313 1953…

In 1953 my father (while living in Detroit, Michigan) was invited onto the NBC Today Show hosted by Dave Garroway. The reason being, my father owned a rare pet at the time and the Today Show needed some filler.

The rare pet he owned was a Peruvian Guinea Pig, which today can be bought for $2 but in 1953, it was a rarity. My father grew up in Pakistan and had owned even more exotic pets, but the producers were not interested in them. The chimp in the photo J. Fred Muggs… who did not get a long with the Guinea Pig or my father so Phoebe B. Beebe had to be brought in. In the 1950s, the Russian newspaper, Izvestia, described J. Fred Muggs, as “a symbol of the American way of life”, and said, “Muggs is necessary in order that the average American should not look into reports on rising taxes, and decreasing pay, but rather laugh at the funny mug of a chimpanzee.” Mr. Garroway grew jealous and began spiking Muggs’ orange juice with Benzedrine to make him misbehave (read above) and deliver his human co-host back to center stage.

This post was created by Hoopenfaust, slapped on this page January 5, 2011 at 5:38 am, filed under 313 Series, 33%. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any trash talk RSS feed for this post.