Patches Pal and Gampa

Matt's blog and request led to this post. Puget Sound natives of a certain age all remember our beloved TV clown J. P. Patches. And they probably also heard on the news, Facebook or Twitter that J. P. Patches had his final public appearance last Saturday at at the Fishermen's Fall Festival at Seattle's Fishermen's Terminal.

Matt's blog post brought to my mind when I was in fourth grade and entered a poster contest. I was very proud of my crayon drawing of Esmerelda, J. P.'s rag doll. I had my own Raggedy Ann doll that I hadn't given up still in fourth grade so I loved drawing Esmerelda. My poster won "Honorable Mention" - I believe this was the first time I'd ever heard that term. I was thrilled to go up on stage and recieve a Patches Pal iron-on transfer from J. P. Patches himself. I don't have a photo of my poster nor of me on stage but I mentioned to Matt that I thought I still had my sweatshirt that I ironed it on to somewhere. So, Matt, here it is!

From Visiting Vintage

The shirt is stained and the transfer crackled but as you can see I never could part with it.

In a way, J. P. Patches connects me to my Grandpa, too.  My Grandfather, Howard Johnson died when I was eight.  I don't have a lot of memories of him but he enjoyed paint-by-numbers in his free time.  He painted a clown for me.  I actually never really understood sad clowns but this is the one painted just for me - he signed it Gampa which is apparently what I called him when I was two.  So despite the frown on this clown, it resembles J. P. Patches to me.

From Visiting Vintage

So, J. P. and Gampa - thank you for the smiles and the fond memories from childhood!