Happy's Place: the hobo clown of channel 55

WFFT-TV, channel 55 — the 1980s to the late 1990s

The program: Fort Wayne's fullest local-television comedy was Happy's Place on WFFT, channel 55, a children's show built around a hobo clown. The host was Mike Fry, a local entrepreneur, who had first done hobo-clown work during breaks in other employment and was hired as Happy after the local clown "Chuckles" — Charles Willer — declined a condition attached to the role. Around Fry the show assembled a small stock company of comic figures: the puppet Froggie, voiced by Craig Beaverson; Chester T. Fox, played by Paul Moring; and Lawn Boy, played by Rick Miller. Fry left in 1990 and Phillip Colglazier succeeded him in the host's role; the franchise proved durable enough to spin off a morning companion, Froggy's Pad. The show was retooled late in the 1990s and then cancelled, closing the era of the local children's-show host in Fort Wayne — the format's last local run, outlasting WKJG's and WPTA's versions by a generation.

The weight of the record: Happy's Place is documented chiefly in the station's compiled history rather than in the newspaper record this history usually rests on, and this entry is carried at that weight: the names, roles, and sequence above are as the WFFT account gives them. What is not in doubt is the format's local longevity — a costumed host, a puppet, and a stock company, produced in Fort Wayne for Fort Wayne children, running from the 1980s into the late 1990s.

Sources:

1. WFFT-TV, station history as compiled in the station's reference summary — Happy's Place: Mike Fry as Happy the Hobo and his route to the role, "Chuckles" (Charles Willer) declining it; Froggie voiced by Craig Beaverson; Chester T. Fox (Paul Moring); Lawn Boy (Rick Miller); Fry's 1990 departure and Phillip Colglazier's succession; the Froggy's Pad spinoff; the late-1990s retooling and cancellation. A compiled station history, carried at that weight.