It was a TV show featuring children and had the awesome title Popcorn Playhouse. It ran for 4,000 episodes and featured 140,000 kids—and I was one of those kids.
Popcorn Playhouse was a live show airing five days a week out of CFRN-TV studios in Edmonton, where TV personality Eric Neville hosted 36 different children Monday-Friday on what was described as appointment viewing.
The log cabin setting for the show featured a gold mine, Muskeg the Moose, and interviews and games for children between the airing of cartoons. Previous attempts at the locally produced show included settings on a ship and one in the jungle, but the studio hit magic with the log cabin and the hiring of Neville who became known as Klondike Eric, at the time Klondike Days was getting its start in Edmonton.
Popcorn Playhouse quickly became one of the most popular shows aired by the station and its appeal got noticed by national sponsors including General Foods and Mattel who bought out the show months in advance. Kids didn't care much about advertising revenue, though. They were just excited to be on it. I sure was.
The 36 children sat in two wooden bleachers, six kids in each row with the host in the middle. When it was time to talk to the children he held the microphone in front of each of us, moving row by row, as he asked each child their name, age and what they wanted to be when they grew up.
An article following the death of its beloved host in 2015, talked about the sheer number of kids who wanted to be on the show. It stated, "Tickets were at a premium, and only about one out of 10 ticket requests was successful. If you got an invite to the show, you went."
So somehow I was on the show on my 7th birthday with my cousin Jeff who was the same age. If it was your birthday there were some extra special things you got to do, including lining up to dig in the Gold Mine. I picked up the shovel, dug into the big sandbox and dumped a shovelful into the sifter the host shook, revealing how much "gold" I found. It was nickels wrapped in foil, and over the run of the show it amounted to $150,000 given to guests with birthdays. I think I came away with three coins.
I also won an A&W baby mug which I absolutely loved and still have. It is sitting on my desk holding paper clips and I treasure it. Yes, it was a promotional item. Yes, it could have been purchased at any of its franchises, but this one means so much to me because I took it home from Popcorn Playhouse.
Popcorn twists, candy and birthday cake were served each episode. Cake, candy, excitement, nerves and hot lights proved a recipe for trouble and since the show was live, apparently the crew got very good at cleaning up after upset tummies.
The studio, which is now a CTV station, held a one-time "Return to Popcorn Playhouse" to mark the station's anniversary. A new generation of children sat in the bleachers, along with a woman whose appearance was delayed by decades after her family’s car accident on their way to the show when she was a child. In the anniversary episode was invited to sit on the bleachers with her own young children 30 years later as she told the story of being in a police station watching Popcorn Playhouse the day she was supposed to have been there.
No tapes of the show exist, so the few things I recall are moments I truly remember. That kind of makes it extra special for me. I referred to this experience as my “TV debut” which would imply there were follow up appearances. There weren’t. It was a one-time thing. Sometimes we have moments that are not life changing, but are ones you simply carry with you, to be brought to mind whenever needed.
In what can often feel like a complicated, perplexing and problematic world, it’s awfully nice to draw on an innocent memory and just sit with it for a while. Or maybe it’s as simple as being inspired to draw on child-like moments and remind ourselves that it might take many years, but dreams can come true. Whether we are 7 or 70 we need to be excited to play, enjoy being in the moment, and always go for the gold. That’s my outlook.
