Watch Mr Wizard

He's the guy who did the Saturday morning science show with a young neighbor kid.  Don Herbert, a graduate of UW-LaCrosse and a Minnesota native, made his mark doing weird things to prove his scientific points.  He's kind of like our own Glenn Rezabek.  Here's his story from the Museum of Broadcast Communications:

Watch Mr. Wizard, one of commercial television's early educational efforts was highly successful in making science exciting and understandable for children. Presenting scientific laboratory demonstrations and information in an interesting, uncomplicated and entertaining format, this long running series was a prime example of the Chicago School of Television and of quality education in a visual format. Created and hosted by Don Herbert, the show's low key approach, casual ad lib style and resourceful often magic-like demonstrations led to rapid success and brought Herbert instant recognition and critical acclaim as an innovative educational broadcaster and as a teacher of science.  You can read the rest of their report by clicking this link...  

I have this vision of Billy Roberts watching him so he could learn how to blow things up.  Kidding . . .

And here's a sample from YouTube.

For all you fisher people out there, Herbert's hometown, Waconia, was the site of the Governor's fishing opener last weekend on Lake Waconia.  It was an unusually beautiful, sunny day (for the opener), but apparently the fish got a bad case of lockjaw, and Governor Dayton scored zero walleyes, one sunny.  But he admits to being no more than a novice at best.  Waconia is just west of the Cities on Highway 5.