Mister Rogers Still Lives In Your Neighborhood
Fifty years ago, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood made its television debut. Nearly 20 years after its final episode and 15 years after Fred Rogers' death, his "neighbors" still look to him for comfort.
It wasn't anything spectacular at the time. When the show first aired on Feb. 19, 1968, it seemed to be a typical children's educational program. On a black-and-white screen, a tall, dark-haired man nearing 40 years of age wandered into a staged living room, softly singing a song as he changed from a blazer into a much softer, cozy cardigan.
That man, Fred Rogers of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, quickly rose into recognition and a half-century later is still an American icon.
"He's more relevant than ever right now," says Amy Franzini, chair of communication studies at Widener University in Pennsylvania.
In the more than 30 years that Rogers' show ran, he won the hearts of generations of Americans as,
