a sad day for science geeks

I read last night that Don Herbert, who was known to generations of protogeeks as Mr. Wizard, passed away yesterday. He was nearly 90 years old.

I remember watching Mr. Wizard's World, You Can't Do That On Television and The Third Eye on Nickelodeon when my parents first got cable television, and I was so excited that there were three shows that appealed to the three strongest (at the time) aspects of my personality.

But learning about science though experiments that seemed kind of dangerous was my favorite. I loved Mr. Wizard's World so much, I even made an effort to understand their funny accents and mysterious metric system, so I knew what the kid was talking about when he said, "Um, aboot four meters?"

Mr. Wizard was the original Bill Nye The Science Guy, and Mr. Wizard's World was the original Beakman's World, so if you damn kids today have no idea who I'm talking about, at least you know what I'm talking about. Now get off my lawn.

Update: Reader rasa nails it: "He was the Mr. Rogers for us geeks, that's for sure. A sad day indeed."

Comments

[alikitty619]

Too many memories!!!

I'm being swamped with memories of my childhood. Mr. Wizard taught me more about science than my 7th and 8th grade science teachers combined. And YCDTOT was way ahead of it's time. ::sigh:: I sure miss those old shows.

[KathrynHawke]

I am one of those damn kids you mentioned Wil who have no idea who Mr. Wizard is. But as soon as you said that he was the original Bill Nye (and was the geek verison of Mr. Rogers as rasa put it), I felt a little sad that the person who started that whole science TV show thing is gone. I feel for you guys who knew Mr Wizard and loved his shows.

PS: Since I live in the Great White North and know the metric system, I learned to use the imperial system since that's what so many old farts use to describe something (eg, someone's height or weight or measurments for ingredients) up here. lol

[DanCole42]

My xkcd-esque tribute to Mr. Wizard:

http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/3084/mrwizardje7.png

[CHV]

I recall hoping each experiment with Mr. Wizard would involve something blowing up, or some similar effect.

But here's to the fans of "You Can't Do That On TV" (I had a boyhood TV crush on Christine McGlade), and "Third Eye" which I was always frustrated did not go further than four stories, my favorite being "Children of The Stones" which some people have described as a "Wicker Man" for kids.

It was pretty wacky, though, especially the extra-creepy soundtrack.

FYI: for those unaware the remaining "Third Eye" episodes included "The Haunting of Cassie Palmer" (pretty good), "Under The Mountain" (a strange tale with invading aliens in New Zealand), and "Into The Labyrinth" (okay, kind of spacey) starring Ron Moody of "Oliver!" fame as the wizard Rothgo who so badly needed that Nydis object.

[Jonathan Dobres]

*sigh*

[VeronicaRobinson]

I'm not sure, but I think I used to watch Mr. Wizard. I distinctly remember watching him take a long ribbon of what looked like cash register tap and had one of this "guest" take a pen and draw a line on it back and forth. The girl looked confused, as did I, both of thinking, "Why?" But when he unrolled it, the line was down the...get this...ENTIRE TAPE!! HOW did he do that!? I remember squealing with delight. My sister and I tried that so many times and I proudly admit to trying it in my adult years, but failed in all attempts to recreate the magic Mr. Wizard had created.