It was a humbling experience for the old Buffalo.
He was at a Pensacola, Fla., television station for a guest shot on
”Romper Room” to promote an appearance with Clarabell at a local shopping mall. But the young whippersnapper of a producer seemed confused.
”Now, what is this Howdy Doody business?” said the puzzled twentysomething.
”It wasn`t very flattering,” recalled Buffalo Bob Smith, the friendly piano-playing buckaroo in the fringed suit whose famous TV chum in those very early days of television was a freckle-faced marionette named Howdy Doody.
Of course, there`s a real pop-culture generation gap here.
If you are over 40, you probably have incredibly fond memories of Buffalo Bob, Howdy and the rest of the Doodyville gang-from Clarabell the clown and Chief (”Kawabonga!”) Thunderthud to Phineas T. Bluster and Princess Summerfall Winterspring.
If you are under 40, however, Howdy may be but a foggy mini-memory. If that.
But for the oldest members of the Baby Boom generation-those very first children of television-”The Howdy Doody Show” on NBC every weekday afternoon was the very coolest of magical kidvid experiences.
”We were the very first means of (television) entertainment for kids aged 2 to 10,” Smith said in a recent interview to promote his book, ”Howdy and Me: Buffalo Bob`s Own Story” (Plume, $12.95).
”The Howdy Doody Show” ran on NBC from 1947 to 1960, finally pushed from weekdays to Saturday mornings after ”The Mickey Mouse Club” dented Doodyville and captured young viewers` hearts in 1955.
”I`ve had people come up to me and say, `We thought you were on just for us, nobody else, just me and my sister,` ” Smith said of the Howdy heyday in the late 1940s and early `50s. ”It`s wonderful that people are still so receptive.”
In fact, the sight of Buffalo Bob in his fringed suit does strange things to people.
”You`re my hero,” one otherwise hard-bitten journalist gushed upon encountering the Buffalo. Another giddily whipped a camera from her purse and requested a quick snapshot of a revered childhood icon.
When asked to say his signature show-opening line, the Buff gladly obliged: ”Say, kids! What time is it?”
Howdy Doody time, of course.
Smith is 72 now, but still as lively, upbeat and full of pitchman pep as he was in the old days.
And he doesn`t take kindly to a suggestion that maybe he and Howdy took advantage of impressionable young viewers with their high-energy marketing of various products such as Twinkies and Welch`s Grape Juice.
”We never took a client that parents would mind buying their product,”
Smith said. ”Basically, we taught kids to brush their teeth after every meal. `Just use Colgate Dental Cream because it has Gardol to fight tooth decay.`
”
Smith, who made shrewd investments in real estate and radio stations in his post-Doody years during the 1960s, still gets a major kick out of doing appearances in shopping malls.
Although Buffalo Bob prefers the sunny side of the emotional street, he temporarily put aside his cheery demeanor for a couple of pet peeves.
One is ”Say Kids! What Time Is It?” a behind-the-scenes look at ”Howdy Doody” by author Stephen Davis, published in 1987. Smith is particularly riled by suggestions in the Davis book that Princess Summerfall Winterspring
(the late Judy Tyler) was a promiscuous party animal.
”He just wanted to be sensational,” Smith said. ”And he didn`t care who he hurt.”
Buffalo Bob also has regrets about what he said is NBC`s unwillingness to market ”Howdy Doody” home videos from the old shows.
”I keep writing letters to NBC and to Brandon Tartikoff, but I never get an answer, not even a `get lost,` ” Smith said. ”Back in the early 1950s, I sold NBC the rights to everything but Buffalo Bob and my suit and my likeness. It`s the worst decision I ever made.”
But the grumpy clouds quickly pass as Buffalo Bob Smith bounces merrily along and happily pumping the hands of adoring, middle-aged ”Howdy Doody”
alums.
Back in 1970, a decade after ”Howdy” had left the air, Buffalo Bob was stunned to be invited to do a campus show at the University of Pennsylvania.
”They told me, `We want to relive our happy, carefree childhood days,`
” Smith said. ”It`s thrilling to realize what an integral part of millions of lives Howdy Doody was.”
