning....love Heart
Oh my, I had no idea the security at Radio Heartland was so lax that a pirate captain with a rusty dagger could get through. I'm glad there was no impact other than the damage to Dale's desk from the point of the dagger being driven into it.
A greater harm, to me anyway, is having missed Huun Hu Tu throat singing. I will have to try to catch him on the rebroadcast.
Donna's comment makes me chuckle as my sweetie works in elementary education and has to practice keeping her composure while delivering those very lines.
Elinor has described me, well at least the computer geek with hipster glasses part.
So assuming we take the strong, wise woman as the captain, which I think we should, then does it follow that her sidekick would be a man in a skimpy costume? Looking at it from this perspective, it seems odd that we seem to accept the woman in a skimpy outfit as a man's sidekick. Well perhaps not for kiddie captain's side kick. Maybe a cute little puppy would work better.
I can't resist the temptation to nominate my niece Zora as the new Captain. She was the subject of a piece on This American Life several years ago and this is how she is described on the archived version on thislife.com website:
"Act Two. Wonder Woman.
"...the story of Zora, a self-made superhero. From the time she was five, Zora had recurring dreams in which she was a 6'5" warrior queen who could fly and shoot lightning from her hands. She made a list of all the skills she would need to master if she wanted to actually become the superhero she dreamed of being. Sample items: martial arts, evasive driving and bomb diffusion. She actually checked off most things on the list ..."
I think she would look good on tv as well.
Here's a note for you, Dale, which I will not pin to your desk with a dagger. I have better manners, I hope, than Captain Billy.
This is a suggestion on music for your program. Benny Golson has a new recording called New Time, New Tet which is a new version of the band Jazztet. He was interviewed on the MPR Saturday Morning news show and I thought some of the music on this new recording might work well on your show. Some of the tracks include mixing of classical music with Jazz which fits the eclectic approach of your program.
A related thought that came to me after reading today's blog, what would Cap'n Billy say about the Captain (and Tennille)?! Nothing good, methinks!
Arg and Ahoy,
I agree with Captain Billy of the Muskellunge. The title of captain is one what has t' be earned.
Them is wise words Captain Billy.
Be there a was to send a message back to Captain Billy, one might ask how his sea goin' vessel came to be called the 'Muskellunge'?
What this country needs more than ever in our time of economic crisis is Captain Consumer. Don't we all need to be convinced to run out and spend money we don't have on things we don't need just for the sake of the country? After all, it worked pretty darn well well when a certain president who shall go nameless told us to go out and shop immediately after 9/11? Didn't it? Ummm, oh well, never mind. :-)
Chris (tongue formly planted in cheek)
Maybe I missed this but what was Captain Kangaroo's "power"? Clearly his arch nemesis was ping pong balls.
So to be complete any so called captain has to have a nemesis.
Captain Kangaroo's power was his beautiful interpretations of the children's literature of the day. I can still hear his voice reading "Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel" and "Ping."
Darcy
And how does Captain Billy feel about Captain Ken's baked beans?
Dale - in honor of us outnumbered male bloggers, you might play the Poozie's song "I love a man who loves the company of women."
Does anyone know why Jasper is playing yesterday's re-broadcast, and not today's?
Thank you, Jennifer
I thought I was going to have to replace my glasses because I couldn't find the song I was hearing on the 6-7 am playlist. I'm not surprised, though. I used to tune in regularly to the Morning Show archives to catch the hours I missed on air and often got links that did not match the playlist.
Jennifer and Lu,
A computer glitch prevented the first hour of today's show from being recorded and re-broadcast as usual. A back-up will be placed in the archive, and we have returned to normal with the hour 2 re-broadcast right now.
Jasper may be sad about our not having a January thaw. Even computers sleep late sometimes.
I guess everyone grew up with their own Captains. In my case, it was Captain Chesapeake, morning and afternoon cartoon host broadcasting from Baltimore, MD. Curiously, he was simultaneously appearing on a sister station in Pittsburgh, known there as Captain Pitt, a parallel universe I never knew about until I moved to Pittsburgh in my 30s.
Since all this chat about childhood "Captain" hosts got me googling, I came upon Captain Chesapeake's obituary, which has a picture of him looking pretty much just like I remember. The picture is even black and white and a little fuzzy and staticy, just like our TV reception...
In my years of watching, I can't remember any pirates ever visiting the Captain; perhaps the Muskellunge has never sailed the fair waters of the Chesapeake Bay.
Captain Chesapeake always ended his show by looking into the camera to the kids at home and telling them "Be somebody important; be yourself." And then with a quasi-naval salute, a hearty "So long, crewmembers!" Funny, 35 years later, but I can still hear him.
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