Was Mister Rogers the Best Neighbor Ever?

really excited. And not only did she give him like this big hug, and Coco was I mean like she was big, right, yeah, enormous, So you have to imagine this giant gorilla just enveloping this rail thin man. But then she started taking his shoes off, and he was a little surprised, but then he realized she was only doing that because it was the same way he used

to start every single show. I mean, well, everybody loves Mr. Rogers exactly, and there are a million stories about how good and kind he was in real life and just how beloved he was, even by gorillas. But with all the tension and politics and general horrible nous going on in the world today, we thought it'd be nice to do a little Thanksgiving show about one of our favorite neighbors and really one of my favorite humans, Fred Rogers.

Let's dive in, kay. Welcome wartime genius. I'm Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good friend Man Guesh. I ticketter and sitting behind the sound proof glass zipping up his card again. Over that another card. It's two card against double card again. That's our friend and producer Tristan McNeil. Alright, so Ango, we're obviously talking about Mr Rogers today, and I'm guessing you watched a ton of Mr Rogers growing up. I did, I mean from our generation.

I really don't know anyone who wasn't influenced by Mr Rogers. But at my house, we didn't watch a ton of TV, but we watched a lot of PBS, like we watched Sesame Street and reading Rambo. We actually subscribed to three to one Contact magazine, which actually had an influence on Metal Floss and and uh, you know, there were shows

like Square one and Carmen San Diego. But I definitely remember watching Mr Rogers and talking to the screen when Mr Rogers would ask questions, and also like learning Little tricks from the show for some reason, always cracked me up. I love watching kids talk to my kids still do that.

But so, do you remember what tricks you learned? Yeah, I mean this is kind of ridiculous, but there was an episode where he was doing some craft and he made a little paper house just out of like a single sheet of construction paper, and then he bent and cut out a front door so that would open like a real door. And for some reason I kind of

filed that away. And then in kindergarten during this holiday party, when we were coloring gingerbread houses, I snuck over to this tin of scissors and cut out the front door like I had seen just two sniffs, so swing open or whatever. And all the adults were so impressed. And when everyone asked me how I'd come up with such a clever idea, I just kind of shrugged. I took credit for it. I know, I totally stole it from Mr Rogers, and I will carry that guilt. I would too.

That's pretty stealing from Mr Rogers. And I'm sure those adults are still talking about it too, how creative that mango is. But yeah, of course I watched Mr Rogers too, but it was. It was always funny how Mr Rogers kind of became this thing at at Mental Flaws, it was really your thing, and you wrote an article about him when we first launched the website. I think it was called like fifteen Reasons Mr Rogers was the best neighbor ever, something like that. So I honestly think he

should be America's patron saint. I probably watched a little more Mr Rogers than most people because my mom was a preschool teacher. And actually, what's funny is that story for Mental Flass was actually the second list I'd written about Mr Rogers. Really, so what was the what was the first? Well, in seventh grade, we had to do this writing assignment where we talked about an inspirational figure in our lives and we had to get in front of the class for five minutes, and it was supposed

to be serious. I think, uh, some kids talked about their grandparents or people they considered heroes, but instead of writting something meaningful, I think I was trying to impress some girls in my class. So I decided to do mine on Mr Rogers and why I thought he should be president, and I presented it as a top ten list, which was super edgy at the time, but the whole thing was full of bad jokes about how he'd make

America feel special. And I'd also really gotten into Eddie Murphy at the time, so I'd seen Eddie Murphy's SNL parody. But I also included things like how Mr Rogers had actually really influenced my style wearing cardigans and low top sneakers. I put so little effort into this thing, and honestly, most of my five minutes was spent with me on a stool, slowly zipping up my sweater and uh, putting

on sneakers, just really hamming it off. I don't know why this is so easy for me to picture, like you giving that same presentation now, but it is funny. If you had not mentioned Mr Robinson or Eddie Murphy's character on SNL, I definitely was going to there. There was a good story about this. I actually read that one time Fred Rogers happened to be at thirty Rocks, so he decided to sneak in and surprise Eddie Murphy,

you know, just to meet him in person. So he goes up and knocks on his door, and when Eddie opens it, He was, of course stunned. I mean, there's Mr Rogers just standing there grinning at him, and so Eddie was supposedly a little bit embarrassed by the situation, but he just gives him a big hug and smiles and says, it's the real Mr Robinson. Oh, I love that. So so did your class like your presentation? Not to go back to that, but it's just I can't stop

