Sexy Meeses and Sexy Caballeros

You know, back in the day there were so many cool kids' shows on TV and they weren't reserved only for kiddie time on Saturday.  That was really more for cartoons like Mighty Mouse and Crusader Rabbit, my two personal favorites.  Speaking of Mighty Mouse, I still have one of the show's songs rattling around in my peabrain:

Krakatoa Katy, she ain't no lady,

when she starts to shake her sarong.

Now Katy's out in full array,

For Mighty Mouse has saved the day,

for Katy, Katy, Krakatoa Kate.

Krakatoa Katy was this really sexy girl mouse who could shake some mean mousehips in a sarong (at one point in her shakin' you could actually see her underpants!  Gasp!)--so mean in fact that she caused a volcano to erupt!  And oh, please, just think your dirty thoughts and let's move on . . .

Like everybody else I watched Zorro! and The Lone Ranger and sang along with Dale and Roy ("Happy Trails to you, until we meet again, Happy Trails to you, keep smilin' until then".  As you can see, we were often ordered to smile, be happy, eat our vegetables and stay away from Dad's business associate who always offered us a dollar to sit on his lap, and . . .  oh wait, that last one came directly from Mom, not a cowboy on TV).

OK--here's my absolute favorite TV hero: THE CISCO KID.  What a hunk!  He wore the coolest clothes

ever and always looked like he was one step away from being the Grand Marshall at the Rose Parade.  Hell, maybe he WAS at one point! 

This is an actual autographed picture from Duncan Renaldo/The Cisco Kid AND his freakin' horse, Diablo.  As you can see, it's personally directed to Lynn (my first husband) which probably got the little kid so excited that he failed to notice that the To Lynn part is in blue ink and the rest is in black ink.  Whoops.

The show ran from 1950 to 1956 and was on at night.  It was actually filmed in color from the beginning but no one knew that since everyone had black and whites--we all found out when we started getting color TVs in the 60's (if we were lucky) and watched the reruns.  The characters and story were created by author O. Henry in 1907 who depicted the Cisco Kid as NON-Hispanic AND a real, unusually vicious outlaw.  Over the years, however, he evolved into another western Robin Hood.  

Duncan Renaldo and his co-star, Leo Carrillo ("Pancho") were the first regular Hispanic TV stars,  followed a year later by some show starring a redhead and her Cuban husband, what's-his-name.

Ay! Carumba!