'The Children's Corner' with Josie Carey and Fred Rogers
Before 'Mister Rogers' Neighborhood,' there was Josie Carey and 'The Children's Corner'
When Fred Rogers met Josie Carey at the brand-new Pittsburgh public television station WQED, he likely had no idea of the extent to which their collaboration would shape his career.
At the vanguard of children’s educational television, the two developed content that would shape many elements of "Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood," from singing puppets to moral messages of kindness. This year for Mr. Rogers’s Day, the Presbyterian Historical Society honors Josie and her profound contributions to educational children’s programming.
Josephine V. Franz was born in Pittsburgh on August 20, 1930. Raised in Butler, Pennsylvania, by her mother and grandmother, Josie’s was a childhood filled with joy. A show-woman from the start, Josie spent her childhood playing in her family’s hotel and Italian restaurants. She took singing, dancing, and piano lessons and loved to “play show” for whoever would watch. “I think we make our own fun, if we’re lucky, and I was very lucky,” Josie said in an interview with Television Academy.
Despite her idyllic upbringing in Butler, Josie dreamed of moving to Pittsburgh. So, she learned to type and got a job with a Pittsburgh advertising agency in her early 20s. At the agency, Josie was assigned to the show “Ask the Girls”, which featured three women offering advice on etiquette, hairdos and the latest fashion. Josie secured products for the women to demo every episode, and occasionally even appeared as a hand model. She found the show’s live and unscripted format exciting and the hostesses taught her all about making television.
Josie spent evenings acting at the Pittsburgh Playhouse. It was here in 1953 that she was “discovered” by WQED manager Dorothy Daniel, who saw her play a young girl in a bit called “Teeter-Totter Tessie.” Daniel immediately spotted a natural for children’s television.
At that point in time, WQED had not even launched yet. Josie and other early hires went door to door soliciting donations for the station. When WQED hit the air in April 1954, it did so as the first fully community-funded public television station in the country. It was here that Josie would connect with Fred Rogers, and once the two learned that they both had an interest in children’s television, they decided to work together. “We learned right on television how to do television,” Josie said of the period.
Running from 1954 to 1961, Josie and Fred’s program “The Children’s Corner” was one of the first programs to air on the station. Fred and Josie wrote and acted the entire show, which ran for an hour each weekday, and the two had almost unlimited creative freedom. Aimed at children ages 8-12, the show was a pioneer that set the standard for future children’s educational television.
Episodes of “The Children’s Corner” consisted of songs, gags, guests and, especially, Fred’s puppets. Much of the show saw Josie chatting the puppets, many of whom would go on to appear in “Mister Rogers' Neighborhood." These dynamic conversations were entirely improvised. “Josie would talk to Daniel as if he was the only person in the room,” Fred said of her interactions with Daniel Tiger. “It was magical how they would converse.”
Despite dominating the show, the puppets were never part of the original plan. But the night before the program aired on April 5, 1954, Dorothy Daniel held a party. Everyone received party favors, with Fred receiving a tiger hand puppet, whom he named Daniel after Dorothy. Josie and Fred decided to give Daniel a cameo in the program premiere. Appearing through a hole in the backdrop, Daniel said, “Hello, Josie, it’s 5:02 and Columbus discovered America in 1492,” then waved goodbye and disappeared. Daniel was such a hit that the course for the show was set right then and there.
The two welcomed guests as often as possible, including some famous names. Johnny Carson, Shirley Jones and Charles Schultz were among the more venerable guests. But most were simply local working people including musicians, chefs, magicians and the occasional zookeeper. “We would probably drag in anybody who would come in and do 10 minutes for us,” said Josie. The show’s budget consisted of “one legal pad” a season, and frugality was always top of mind.
Josie and Fred used the show to interact with children across the region. Kids would write in to share their birthdays, and would tune in to hear the puppet King Friday XIII sing “Happy Birthday” on air. Children could also be part of a club in which they “earned stripes.”
One day, they invited all the kids who had earned four stripes to Daniel Tiger’s birthday. They expected to see a handful of kids, but instead, children lined up around the block. Josie led the kids in a song in French that they had learned to earn a stripe and every one of them sang it perfectly. Josie declared it one of the most exciting moments in her career.
“The Children’s Corner” was so successful that soon NBC called. Josie and Fred started traveling to New York for Saturday-morning episodes. In the first several weeks, the network received 138,000 letters about the show, breaking a record.
The gig presented numerous roadblocks, however. For one thing, they couldn’t have guests. And for another, the commute was less than ideal. The two would fly to New York on Friday, do the live program on Saturday morning, and fly back that same afternoon. The reason? Fred wanted to go to his own church in Pittsburgh on Sunday. And speaking of church, NBC didn’t want the two to mention God. When Fred responded with, “Well then, I don’t think we’ll come back,” the restriction was lifted.
Josie and Fred also enjoyed working together as songwriters, writing and performing all the songs on the program. Josie would write the lyrics and hand them off to Fred, who would compose melodies. Josie then sang them while Fred accompanied her on organ or piano, often adding the puppets.
It was during his time on “The Children’s Corner” that Fred enrolled at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary and began studying to become a Presbyterian minister. The show itself was not explicitly religious. “We didn’t try to tell the children what religion to follow or that they should go to church or anything like that,” Josie said of the messaging. Rather, Christianity was primarily expressed through song. Josie performed “Good Night, God” and “Good Morning, God” every week. Both Josie and Fred heard from families that their children sang the former every night before bed. Though Fred was more religious, Josie stated, “I always felt that God really did have a hand in what was happening to us.”
Though lesser known than “Mister Rogers' Neighborhood," “The Children’s Corner” carried immense meaning for its fans. Josie would later receive letters from people telling her she shaped their careers. Musicians, teachers and even a professor of French were inspired by the whimsy of “The Children’s Corner” and its surprisingly robust educational content. Of her legacy, Josie stated, “I’d like to be remembered as someone who brought a little light into the world.”
To see Josie in action, check out PHS’s digitized copy of “Sunday on the Children’s Corner”. This 16mm recording is not from a live broadcast of the show; it's in color, and broadcast prints from WQED at the time would have been in black and white. This rare 30-minute-clip demonstrates a bit of the light that Josie and Fred created together.
The film came to archives from the former offices of the UPCUSA Department of Television and Radio, and is part of a larger collection of media that PHS staff picked up when the office, then called Media Services, moved from New York to Louisville in the 1980s. A note on the original canister read "For Audition Only."
"The Children's Corner" was not just broadcast — select episodes were also packaged as vinyl LPs. It's possible that this episode was intended for home or church screenings, and that the Department of Television and Radio sponsored the program specifically to be able to distribute it to Presbyterian Sunday school classes, day schools, or Vacation Bible Schools. At the 3:23 minute mark, Daniel Striped Tiger mentions going to Sunday school earlier in the day.
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