thinking about it. Like it, I think so. But the worst part was that the teacher liked it, so for the next assignment she made everyone else do a top ten list of celebrities that should be president, right, which we have now, I guess. But honestly, now that I'm saying this out loud, all of it makes zero's sense, you know. I know we both read and loved Tom Juno's piece for Esquire years later and realized what an

amazing figure Mr Rogers actually was. There's so many incredible parts of the story, but one of the things I loved most was that wherever Fred went, people wanted to tell him how much he meant to them. Everywhere. Actually, I pulled this passage from the story because I wanted to read it here. It says um quote. Once upon a time Mr Rogers went to New York City and

got caught in the rain. He didn't have an umbrella, and he couldn't find the taxi either, so he ducked with a friend in the subway and got on one of the trains. It was late in the day and the train was crowded with children who were going home from school. So of all races, the school children were mostly black and Latino, and and they didn't even approach Mr Rogers and asked him for his autograph or anything

like that. They just sang. They sang all at once, all together the song he sings at the start of his program, Won't You Be My Neighbor? And it turned this clattering train into a single, soft, runaway choir. I mean, it isn't just great, that's so wonderful. I mean he did do eight episodes and thirty one seasons of that show, so um I looked up the numbers and it reached eight million families every week, So obviously he was bound to run into some fans. But that Juno piece is

honestly one of my favorite magazine stories ever. And for those of you listening, it's written as these vignettes of him interacting with kids and interacting with the author, and you just leave it wondering how can pur and be that good? I mean, it sounds ludicrous, but reading that story made me want to be a better person. And I think you know, wrote that piece in the late nineties, and then six or seven years later when you couldn't find that story online because so many magazines had pulled

all their content from the Internet. I I wrote that list partially because I generally wanted readers to rediscover that article. Yeah, and so we'll definitely link out to it from our Facebook page. All right, so we we've talked around Mr Rogers, but why don't we dive into his actual story here? Sure, but why don't we start by each giving one fact we learned about him this week? You always want to skip right to the facts, be patient, whatever. I can't

hope that they're so fun. But here's mine. Did you know Mr Rogers was the official celebrity captain of the Pittsburgh Penguins. Like the hockey. Yeah, hockey doesn't exactly seem like Mr Rogers. Yeah, I don't think it is either, but for season, and this was the NHL seventy anniversary, every team got to pick a celebrity captain, and most of the teams picked like a list celebrities or movie

stars or whatever. But the Penguins picked him. And there was even this rookie trading card they made for Mr Rogers. Oh my gosh, I love that. So is he wearing a hockey uniform in it? I wish it's just a picture of him in his neighborhood. But hearing that made me like hockey a little more. Um, why why don't

you tell me about fact you liked? It's hard to surprise you with these facts, but there, I mean, there are some good ones, like like, once you realize how committed he was to kids in childhood development, it makes sense that you know, he taught himself to speak slowly. I think he spoke at a rate of a hundred and twenty four words per minute, because that's actually the optimal speed for kids in the you know, three to five age range. That's so crazy that he was not committed.

But h what's your actual fact? All right? Uh? I don't know. Maybe that he was a vegetarian. He actually owns shares in a vegetarian magazine called vegetarian time. That's so strange. You know, my mom actually used to subscribe to this nice and a lot in common. Well, he stopped eating meat in the seventies because he didn't want to eat anything with a mother. And when he was profiled in the magazine, he said, I love tofu burgers and beats. He has to be the only NHL captain

in history to ever say those. But let's get back to this bio. Why don't you give us a quick rundown of how Mr Rogers got into TV? Al right, I can do that, so, um, Fred mcpheeley Rogers, How great is it that his middle name was mcpheel like was born in n in Latrobe, Pennsylvania. He grew up to be a puppeteer and an ordained minister, but he had a suite and fairly ordinary childhood. He was a gifted pianist. He was editor of his high school paper,

president of student council. Not surprisingly, he did really well in school, and when he graduated, he decided to go to Dartmouth to study Romance languages, but then he transferred out a year later than that to go to Rollins College because he wanted to pursue music. Yeah, I've read that he composed like two songs from Mr Rogers neighborhood. Yeah,

that's right. And I actually thought he was playing the piano at the start of the show because I knew that he could play the piano, and and because he does play on the show when he sings. But but at the beginning of the show, it's actually his friend, the jazz musician Johnny Costa. You know, I hadn't heard of Johnny Costa before this week, and I read that he and Fred went way back and that this was kind of a steady side gig in rough times for him.

