Reminiscing
for a moment, please…
Before I
continue on with what transpired following the cancellation of my Disney show,
I have been thinking about some of the experiences I had back in college which,
in a large measure, have helped prepare me for all of the wonderful upcoming opportunities
that I am about to have in my life. So, please bear with me as I take a little
bit of a detour in the progressive chronology of my narrative.
During my
tenure as a Producer at the Disney Studios, there was a moment of reflection
when I thought how very fortunate I was to be actually working in an industry
for which I had a college degree. While at the University of Colorado, one of
my majors was Radio and Television Broadcasting (the other two were Theater and
History) and here I was actually practicing the TV craft I had studied in school.
Remember, that I had
lost my music scholarship when I got sick and then went into the Arts &
Sciences School when I was able to return to university. I loved my college
days.
During one semester, for something else really cool to do, I talked the
programming guys at Channel 2 in Denver into helping me create a show I called
“Denver Teen Time” which was an afternoon/after school “live” dance party for
area teens. I was the host (based on the biggest dance show on television at
the time, American Bandstand, hosted by Dick Clark). I would drive to Denver
every afternoon that spring and we would broadcast the show with a great big
bunch of high school kids dancing, me interviewing them, and me looking right
into the camera and pitching a sponsor’s product twice during a show. Then,
back in Boulder the next morning in my Television Production Class at CU,
everyone would ask me about the show the day before, even the professor, and
the discussion seemed to revolve around the production of my little teen dance
show. Needless to say, I got a very easy “A” in that class.
In another
fall semester, I produced a radio show for the Intermountain Network which was
a recap of that recent weekend’s football game. It was called The Colorado
Buffalo Football Report. I recorded the show each week in the CU radio studios
and then sent it out to all the Intermountain stations.
Besides
travelling and performing with The Hustlers all during this time, I found some
open windows of time to go back to my main love of musical theater. I won the
comedy lead role in the Homecoming Production of “Bye-Bye Birdie”. What great
fun that was!
Another fun
sideline and extracurricular activity I discovered was my ability to emcee
programs – for pay! The Miss Colorado Pageant was one of the first and turned out
to also be an absolute blast…and, as you might imagine, was not without its
benefits to my social life.
I think I’ve
already told you that it took me 6 ½ years to finally get my degree (Fall of
1960 to January of 1967). Travelling and performing with the Hustlers all over
the western U.S. only allowed me to take a small number of credit hours as I
ever-so-slowly worked toward my graduation. That small class-load allowed me to
do all these others activities along the way. One of the best was being pretty
serious about playing golf.
The Hustlers were invited every summer to the big
Country Club Golf Tournaments in Texas and Arizona by the ski clubs that came
to Aspen in the winter. Here I am playing in a foursome in the Peppermint Stick Tourney at the Ft. Worth Country Club.
Talk about enjoying being in school – especially with
such a small class schedule. On all of our performing travels, we also tossed
our golf clubs in the van and got to play some fabulous courses around the
west. It was a terrific rhythm…golf in the daytime, performing at night. What a
life.
I even found some extra time to be on a couple of student committees like the fabulous CU Winter Carnival. If you look close you'll notice that I'm the only one of this committee that's not a president of something.
Yes, I truly
enjoyed my college life.
