Banned from the Peanut Gallery

Mr.Specs, me, and Splash

In the early fifties, while my dad was away in the Korean War, I lived with my mom in Carlisle, Arkansas. Our Zenith TV picked up a channel in Pine Bluff, and my favorite show was Mr. Specs’ Cartoon Caravan.

The show had a live studio audience, all children, between five and ten years old. They sat on a small set of bleachers, and watched Mr. Specs perform some magic tricks, then he interviewed some of the happy kids. Next, he would show a few old Betty Boop or Popeye cartoons.

The climax of the show was when one lucky kid won a purebred Cocker Spaniel puppy, and it was passed squirming through the laughing peanut gallery to the winner.

To win the puppy, you had to send a letter to the station, explaining why you wanted a puppy, and the winning letter won the prize. I couldn’t read or write yet, so my mother wrote what I dictated.

Dear Mr. Specs,

My daddy is away in Korea. I miss him. I am afraid of dogs, but if I had my own puppy, I wouldn’t be afraid.

Yours Truly,

Mark Schnick,

Carlisle, Arkansas.

We mailed the letter, and a few days later, a reply arrived. I had been chosen to receive a puppy. I was pretty excited about this, and Mother said she would drive to Pine Bluff so I could be on the show.

The great day arrived, and Mother drove me to Pine Bluff in the 1949 Chevy coupe.Things started to go downhill from there. We parked outside the studio and went in. The lady at the desk in the lobby looked worried after Mother told her why we were there.

She called her superior, Mr. Smith, who turned out to be the advertising manager of the station, and also performed as Mr. Specs. He informed us that a mistake had been made, and today was “Colored Day”. I could still get my puppy, but I would not be able to sit in the peanut gallery with all the kids. They were colored, and I was white.

I don’t think I’d ever been as disappointed. My mother didn’t care what color the other children were, I didn’t care, either.

“I’ll lose my sponsor if we show colored and white kids together,” said Mr. Specs.

I took the beautiful puppy home with me that day, but I knew then and there, that something was dreadfully wrong in the world. This was the first time I realized that the grownups didn’t really know what they were doing. 

Something similar happened years later when an angry Woolworths clerk caught me drinking from a water fountain marked colored. I wasn’t trying to make trouble, but the white fountain was out of order. After wrenching me away from the forbidden fountain, the white woman scolded me and threw me out of the store. I had to walk a mile back home to get a drink.

Over the years since, I came to understand how sad and hateful the Jim Crow laws were. The South had to change, but it came too slow and too late.

You can read more about growing up in the segregated south in Cold Coon and Collards.