But being friends. Mr Rogers new costas financial situation and the salary he offered him was the exact amount Costa needed to put his son through college. It's not kind of sweet. But from your reading, is Costa famous? Like I didn't really know about him. Well, I mean, I think people in jazz circles knew him. You know. Apparently Ella Fitzgerald's pianist used to tune into the last five minutes of Mr. Rogers every day just to quote here what Johnny was up to, because he was that good.

And I do have to add this because it's a very Mr. Rogers fact. So Johnny said, children understand good music. I would never play piddling nursery rhyme. That's pretty neat. But we'll get into Fred Rogers philosophy and a bit. But it was never too dumb down anything. It was always about respecting the kids and their feelings and their intelligence.

You know, it's funny. I heard Sarah Silverman talking about a really difficult topic this week, but as she was kind of talking herself up to it, she said, quote, if it's mentionable, it's manageable, and like that kind of stuck with me and I thought, what a nice quote. And then as we're doing this research, I realized that's actually a Mr. Rogers phrase and one he used about talking about difficult topics on his show. But we should

get back to the biography. Yeah, alright. So so Fred goes to college and he meets his wife Jean there, who's also a pianist. But when he's home on break from school, he watches TV and he sees people throwing pies in each other's faces, and he has this pretty visceral reaction to it, as you know puts it. Fred was quote the soft sun of overprotective parents, but he

certainly had conviction. And and right then, while watching this mean spirited pie throwing Fred realized that if TV is going to have this sweeping effect on our culture, he wanted to fight against programmings, base or impulses. He wanted to fight for what he called broadcasting of grace through the land. I don't know exactly what that means, but

it sounds kind of so. So when he became this ordained menace or which which he did at the same time that he went through grad school for child development, he decided to use all of those skills on television. And that's when he started Mr Rogers in Pittsburgh. Well not exactly at that point. I mean, he'd done a little puppeteering and TV producing, but his first real gig as Mr Rogers was actually in Canada, and that's when he first got on camera, and the show was called Mr. Rogers. Weirdly,

for some reason, it was all one word. I'm not sure why, but it only lasted a year or two because Fred decided he wanted to raise his kids back home and and that's when Mr. Rogers Neighborhood really kicked off. So I of course want to talk about his pacing of the show and how he used that medium for good, but I also wanted to take a second to talk about his wardrobe. I know a lot of people may know that all of the cardigans on the show were

knit by his mother. Apparently she used to knit one sweater a month for family members, and she'd ask Fred what color this year, So wearing that cardigan was this little tribute to his mom. But taking off his dress shoes at the beginning of the show actually had an alternate purpose. Really, I mean, I'm guessing it was just to make the kids feel cozy. If you remember, back in our education episode we talked about the fact that it helps kids concentrate better in school when they take

their shoes off. Was was that what this had to do with? Yeah, that might have been a side benefit, but his dress shoes also clunked and squeaked, so walking around the studio with quieter and less squeaky shoes is why he switched to sneakers. Okay, all right, Well, I want to get to the actual TV show along with some of the heartwarming stories about him. But before we do that, why don't we take a quick break, Welcome back to Part time Genius. So we're talking Mr. Rogers

and how he used his neighborhood to educate kids. So let's talk for a second about the pacing of the show. Yeah, so Rogers like the show to move slow but deep. So he talked kids through things like anxiety, telling kids they were too big to slip down the drain, or talking about how things like haircuts don't actually hurt, or

even talking about complex things like divorce. And they're also field trips around the neighborhood to nurture curiosity and the land to make believe was there, you know, the place the trolley would go to with all the poppeting. But um, what's really interesting to me is how much he studied kids nature and the way they learned. So there was this one Yale psychology study that compared the effect of Sesame Street on kids versus Mr Rogers neighborhood and the

