NEW YORK, NY (KNX) -- Sad news for an entire generation of baby boomers...Clarabelle the Clown is dead.
Lew Anderson played the silent clown in the final years of the most popular children's show from television's early days, "Howdy Doody."
In front of a children's audience in the "Peanut Gallery," Anderson used bicycle horns and seltzer bottles to communicate with and bedevil the show's host, Buffalo Bob Smith.
Anderson was the third actor to play with mute clown. The first, Bob Keeshan, went on to become the venerable Captain Kangaroo. Anderson assumed the role after Bobby Nicholson moved into another role on the circus-themed kid's show, that of J. Cornelius Cobb. Smith said in his memoir that, while there were three Clarabelles, Anderson was by far the best in the role. Smith died of cancer in 1998.
Anderson went on to a successful career as a big-band jazz musician, but still continued to make appearances as Clarabelle as recently as February of 2000, when he showed up in full costume, make-up and seltzer bottle at a New York store, the NBC Experience.
Lew Anderson died of complications from prostate cancer. He was 84.
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