Things That Made Me Smile As A Kid:
The end of every Cub Scout meeting.
A Creamsicle.
Wearing a baseball uniform.
Avoiding Rudy Kemper in dodgeball.
An open-faced hot turkey sandwich on the elementary school lunch menu for twenty-five cents.
Doing six hip twirls with a hula hoop.
Rocking the baby with a Duncan.
The Shirelles.
A pogo stick.
Watching a Slinky slink down a staircase.
My cool blue Pez dispenser.
Any Dave Clark Five song.
Drake’s Ring Dings.
The bus ride home from school.
A Pittsburgh Pirates’ win.
Mom’s spaghetti and meatballs.
My Zorro lunch box.
The Ed Sullivan Show, except for Topo Gigio. 
The mailman bringing me the new Sporting News.
Hostess Twinkies.
The Kramdens and the Nortons.
Bobby Hull’s slapshot.
Joe Namath, shoulders slumped, barking signals over center.
WMCA radio “Good Guys.”
The OCD melody of the Good Humor truck.
Helen Crump.
Meadowlark Lemon.
Bob Hope.
Norm Crosby.
Crazy Guggenheim.
Cassius Clay on a rant.
Toody and Muldoon on Car 54 patrol.
Herman Munster’s laugh.
Anticipation the night before summer sleepaway camp begins.
The first night after summer camp ends sleeping in my own bed again.
Grandpa slipping me $10 every weekend.
Carvel swirling in a cup.
Playing catch with Dad on the side of the house.
Elbowing my brothers every time we walked past each other.
Watching Mom and her friends play mahjong. Four bam, three dot, whatever that means.
The smell of my grandmother’s latkes frying.
Eating them.
School canceled for snow.
Reading the Long Island Press sports section.
Borrelli’s pizza.
Going to the bowling alley, Bowlerama, on Tuesday nights with Dad and his friends.
Any baseball players’ autograph.
Howard Cosell’s Speaking of Sports, every morning at 7:25 am, on WABC radio.
The New York World’s Fair in 1964-65. Eat at the Brass Rail.
A hamburger, fries and egg cream at Bernie’s luncheonette.
A black & white ice cream soda at Jahn’s.
Going out to dinner on Sunday night, every Sunday night, with the family.
A phone in my room.
Taking the Long Island Railroad to New York City.
Christmas week on Miami Beach.
NY Daily News sports columnist Dick Young.
Patty and Cathy Lane. Identical cousins, different as night and day.
Jackie Vernon on Ed Sullivan.
Vaughn Meader impersonating JFK.
Adjusting the red in Superman’s cape with our new Zenith color TV.
Perry White. Great Caesar’s ghost!
Uncle Martin, my favorite Martian.
Don Rickles. The GOAT.
To Tell The Truth and What’s My Line.
The Match Game with Gene Rayburn, too.
An aging Casey Stengel trying to explain why the ‘62 Mets were so bad and forgetting his players’ names.
Cousin Brucie and Dandy Dan Ingram.
Sergeants Bilko and Carter.
Wilt and Haystacks.
Broderick Crawford on Highway Patrol. 10-4.
Barnaby Jones.
Abbott and Costello.
Soupy Sales.
The Three Stooges, except with Joe Besser.
The enormity of Wilt Chamberlain and Haystacks Calhoun.
Jim Nabors. Wondering how someone who talks like that can also sing like that?
Hullabaloo and Shindig.
Playing two-handed pinochle at the kitchen table with my friend Phil.
A Roberto Clemente baseball card.
Laura Petrie and Mary Tyler Moore. Va-va-va-voom!
What did I forget?
A good game of “Kick the Can” at night.
Sliding down the yard on a big box.
Riding a Flexi-Flyer.
Today, it’s reading a good cup of coffee! Thanks Roy!
You’ve pretty much covered everything. How about Carl Reiner’s appearances on the Dick Van Dyke show as Rob’s boss? Everyone a classic. “Say hello boys (talking to his toupees). She just put you out of business.”
Well you pretty much summed up my childhood memories as well! But no, Red light, Green light, one, two three? Or was that a girl thing?