results were sort of surprising. So why was that. Well, the kids who watched Mr Rogers remembered the storylines better and they also had a better tolerance of delay. Essentially, they were more patient when they've been promised treats. I mean, but you've seen old sesame streets though. I mean, I know there's some quick moving graphics from time to time,

but for the most part those shows seem pretty slow. Yeah, but Mr Rogers really worked to keep the show as seamless as possible, Like he'd rehearsed the show over and over because he wanted to be thoughtful about every word he used, and he didn't want to make too many cuts, partially because that can be jarring to viewers watching so intensely. You know, it is funny to contrast this show with

something like SpongeBob or show like that. I remember our friend Ethan Trucks and Mental Flass telling us about this study from two thousand eleven that the show was basically

making kids dumber. You know, there was this uv A study that that looked at a group of four year olds that were allowed to watch an educational cartoons, some that watched SpongeBob or spend their time coloring, and after nine or ten minutes, they then tested the kids on puzzle solving and following instructions and also a tolerance of delay, and the kids who watched SpongeBob did by far the worst. I mean, I'm guessing that's because all those quick cuts

made it hard to process for kids, right. Yeah, but you know, the way the study was argued against was pretty hilarious. There was a spokesman from Nickelodeon that started out by saying that the show is intended for older kids, but then the argument devolved into something like, quote, watching a sponge in pants is just a new and unfamiliar concept for kids to wrap their head around. Yeah, I'm

not sure that's what caused the lower scores. There's also that great story of one coming to the studio to put a fish on microphone and feed them in the aquarium, like Mr Rogers wanted to hear the sound of fish eating and and it was all being taped live, but the person kept trying to hurry the fish along because they just weren't feeding, so uh, they'd say things like chow time or dinner bell and Mr Rogers just kind

of patiently waited. And afterwards he revealed his philosophy that it's okay for kids not to have that immediate gratification, that they can learn to wait through watching the program. It's just remarkable, really. I mean, the other thing Mr Rogers was really thoughtful about with social issues, which he kind of saws Christian issues as well. So Michael Long of HuffPo wrote up a few things he'd noticed, and here are some of the things I didn't realize about

the show. So ten years before Sally Ride, Mr Rogers had his puppet character Lady Elaine Fairchild fly to outer space and discover new planets. And then two years before Barbara Walters broke through as the first female anchor on the Evening News, he actually had Lady Elaine break that barrier as well. She's just breaking barriers, and you know, and and and obviously those are imaginary characters and and I do think they affected kids perceptions of what women

were capable of. But he also had some real people on the show to stress these points as well. Right. I read that he created a character Mayor Maggie of Southwood played by an African American actor in nineteen seventy five, which I guess was almost like fifteen years before an African American woman would become the mayor of a big city. Yeah, And actually the character he created after Martin Luther King Junior's assassination in nineteen sixty eight was also really important.

So he asked this musician friend of his whose voice he loved to play the role of officer. Clements and Story Corps did this incredible interview with Francois Clements that deserves to be listened to. But here's how he described it to NPR. Quote, I grew up in the ghetto. I did not have a positive opinion of police officers. Policemen were sicking police dogs and water hoses on people, and I had a hard time putting myself in that role.

So I think he really struggled with it because he liked Fred but was conflicted about the impact he could have. But then in nine nine there was this episode where Mr Rogers is resting his feet in a kiddie pool on a hot day, and as Clements put it, quote, he invited me to come over and rest my feet in the water with him. The icon Fred Rogers was not only showing my brown skin in the tub with his white skin as two friends, but as I was getting out of the tub, he was helping me dry

my feet. I mean, that whole story just kills me. Yeah. And the thing is is like, it's so hard to pick these stories because there are so many of them. I actually saw a quote from Clemens where Mr Rogers was ending the show the way he always did. He was hanging up his sweater and telling the audience you make every day a special day just by being you,

and I like you just the way you are. And on that particular day, Clements thought Rogers was looking at him, so he walks up to him and asks, Fred, were you talking to me? And this is how NPR tells it. Yes, I've been talking to you for years, Rogers said, but you heard me today. It was like telling me that I'm okay as a human being, Clements says, And and that was one of the most meaningful experiences I'd ever had.

