Playing Fair and Being Kind

This piece contains so many off-shoot threads that one could spend a day chasing interests.

A HORSE IS A HORSE OF COURSE OF COURSE

Mister Ed was a favorite character in a weekly T.V. show during the sixties. Reruns for decades put the opening credits’ theme song into everyone’s conscious forever. The plot contained a ‘talking’ horse Mister Ed. I briefly discussed the song with the bag-boy at Hannaford Supermarket recently and that is how I have arrived here today. Once in a great while some comment or event will trigger my memory of the theme song and I will mutter or think to myself, “A horse is a horse of course of course”. If you want to know more about the song or listen to it you will have to look it up online. You may or may not regret it.

The bag-boy had done a very nice job of putting my purchases in plastic bags and I thanked him on my way past. His response was a wonderful trigger. “Of course, of course”, he said. That’s all it took. I was stopped dead in my tracks and what ensued was a brief dialog about Mister Ed and “A horse is a horse of course of course”. The bag-boy was completely impressed with my knowledge of Mister Ed and he promised me that he would indeed look up the words to the theme song. Such are the victories left for the ancient in their tottering years.

This morning a similar trigger made me mutter the opening words to Mister Ed’s theme song as I was making my first cup of joe. I hummed the words in the first line and began researching who was the actor who was the voice of Mister Ed. I’d never heard that actor’s name and why hadn’t I ever been cognizant of their identity? I was surprised to learn that the actor was never credited with the part in any of the credits throughout the run of the show. The actor was well known leading man from the forties and fifties, Allan “Rocky” Lane. He was a star in westerns and non-westerns for a long period. “Son of a gun”, I muttered ironically.

Son of a gun, indeed. Allan “Rocky” Lane also happened to be one of the actors who played the part of “Red Ryder”, a hero cowboy, in films. Red Ryder was an original comic strip character hero of mine from my youthful days. Red was a cowboy who was quick with a gun and always shot to wing the baddies. He had a side-kick Indian (now ‘Native’) boy. The boy’s name was (hold onto your hat) “Little Beaver”. I often identified with Little Beaver, well, because he was a boy and he was very young. I read the comics often. The drawings and dialog of Little Beaver would no doubt be considered racist and offensive today.

Now, get this. The actor who played the movie version of Little Beaver is the actor Robert Blake who in later life was acquitted of murdering his wife, Bonnie Lee Bakley. That is a whole other story and this space is not large enough to hold all of the head-shaking events wrapped in that tale.

Robert Blake also played a main character in the police TV show “Baretta”. In that production he had a pet cockatoo named Fred. Fred was later kidnapped from the San Diego Wild Animal Park. I can’t go on with this. There are so many wild-eyed and sometimes tragic stories involved. I will stop here and maybe go back to bed. It’s already been a long day and still early in the morning.

I can hardly wait to go to Hannaford. That bag-boy is going to get an earful.

Gentle George
29 July 2020

Mr. Ed Theme

Jay Livingston

“Hello, I’m Mister Ed”

A horse is a horse of course of course

And no one can talk to a horse of course.

That is of course unless the horse

Is the famous Mister Ed!

Go right to the source and ask the horse.

He’ll give you the answer that you’ll endorse

He’s always on a steady course.

Talk to Mister Ed!

People yakkity-yak a streak

And waste your time of day,

but Mister Ed will never speak

Unless he has something to say!

A horse is a horse of course of course

And this one’ll talk ’til his voice is hoarse.

You’ve never heard of a talking horse?

Well, listen to this…

“I am Mister Ed!”

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Jay Livingston / Ray Evans

Mr. Ed Theme lyrics © Warner Chappell Music, Inc, Jay Livingston Music, Inc