Return with us to the days when the circus was still a major entertainment attraction, when clowns were funny, not scary and small boys were allowed to roam TV’s vast wasteland years before finding lasting fame as rock stars!

Of course, we’re talking about that TV treasure, Circus Boy, which ran for many a Saturday morning during our youth, but actually began life as a for-real prime-time series. Circus Boy was set in the 1890s which allowed it to cast itself as a sort-of Western (back when that genre ruled the airwaves). Because the circus changes very little from generation to generation, the only way you’d know we were back in the 19^th century is the folksy outfits worn by the audiences who gather under the big top as well as the old-fashioned circus wagons and horses we glimpse in those scenes when the show is moving from town to town.

Circus Boy is primarily remembered today as the launching pad for Mickey Dolenz’s show biz career. Using the stage name Mickey Braddock, the future Monkee starred as Corky, the son of circus trapeze artists who died while performing. In the true spirit of 1950s television, Corky is adopted by the entire circus family and in particular, by Joey the Clown, played by a pre-Rockford Files Noah Beery, Jr. Rounding out the rest of the regular cast were Robert Lowery as “Big Tim” Champion, owner and manager of the circus and Guinn Williams as Pete, billed as the circus’ advance man, but always exactly where the circus is playing, never in the next town, where a real advance man would be.

While most shows featured a boy and his dog, Circus Boy featured a boy and his elephant as Corky was paired with the unfortunately named Bimbo the Elephant.

Typically, the plots involved trouble with one of the circus’ acts (a lion tamer who lost his nerve, a high-wire artist whose vanity is ruining the harmony of the troupe, etc.) or trouble in one of the towns they’re playing. Corky is always at the center of the action, frequently receiving the patented fatherly advice most shows of the era were overrun with from Beery’s character, Joey.

The show ran on NBC during the 1956-57 season, then transferred to ABC for a second season. After that, reruns began on Saturday mornings back on NBC in 1958 and eventually on local stations through syndication.

The show was popular with the Boomers, spawning the usual raft of comics books, toys and other merchandise. Today, outside of the connection to the Monkees, the show has been mostly forgotten. It’s a shame because, thanks to its initial run in prime-time, the scripts and production values are higher than the typical Saturday morning fare of that era.

The mayor of Margaritaville, Jimmy Buffett has passed away at the age of 76 of unspecified causes.

While Jimmy had only one song reach the U.S. Top 10 (the aforementioned “Magaritaville”), he enjoyed considerable success with his long players, becoming a staple of album rock radio stations from the mid-seventies through the mid-eighties.

He also developed a substantial following of perpetual concert vagabonds, similar to the Grateful Dead, known as Parrotheads, who followed him from show to show. Most youngsters probably know him for the successful string of Magaritaville restaurants that now dot the landscape.

When we first moved to Florida (lo, those many years ago), we learned you could not consider yourself a true Floridian until you had seen Buffet perform live at least once.

We had that privilege a little over a year later when he was on the bill of one of the first, legendary "Rock Superbowls," held at Orlando's Citrus Bowl stadium. The previous act had been plagued by a typical summer thunderstorm (Hall & Oates, who nevertheless persevered, turning in a killer set of their own). But the rain stopped moments before Buffett took the stage. It remained sunny for his entire set. Once he left the stage, the rains returned. You may take that for whatever sort of omen you wish.

It sort of sad that "Margaritaville" overshadowed the rest of his output because he produced a great, substantial body of work. But then again, without "Magaritaville," would we even have Yacht Rock?

Do we even have to say that we will miss him and that his music will live on here at Boomtown America?

Baby Boomers were not just the first generation to grow up with television, we were first to experience the magic of Saturday mornings. Back in those dark days of no cable and no home video, TV programming aimed at kids aired for only about one hour before school in the morning and maybe another hour after we came home from school.

But on Saturday mornings, there were at least 4 hours of uninterrupted programming aimed just at us! If you were fortunate to grow up in a big city, you had your choice of three network affiliates and at least 1 UHF station. In smaller towns, you had a minimum of one station that would dedicate its Saturday mornings to pleasing us kiddies.

Because made-for-TV cartoons were in their infancy, the networks were often broadcasting older (and better) theatrical cartoons like Bugs Bunny and Mighty Mouse. Local stations also broadcast theatrical fare like Popeye and the earlier black & white Looney Tunes. As there weren’t any reruns of older children’s shows, there was also a huge market for first-run syndicated kid-vid like The Adventures of Superman and Sgt. Preston of the Yukon.

Westerns had been popular with kids during the 1930s and 40s, so with the advent of television, most of the gun-totin’ he-men who rode the range of the Saturday matinee (and their trusty stallions) made the jump to TV including Roy Rogers, Gene Autry and Hopalong Cassidy. But those hombres all were outstripped by a buckaroo who came from radio to TV – the Lone Ranger. Starting in 1949 and running for years and years after, the Lone Ranger’s TV adventures helped ABC establish their Saturday morning line-up.

The rise of 24/7 children’s channels on cable TV along with home video and now, on-demand streaming content from the likes of Disney and others, have made the ritual of Saturday mornings a thing of the past.

But if you’re feeling nostalgic, next Saturday, get up at the crack of dawn, pour yourself a big bowl of Sugar Smacks or Cap’n Crunch, plop yourself down in front of your TV and pop in a DVD on any of your favorites of yesteryear – they’re nearly all available in some form or other.

Hi-Yo Silver, awaaaaaaaay!

Robbie Robertson, who rose to fame as the principal songwriter and often spokesperson for the Band has passed away after a long illness at the age of 80.