I know. They're honestly a million stories of Mr Rogers doing kind thing, from how he'd get up at five thirty every morning to answer massive piles of mail, like every person who wrote in got a note back. He'd also make friends with journalists, which made him a really hard interview because he take photos of them and their time together and then mail those to him, and and he keep up with them to ask how their families were.

One time, he made a limo driver drive to his own house Sir Rogers could meet the driver's family, and then they played music and sang late into the night. And when a father wrote in because his blind daughter had heard Mr Rogers feed the fish once but then was worried that they had died, Mr Rogers changed his daily narration to include a bit where he said the fish were fed and doing well. And there's just so many heartwarming stories of him telling kids to be brave

and difficult situations. Yeah, yeah, there's too too many great stories. And by all accounts, he was very much the same person on an off screen. But we should talk a little bit about how he saved PBS and also the VCR. So what why don't we do that? After the brink? Okay manga. So earlier we were talking about this wonderful profile of Mr Rogers and Esquire called can you Say Hero? And we were lucky enough to get the author of that profile on the line, Tom's you know, welcome to

part time Genius. Thanks for having me so, Tom, it's been I think nearly twenty years since your profile, and I think at the time Mr Rogers must have been famous, but not top of mind for most people. Why did you choose Mr Rogers as a subject? Yeah, I didn't. I didn't actually cheer them. It was it was definitely one of those profiles that was chosen for me. Um.

I mean there are two reasons for it. Number One, we were doing a story or or an issue devoted two American heroes, and you know, one of the editors very strongly advocated that that Mr Rogers should be accounted on that list. But the second thing that that had happened was I had just gone through a bunch of stuff,

UM regarding Kevin Spacey a year before. I had written the story, the cover line for which was Kevin Spacey had the secret that sort of danced around outing him and it probably did more than dance around so um, and that at the time seemed incredibly um transgressive and wrong. And you know, I was attacked from all sides, and Kevin himself UM called for me to be blacklisted for further celebrity profiles, and I was just sort of finishing

up all that. The editor who advocated Mr Rogers on the cover of the Hero's issue advocated that I'd be the writers just like you know, not only would it be sort of counterintuitive to have him on the cover, it would be her extra counter recruited to have a notorious comes you know that piece, and so what was he interested in having a story on him? Um? You know, it's just that it was just a funny thing. I you know, he had a lot of protection at the time,

but I didn't know any of that. I know, contacted his UM people, and his people said, okay, well you can you can you know, visit him um in New York when he's in New York. I didn't know at this time that his people were trying very hard to dissuade him from talking to me. Don't you know who this guy is? Don't you know what he did? And it had nothing to do with you know, Fred being gay or whatever. That was never part of the equation. But it had to do with just me being sort

of a bad guy, a notorious guy. And that really set up the whole dynamic for the story because I didn't I didn't know that that was going on. But I went and saw him in his apartment in New York City, and you know, he he you know, I called him up and said, you know, can I come over?

And he was like, well, Tom, you know, I'm I'm in my robe and slippers, I'm taking a nap, you can come over, you know, and and you know, and I went there and I knocked on the door, and you know, by god, he was in slippers and in a robe and U and he was in this apartment. And just right from the very very start, I started asking him questions which he never answered. He did not. I mean I thought for it many times. Um, he

never answered a single one of my questions. He always reflected by asking any question about myself, you know, um, you know, and and you know part of that is in the story, you know, he he asked me. I mean, just like I was started asking him about his past. And I was like, wow, you know, I was. I had a lot of friends back there. I didn't have a lot of friends, but I had a lot of you know, imaginary friends like stuffed animals and things. I bet you had a close friends like that. Two didn't

you come like? Yes? Then was old Rabbit? Oh, I bet you loved old Rabbit very much. And you know, and it was it was just, you know, that dynamic from the very beginning. And you know, as a journalist, I had to decide whether to accept that or not. And I did, and I think I did because they needed to. I think I was really I was really at a tough place in my career. I had just gone to Esquire from g Q, and you know, GQ

was was pretty much a you know, a UM. It was like, you know, NonStop um, you know, glory really and it was it was just you know, I did you know, every story was was kind of greeted, you know, and welcomed um, you know, with enthusiasm. And then I went to Esquire. My first story was on Kevin Space and people just hated it and for a while kind of like hated me, and and then said came in and really really, um, I think saw that. I think

he saw that. I think that he saw that I needed someone to trust me, and he decided to and I decided to trust him. And that was the dynamic of the whole story. Wow, that's really interesting, Well, Tom, One of the things we haven't seen written about much is is his relationship with his sons. Do you happen to know much about him as a parent, you know,

I don't, I really don't. You know. I met his wife Joanne many times and I'm still in touch with her, but I don't know very much about his relationship with his son. Well, you know, I've known he was a minister, but he was always so quiet about his faith on the show. And I'm curious, why do you think he asked you to pray with him during your reporting, because I think he was quiet about his faith on the show. But I think he lived his face, you know, every day.

