A special “What Did You Do This
Summer?” edition with kids as contestants.
12-year-old Joseph Mormello Jr of Levittown, Pennsylvania: “I
pitched a no-hitter in the Little League World Series”
8-year-old Vicki Hixenbaugh of Louisville, Kentucky: “I learned to
fly an airplane”
7-year-old Roger Woodward of Niagara Falls, Canada: “I fell over
Niagara Falls”
The kids are
only identified by their first names initially, because all three stories made
headlines over the summer. In a boating
accident, Roger fell 165 feet over the Horseshoe Falls and was rescued by the
Maid of the Mist tour boat in the river below.
His 17 year old sister was saved by tourists at the top of the falls,
but the adult family friend manning the boat perished in the accident. Roger became the first person to plunge over
Niagara Falls without a protective device (beyond a normal life jacket) and
live.
[Carolyn Mitchell] from New York, [Ronnie Perks] from Wilkes-Barre,
Pennsylvania [Jimmy Scott] from Natick, Massachusetts and [Roy Ferguson] from
Toronto, Canada: “We entered an ice cream eating contest…One of us will become
the national champion tonight”
The kids must
eat a cone dangled from a fishing rod held by a panelist. Ronnie wins, on Bill’s rod. The contest was a national event sponsored by
Dairy Dan, one of several ice cream truck franchises that sprang up in the
1950s to compete with Mister Softee for the soft-serve ice cream market.
Duff Jackson from New York City: “I formed my own jazz band”
Duff is
already an accomplished drummer at age seven.
He is the son of noted jazz performer and children’s TV host “Chubby”
Jackson. He would play with some of the all-time greats, including Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Woody Herman and Buddy Rich, before he
graduated high school. Duff would make
jazz music his career and is still active today. He performs (and conducts) the Duke Ellington
standard “C Jam Blues” with a group of young musicians here.
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