Robertson was born in Toronto, Ontario in 1943. Late in life he learned that his biological father had dies in a highway accident while his mother was pregnant with Robbie. She married James Robertson before he was born, so Robbie never questioned who his father might be.

At the age of 16, Robertson joined Ronnie Hawkins’ back-up band, the Hawks. Five years later, in 1964, the Hawks would strike out on their own. Consisting of Robertson, Levon Helms, Rick Danko, Richard Manuel and Garth Hudson, the band became Bob Dylan’s back-up during his first, very tumultuous tour as a rock & roll act – often playing before hostile crowds of heckling folkies.

When Dylan wrapped up that tour and sustained his infamous motorcycle accident, the Hawks holed up near Dylan at a house in Woodstock, New York in 1967, working on recordings with him that have since become known as “The Basement Tapes.”

The group finally decided to change their name to the Band and became extremely successful with their first two albums for Capitol Records – “Music from Big Pink” and “The Band.” Robertson’s songwriting was essential to the band’s success. He wrote most of their big hits, including “The Weight,” “Up on Cripple Creek,” “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” and more.

Drug use and personal problems led the Band to call it quits in 1976. But not before their farewell concert in San Francisco’s Winterland was filmed by Martin Scorsese and released as The Last Waltz. That event produced a lasting friendship and professional relationship between the director and Robertson. Robbie has served as musical director on Scorsese’s Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, The Color of Money, Gangs of New York, The Departed, Shutter Island, The Wolf of Wall Street, Silence, The Irishman and the forthcoming Killers of the Flower Moon.

Robertson was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame along with the rest of the Band in 1994. He received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Songwriters in 1997.

If you’re looking for a fantasy film that’s well off the beaten path, give Night Tide (1961) a view. Often marketed as a “horror” film (its original distributor was American International, the same people who gave you all those Vincent Price – Edgar Allen Poe adaptations), this little gem is nothing of the sort. It’s a haunting, dream-like study of love and obsession.

Filmed in black & white and starring Dennis Hopper in his first major role, the story involves a sailor who has taken to hanging around a seedy amusement pier in southern California during his summer shore leave. There he meets and falls in love with a beautiful young woman, played by Laura Lawson, who makes her living as a mermaid in one of the pier’s sideshow attractions.

But as Hopper gets to know the woman, he discovers that she believes she really may be an actual mermaid, a descendant of the mythological sirens who lured men to their destruction. She has a father figure of sorts, an old sailor who owns the mermaid attraction and she’s also haunted by a very mysterious older woman, who may or may not be another of the fabled sirens.

As the movie progresses, Hopper definitely seems to be in some sort of danger, but he can’t stay away from Lawson, who previous suitors have all come to a bad end.

The film was one of the first independent productions shot in America. Written and directed by Curtis Huntington, the script was purchased by Roger Corman (director of the aforementioned Price-Poe classics) in 1956, but didn’t go in front of the cameras until 1960. The film did make Time Magazine’s Ten Best list in 1961 but couldn’t initially solve distribution problems caused by Huntington’s use of a non-union crew.

Night Tide finally received a wide release in 1963, but failed to generate much cash at the box office. That was probably because the garish marketing campaign set viewers up for a gory horror fest and not the ultra-atmospheric, moody fantasy the film actually is. Once seen, it is not easily forgotten.

Writer/director Huntington went on to a fairly successful career as a TV director, handling episodes of Charlie’s Angels, Wonder Woman, Dynasty, Baretta and others.

The film itself was designated for preservation by the Motion Picture Academy (the Oscars folks) in 2007. It’s widely available on DVD and Blu-Ray and, in our opinion, well-worth seeing.

Studies show older Americans are the most reluctant to give up using actual hard cash & checks to pay for things. If you’ve been one of those clinging to your old habits, maybe we can give you several profitable reasons to shift to credit card and digital payments.

1.) Digital & credit card payments are actually more secure, not less. Because these service have more to lose from hackers than you do, their encryption is strong, reducing the risk somebody else will get your personal information

2.) Rewards – Many credit card companies offer rewards for using their cards. That can translate into stuff you can purchase using your bonus points. Make sure you’re paying off those cards, though, so interest payments don’t offset what you’re earning in points.

3.) Build your credit – Many Baby Boomers have already paid off their house. Without those regular mortgage payments and with few credit cards payments, you may become what’s known as “unscorable,” which can be a problem should you want to purchase a big ticket item like a new car or an RV. By making your regular monthly payments via credit cards, you continue to establish and build your credit score.

4.) Once you get used to paying digitally, you’ll discover how fast & easy it is – leaving you more time to use your money doing things you like!

Jonesing for the sweet treats that made the summers of you childhood so special? Think those have vanished forever?

Not true, there are plenty (or should we say “Good ‘n’ Plenty”) of companies online still making and selling the candy we grew up with. Here are links to just a few of them.

vintagecandyco.com/

oldtimecandy.com/

amazon.com/retro-candy

bulkcandystore.com/nostalgic/

Boomtown America is not affiliated with any of these companies and we’re provided these links purely for your informational purposes.

It’s hard to get through a day of commercial TV watching without hearing the word “probiotic.” In fact, it shows up in so many ads about a healthy digestive system, that you may assume taking a probiotic is a slam dunk.

Guess what? There is absolutely zero standardized testing that proves probiotics are beneficial. Say what? Compounding that, because probiotics are not regulated by the FDA, there not even a guarantee that your probiotic even contains what the label says it contains. Say double what?

Research is ongoing, so there may be some hard evidence to back up the claims made by Team Pro-Probiotics. Until then, many health care pros urge you to stick with foods high in natural probiotics which include yogurt, sauerkraut & kimchi. Besides, those taste better than a pill/