I mean, I know for a fact that he woke up, um every morning at five o'clock in order to pray for people and to write and to think and to read. But from five to seven, with his time by himself and UM, part of that was prayer for people. And I, you know, I became one of the people he prayed for. UM. You know, from the very beginning, he was ministering to me. He was not just like a typical profile subject in

any way at all. He was ministering to me and I was okay with it, and in fact I was, you know, I needed it, And so that was that was really what happened. So but I think that Fred was one of those guys. It was, you know, he was very private. He was not a person who you know, talked about his personal life at all, I mean like zero. And but I think that when you got past a certain point. I think his life faith was a huge

component of that private life. So Tom, I was curious, what was your relationship like with him after the interview and and uh, did you stay friends? Yeah? We did. We stayed We stayed friends until he died. And um, even though I did not know how sick he was. UM, I was not one of the people who um was led into that level. But I mean, you know, after

UM the story came out, we stayed friends. I mean I have I don't know, like I don't know how many emails I have from friends that he set me between in two thousand and three when he died, but I mean at least five hundred. And they were just they were mostly short. They were mostly there's like, you know, praying for Utah and they were praying praying for and I mentioned, you know, a family relation who was having trouble and she was young, and I know that he

prayed for her. I mean I know that for I know that for a fact, and so so I would like call him every once in a while, like one I would you know. It was it was just funny. I was the other day in Atlanta. I came around

US exit. That reminded me of Fred because I remember the day when I came around that exit and there was a snapping turtle crossing it to get to some sort of you know, vistigial pond that had been you know, developed around and I stopped my car and you know, I picked up the snapping turtle and all these people all at once came out and helped me. And you know,

I told I told Fred about it. I called him up and told him about it, and he was like, isn't that like you you know, like always, you know, he always had he always had a kind word to say. And the last time I spoke to Fred, Um was um on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day. She's down in two and on Christmas Eve there has been a a battle, uh in my family and it was brought between um, my wife and I. But my wife's got involved in a practice between me and some you know, some others.

It was, you know, it was just a typical kind of family form. But my wife was really upset that night and she couldn't sleep and she was so she was so mad about how she had been treated, and the thing that got her to sleepers that she thought to herself like, what would Fred Rogers do? How would Fred Rodgers react to this? That's I mean, that's how sort of ingrained um he was to you know, our our way of thinking in our family life. And you

know I called him Um Christmas morning. I called him that next day and told him that, and he, you know, he gave me that same that same answer. You know how how like Tom to call me and tell me that? And I did not know that he was dying a stomach cancer. He already was. He was, you know, he was diagnosed and was sick. He died two months two months later, and said your weary two thousand and three. And I know, I remember very well how he found

out that he died. And I went down to my computer, looped over my laptop and there was his picture, and you know, I just I knew, I knew right away with that picture Ned, and you know it was I had to give a speech that day here in Atlanta, and I wound up UM asking everybody in the audience to maintain one minute of silence in UM in tribute to Fred. Not something to remember Fred, but because that's

what he did. That's how that's how he you know, opened his speeches, he would count off that minute of silence and have people think about someone they loved. We had the audience to think about people that they loved, and so I did that that day. It was pretty emotional. Wow, well it's it's such a great story and I can't imagine that story for you having come at a at

a better time and what a life changing moment. I think it's been so remarkable for us as we've been preparing to do the episode this week, is just how many people there are in the world that feel similarly. That we're so positively affected by him and in so many ways. But thank you for writing this profile on him. I know, again it's been a couple of decades, but Mango and I have talked about this one so many times over the years. It definitely changed my life and

you know, definitely changed how I operated. Thank you so much, Tom, I really appreciate it. Welcome back to our time, genius. So before the break, I mentioned that we talked quickly about Mr Rogers impact on culture and specifically PBS and the VCR, and in both instances, Mr Rogers went to Washington. It was it was almost out of a Capra film. And actually you can see these things going around. You still still see them shared all the time on social media.

