April 4- Let’s Throw Two Chickens Today!

I mentioned yesterday that I would relate the story of how Ernie Banks almost made an appearance on the Svengoolie show- and so- I shall.
This was pretty early on in the program history here at “the U”- probably around the second year. The Cubs great had come to the station, I believe, to do an interview with our old friend Jack Taylor over on the “Stock Market Observer “ business show that was the original mainstay of WCIU. He very graciously was signing autographs for his many fans here, and, since I was not there, one of our associate producers asked him to sign something to me- which I still have- she only had one of my old Svengoolie still photos on hand (to show Ernie who he was signing for)-and he signed the photo “Aim high!” She laughed and wondered if he meant in throwing rubber chickens at me- then asked him if he would like to be a celebrity chicken-chucker on the show!(You’ve no doubt seen celebrities and local names show up on the program doing that…)
Ernie seemed more than happy to do so- and told her to get in touch with his people to set it up. He even told one co-worker as he was leaving- “the next time you see me here, I’ll be chucking chickens!” how cool would that have been?!
…and then- nothing happened. Our associate producer made the call, and got hold of a woman who had been with Ernie as his public relations person or handler or whatever- she might have even been related to him-and she was very cold to the idea, eventually saying that she didn’t think Ernie could do it.
Our producer said she felt that whoever this lady was, SHE was one who thought it was a bad idea, or that maybe it was not suitable for Ernie to do so. So ended our hopes of having “Mr. Cub”- the guy who always wanted to play TWO every day-
as a Sven chicken-chucker.
Other athletes certainly weren’t worried about showing up-Bears great Chris Zorich was happy to come in and fling chickens at me (embarrassing me by saying that he had been watching me since he was a little guy- which MUST have been a long time ago!)-and other sports figures seem to be happy to associate with Sven. Former Bears Otis Wilson, Tom Thayer, Keith Van Horn, and Steve “Mongo” McMichael have proclaimed themselves Sven fans- and White Sox great Bill Melton, as well as Ozzie Gullien, who made an appearance with us as a player- and even remembered us and said hello a year later when we were at the ballpark!
Even the Bulls Will Purdue spotted me once at the United Center, and said- “hey! There’s Svengoolie!” So, Ernie- should you ever decide for yourself that you want to throw chickens at me- what the heck, let’s throw TWO today! You’ll always be welcome to join us!
And- join us tomorrow night on Sven for a special “Shriek Previews” feature! More about that in our next blog…