1 Even Koko the Gorilla Loved Him
Most people have heard of Koko, the Stanford-educated gorilla who could speak around 1,000 words in American Sign Language and understand about 2,000 in English. What most people don’t know, however, is that Koko was an avid Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood fan. As Esquire reported, when Fred Rogers took a trip out to meet Koko for his show, not only did she immediately wrap her arms around him and embrace him, she did what she’d always seen him do onscreen: She proceeded to take his shoes off!
Looking for Mister Rogers’ actual neighborhood? The show filmed in Pittsburgh.
2 He Made Thieves Think Twice
According to a TV Guide profile, Fred Rogers drove a plain old Impala for years. One day, however, thieves swiped his ride from the street near the TV station. When Rogers filed a police report, every newspaper, radio, and media outlet around town picked up the story. Amazingly, within 48 hours the car turned up in the exact place from which it had been stolen, with an apology on the dashboard. The note read, “If we’d known it was yours, we never would have taken it.”
3 He Saved Both Public Television and the VCR
Strange but true. When the government wanted to cut Public Television funds in 1969, the relatively unknown Mister Rogers went to Washington. Almost straight out of a Frank Capra film, his five-to six-minute testimony on how TV had the potential to give kids hope and create more productive citizens was so simple but passionate that even the most gruff politicians were charmed. While the budget should have been cut, the funding instead jumped from $9 to $22 million. Rogers also spoke to Congress and swayed senators into allowing VCRs to record television shows from the home. It was a contentious debate at the time, but Rogers’ argument was that recording a program like his allowed working parents to sit down with their children and watch shows as a family.
4 He Might Have Been the Most Tolerant American Ever
Mister Rogers seems to have been almost exactly the same offscreen as he was onscreen. As an ordained Presbyterian minister, and a man of tremendous faith, Mister Rogers preached tolerance first. Whenever he was asked to castigate non-Christians or gays for their differing beliefs, he would instead face them and say, with sincerity, “God loves you just the way you are.” Often this tolerance provoked ire from fundamentalists.
5 He Could Make a Subway Car Full of Strangers Sing
Rogers was once running late to a New York meeting and couldn’t find a cab, so he and one of his colleagues hopped on the subway. Esquire reported that the car was filled with people, and Rogers assumed they wouldn’t be noticed. But when the crowd spotted Rogers, they all simultaneously burst into song, chanting “It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.” The result made Rogers smile wide.
6 He Composed All the Songs on the Show, and over 200 tunes.
7 Those Sweaters Had a Pedigree. Many of the cardigans Rogers wore on the show had been hand-knit by his mother.
Cardigan sweaters are named for James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, who wore the garment during the Crimean War.