Ernie Coombs (RIP, Ernie.) The WAY VERY COOL Canadian Answer to Mr. Rogers. He had Casey and Finnegan and the Tickle Trunk and oh my it was just a part of Canadian childhood.



Casey is the little boy puppet, Finnegan is the dog, Mr. Dress Up is, well, obvious ;)

This is from a puppeteer blog (http://puppeteersunite.blogspot.com/2006_07_01_puppeteersunite_archive.html):

Mr. Dressup cancelled
The end of an era in Canadian children's programming is at hand. After 11 years of daily reruns, the CBC is cancelling Mr. Dressup, says a Toronto news report.
In July, the show will be bumped to a Sunday morning slot and by September will forever disappear from the CBC lineup. The network's management has been reworking its children's lineup over the past several years and decided it was time for the friendly, bespectacled Mr. Dressup and his "Tickle Trunk" to go. In his prime, Mr.Dressup would draw 500,000 preschoolers every day, but ratings have been in steady decline. Ernie Coombs, the man who was Mr. Dressup, died of a stroke at 73 in 2001. Coombs came to Canada in 1963 with Fred Rogers to launch the original Mister Rogers Neighborhood. Rogers took his show to U.S. public television a year later, leaving Coombs to create Mr. Dressup on Butternut Square in 1964. The series became Mr. Dressup in 1967 and remained in production until Valentine's Day, 1996. In all, Coombs logged 32 years and 4,000 shows as the the fun-loving character with his puppet friends Casey and Finnegan.

Did you know, I had NO idea he was American first. He was to me, quintessentially Canadian. And he said Zed (see, it CAN rhyme ;).

You can listen to the theme song and see the new-fangled animated intro sequence (this was well after my time -- Casey and Finnegan retired, you see, and they needed new puppets) on you tube, here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zRo0eDnFTM&search=dressup