Memory Lane: The Day I Became Smalter Kitecronk

I was in sixth grade the year we moved to New Jersey from the Cleveland suburb of Maple Heights. The date was January 20, 1964, three weeks before The Beatles first appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show.

The real Kitecronk, I mean Cronkite

My memories of those first months are surprisingly sparse. My sixth grade teacher was Mr. Klein, a friendly young man of average height, slender of build. I remember little of what we studied except that for social studies we were asked to cut out political cartoons from the editorial page of our newspaper and explain what they meant. It was an interesting exercise in expanding our awareness of the broader world.

The classroom probably had 30 desks and chairs. Most were filled by other students whose names I would have to learn. (They only had to learn one, since they already knew each other.) A few weeks after my arrival a new student joined the class and was seated next to me. Now that I was no longer "the new kid" I spent the day trying to make her feel at home in this class of new faces. I talked to her as if I had been there all year. By day's end, however, I discovered that Diane had actually been part of the class all along. She'd only been out of school because of a surgery she'd undergone. 

The memory that came back to me the other day, leisurely drifting into my consciousness after lying dormant more than half a century, was the skit I was part of near the end of the school year. I don't recall auditions, or even rehearsals. In the segment I was part of I played the role of Smalter Kitecronk in an obvious parody of the television newscaster Walter Cronkite. Like the famous newsman, I wore a suit and tie along with a narrow mustache.

The Hillside School auditorium was crammed with students and parents that afternoon. It must have been a pretty big deal.

In the skit I was part of I sat at a table up on the stage facing the audience, reading the news like talking heads did on news shows before there were teleprompters. Seated next to me was another student, and the banter we exchanged was news show parody. 

Behind us there was a large map of the world affixed to a wall prop. Keep in mind that this was 1964, still the heart of the Cold War. I believe one of the news stories involved classmate Michael Beale as Nikita Khrushchev (if memory serves me well), who stood, took off his shoe and banged it on the podium. 

In my portion of the sketch I was asked a question about Russia. I stood, went to the map and said, "It's still Red." 

I then stuck a pushpin into Moscow, whereupon the map shouted, "Ouch!" 

So much for my early life in theater.  

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Related Links

The Khrushchev Shoe Banging Incident (Satire)

A Farce So Dark It Will Make You Laugh: The Death of Stalin (Movie Review)