The Uncle Al Show - Uncle Al & The Kids

Uncle Al & The Kids

The kids who visited Uncle Al were more than just audience members; most of them were selected to be active participants for different skits on the show. While Wanda would handle the more educational aspects of the show, featuring kids assisting in one way or another, Uncle Al got kids involved as helpers for puppets doing different odd jobs, or he would enlist a child from the crowd on-the-spot to be a barker for games at Uncle Al's circus ("Step right up! Win a prize!"). Then-eight-year-old future film superstar George Clooney appeared in a 1970 episode of Uncle Al playing a ship's captain in one of the show's skits.

By the 1960s, kids who appeared on the show each were given a nametag sticker in the shape of a bow tie modeled after Uncle Al's sartorial trademark. While the kids were told the name tag was a ticket to get in and a souvenir to take home, the primary reason for them was so that Lewis could refer to each child by name. Initially the tags were plain white, but later included the name of the show to one side, and WCPO's "9" logo to the other, with room in the middle for the child's name.

Other activities included dance contests, celebrating birthdays of kids in the audience that day (which was usually done during their trip to the circus near the end of the show) and singing, accompanied by Al himself, who often played either a banjo, a guitar or his trademark accordion singing simple ditties like this one:

"When we sing together songs are such delight..
Har-mo-nee makes the melody right.."

Each day the show would end with Uncle Al, Wanda and the kids all singing a prayer on the air before the kids made their way off the stage:

(they sang the first three lines of the prayer)

"Help me, God, to love you more,

Than I ever did before,

In my work and in my play,

(the last five lines they spoke)

Please be with me through the day,

Thank you for the friends we meet,

Thank you for the food we eat,

Thank you for the birds that sing,

Thank you, God, for everything!"

The cast and the kids would then say their goodbyes and the kids would walk off the set as the closing credits ran. The show's closing theme was the last few verses of the Disney standard It's a Small World written by Robert & Richard Sherman.