Bruce Morrow is back where he started on AM radio at 77 WABC! “Cousin Brucie”s Saturday Night Rock & Roll Party” from 6-9PM ET. He turned 85 years “young” on October 13. Rock on cousins!
Another great Blog Roy, but Buddy Epsen was Jed Clampett from 1962 -71 on the Beverly Hillbillies. Barnaby Jones came a few years later (still a good show). No mention of The Beatles? The rest bring back great memories!!!
Amazing recall of the Good Ole Days! Thanks for the memories.
American Bandstand on Saturday with Dick Clark.
Friday night dinner out at The Western Sizzler or Morrison’s Cafeteria at Perimeter Mall.
Riding with dad to a fire or rescue call. He would put the siren on the dash and all the other cars would pullover. (He was a volunteer fireman/paramedic)
Bubble gum cigarettes.
The smell of Crayola Crayons.
The first summer tomato out of my grandmothers garden.
Hot homemade biscuits out of my grandmothers oven.
Cranking the ice cream maker on summer evenings.
Braves baseball at the old stadium with Chief Knokahomma and his t-pee.
And thank goodness I learned what crak, bam dot is! Love me some mahjongg!
Thanks for the memories (Bob Hope). Just a few more.
Phil Rizzuto’s HOLY COW every time the yankees did something good.
Mel Allen being Mel Allen
Snap Crackle Pop
Plop Plop Fizz Fizz
Every friday night chinese food with the family. At eight years old I was told that’s what jewish families do.
Always look forward to my Sunday Morning Coffee
You didn’t miss much…my friend. I’ll add a few.
Stoop Ball
Stick Ball
Ring a Levio
Vince Scully, Mel Allen, Red Barber and Russ Hodges…all calling baseball at the same time. They were the best.
The Mick…my childhood hero
Rheingold (the I before E except after C obviously did not apply here) Beer, Shaeffer Beer, Ballantine Ale and Knickerbocker Beer…all sponsoring NY sports teams.
Polio Scare…looks like we are reliving that.
Great memories…and regards from Happy Felton’s Knothole Gang.
Your Bar Mitzvah (especially the gifts)
Your first Kiss
Being the fastest/slowest kid on your youth baseball team (choose one!)
Great reading as always, my friend. Stay healthy, best to all and congrats to Scott and Jason for all their success.
Watching any cowboy show that came on…including Yancey Derringer, Bronco Lane, Cheyenne, and Sugarfoot, and still remembering their theme songs. ( Easy lopin’ , cattle ropin’ Sugarfoot ).
Hadn’t thought about catching on the side of the house with my dad in a while. That’s where I learned to pitch. If I didn’t throw a strike I’d hit the house.
What boy our age didn’t have vivid fantasies of Laura Petrie?
“The Gillette Cavalcade of sports is on the air”
Was it a folksy Hungarian accent or was Eva Gabor ahead of her time when she referred to Betty Jo, Bobby Jo and Billy Jo Bradley’s hometown as Hootersville?
Roy, you’ve captured some great childhood memories for sure! A few others for me; my Bonanza lunchbox, opening new packs of baseball cards and organizing them into my teams, Little League, going to Dodger games with my dad and getting to the game 2 hours early to watch batting/fielding practice and hang out by the dugout to get autographs, Gilligan’s Island, Batman & my electric football game. Love your blogs!!
Your blog always is the best!
Great memories. Most them are also mine!
Sunday night hamburgers at the White Tower
Watching the Rangers on my parents 9 in BW TV. Only 6 teams in the league.
Watch the European Circuses with Don Ameche(sp)
Globe Trotters. At the old Garden
Walking up the Smoke stained walls catwalk for the first time at Yankee Stadium. It was in color!!
Playing game after game of waffleball in the backyard.
Swimming every day in Long Island Sound. I could see my feet in the water.
Hundreds of Horse crabs on the beach of Long Island Sound
Freezing at Shea at seeing Namath throw 4 TDs
Pot Roast every a Sunday after Church
The same black and Million a Dollar Movie every day For a week
Can’t forget the signpost up ahead…you’ve just entered The Twilight Zone!