Him going in front of Congress, but when PBSS budget was going to be cut, he went and spoke passionately about how TV can help kids with emotions, and instead of a budget cut, the funding jumped from nine to

twenty two million dollars. That incredible. And when the government was debating whether VCR should be allowed in homes because recording videos from TV might work against copyright issues, and keep mind this was a long time ago, but it was actually a pretty heated issue, Rogers convinced them that for working families, being able to tape a show and then watch it together later was really important, and his testimony swayed that decision as well. I mean, he was

so gentle but so convincing. Burger King rend this commercial a while back called Mr Rodney, which was kind of a sweet parody. But then they got a call from Mr Rogers, who had received letters from kids and parents wondering why he was now pushing Burgers. Would be kind of a weird fit for a vegetarian, so I guess that's why they just decided to transition to that giant, weird looking king. That isn't going to parody anything. I

don't think so. But Mr Rogers had never done any commercials, so you know, he hadn't even done those PBS auctions that you see during the fundraising drive. So he gently asked them to remove the hundred fifty spot because he didn't want any of his kids confused, and Burger King actually pulled it like the commercial only aired for one week. His ability to just call people up and relate to them as humans was extraordinary, and even Burger King agreed.

This is what their spokesperson said, quote it just goes to show that everybody will be good if you're spoken to in a nice way. Yeah. I mean, he really believed in these peaceful resolutions, and even in smaller ways, like when gorba Chov visited the US during the tail end of the Cold War, he had a guest on from a Russian children's program with a translator. He wanted to show kids how people can communicate from different parts of the world and and how quote, we all want

friendships and we all want to be cared for. And some months later he went to Russia and returned the favor with an appearance on Russian TV. Yeah, he has this quote, I love uh. Peace means far more than just the opposite of war. And there's so many more stories to tell. But maybe that's a nice place to end this for now. Well, I mean, we can end this part of the show, but there's still one more part of the show we have to get to, and that's the fact. Do you know Mr Rogers was color blind?

I didn't like literally color blind. Though his family also took in foster children of all races. All right, well here's one you should love. So Mr Rogers was a napper. He got up at five thirty every morning to answer mail from from viewers, and then he went swimming, and every afternoon he'd tried to get in and app So I need to figure out how to get more naps into my day. But did you know Mr Rogers created

his own ice cream flavor for a local dairy. It was called Blueberry Go Round and it had a blueberry ripple with macaroon chunks in it. His grandmom used to make macaroon's for him as a child, apparently, you know, And sometimes people forget that he was a loving husband and father. So once while playing piano at an event, his wife walked in the door, and he joyously stopped

playing and ran to greet and embrace her. The photos he took of journalists and experiences were so he could share his day with her, and after he passed, she had a really hard time not starting her sentences with we oh, that's sad. Well. This is my absolutely favorite fact about him, and what I wrote in Mental Flaws years ago quote. As an ordained Presbyterian minister and a

man of tremendous faith, Mr Rogers preached tolerance first. Whenever he was asked to castigate non Christians or gays for their different beliefs, he would instead face them and say, with sincerity, God loves you just the way you are. I love that. And you know, on this Thanksgiving, what do you say instead of crowning a winner, Let's forget about the trophy today. And in this segment the way Mr Rogers would end some of his speeches, all right, here goes. All of us have special ones who have

loved us into being. Would you just take along with us ten seconds to think of the people who have helped you become who you are? Ten seconds of silence. We'll watch the time. Thank you for listening to Part Time Genius, and thank you for being exactly who you are. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius is a production of how stuff works and wouldn't be possible without several brilliant people who do the important things we couldn't even

begin to understand. Chris and McNeil is the editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme song and does the MIXI mixy sound thing. Jerry Rowland does the exact producer thing. Gay Bluesier is our lead researcher, with support from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and Lucas Adams and Eves. Jeff Cook gets the show to your ears.

Good job, Eves. If you like what you heard, we hope you'll subscribe, and if you really really like what you've heard, maybe you could leave a good review for us. Do we do we forget Jason? Jason who