Author: Garrison HilliardGarrison Hilliard Date: Jul 3, 2008 21:30
Larry Harmon, longtime Bozo the Clown, dies at 83
By JOHN ROGERS 3 hours ago
LOS ANGELES (AP) Larry Harmon, who turned the character Bozo the Clown
into a show business staple that delighted children for more than a
half-century, died Thursday of congestive heart failure. He was 83.
His publicist, Jerry Digney, told The Associated Press he died at his home.
Although not the original Bozo, Harmon portrayed the popular clown in
countless appearances and, as an entrepreneur, he licensed the character to
others, particularly dozens of television stations around the country. The
stations in turn hired actors to be their local Bozos.
"You might say, in a way, I was cloning BTC (Bozo the Clown) before anybody
else out there got around to cloning DNA," Harmon told the AP in a 1996
interview.
"Bozo is a combination of the wonderful wisdom of the adult and the
childlike ways in all of us," Harmon said.
Pinto Colvig, who also provided the voice for Walt Disney's Goofy, was the
first Bozo the Clown, a character created by writer-producer Alan W.
Livingston for a series of children's records in 1946. Livingston said he
came up with the name Bozo after polling several people at Capitol Records.
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