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The mistakes were not funny when they happened, but afterward they had a way of seeming hilarious. The great Dixieland trumpet player Bill Davison showed up one morning so stoned that I had to prop him in the corner. I had to look back after we went off the air to make sure he wasn’t still there. Guests came in all the time still drunk or stoned from the night before. I came to realize that that glassy-eyed look meant I was not only going to ask the questions but also have to figure out a way to come up with the answers.

My most memorable disaster occurred when I interviewed a dogsled racer. I was going to question him about traversing Canada’s Laurentian Mountains. He had his team of dogs set up on the stage. They were gorgeous animals. Just before we went live, he warned, “Whatever you do, don’t say ‘mush’ to the dogs.”

“Okay,” I told myself, and made a mental note. But of course during our interview, as I asked him about driving his team of dogs, I began clowning around and jokingly said, “Mush.” It just came out of me. His dogs didn’t understand it was a joke and they took off. They ran through the kitchen set, the weather set, and two other sets, knocking all of them down, before they stopped.

I never thought I was good at reading the news or interviewing the more serious-minded people who came into the studio. It wasn’t my cup of tea. I got by only because my newsmen were two of the best who ever worked in television, Walter Cronkite and Charles Collingwood.

However, six months into the show, the network removed Walter. I guess they thought he was busy enough with the Evening News and his own show, You Are There, but apparently that was not communicated to Walter. He called me as soon as he heard, looking for an explanation.

“What did I do?” he asked. “What didn’t you like?”

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“What did I do that got me fired?”

Walter was ten years older than I was, far more experienced, and basically in a whole other universe at the network. But I realized he had no idea what was going on. I set him straight.

“Walter, I can’t fire anybody,” I said. “I’m lucky to have this job myself.”

My way out of the news and into a more comfortable role was to start doing a five-minute segment where I sat in front of a large easel, told famous children’s stories and fairy tales, and illustrated them with cartoons. A composer named Hank Silvern wrote me a theme song called “Mice on Rollerskates.” And viewers seemed to like the segment. But I went into work one morning and found all my belongings in the hall.

In short time, I learned that the network had brought in a new producer, Charlie Andrews, a nice guy who actually turned out to be quite helpful. But they had given him my office without telling me. I was assured that it wasn’t a message; it was a mistake. I was also told not to read anything into the fact that they didn’t have a place to put me.

Yet how could I not get upset? It was six in the morning and I was standing in the hall, without an office—and with a show to do.

I got on my high horse and complained to the network’s vice president of television, Harry Amerly. It wasn’t fair, I told him. In those days, CBS was known as the Tiffany network, and it was. Network headquarters was located at Fifty-second Street and Madison Avenue, the heart of Manhattan, and the executives were gentlemen. They dressed to the nines and conducted themselves accordingly. There wasn’t any skulduggery. The network was run beautifully. And Harry reflected that sensibility. He responded to my ire by saying, “Let’s go out to lunch.”

He took me to Louie & Armand’s, an upscale speakeasy on Fifty-second Street. I didn’t drink at the time. Harry nevertheless ordered me a couple of martinis, one right after the other, which I sipped until I felt a chill in my extremities and heard Harry’s voice begin to fade into the distance as he said something about getting me a new office.

“Boy, I don’t feel well,” I said, and then, all of a sudden, boom! My head hit the table.