One of the classic cartoons played regularly on Captain Ernie's Showboat TOUCHE TURTLE IN ZERO HERO
THE CARTOON SHOWBOAT'S GOLDEN ANNIVERSARY!!! 1958 - 2008
Captain Ernie's Showboat WOC TV 6Davenport, Iowa
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The mighty blast from the horn of a Mississippi River Valley showboat echos throughout the living rooms of the bi-state area. To thousands of children this could mean only one thing. Captain Ernie's Showboat is on the air! Before cable television, the Cartoon Network and satellite dishes, there was one who was undisputedly the king of the Quad City area afternoon children's television. That man is a local icon, Mr. Ernie Mims.
THIS IS THE UNOFFICIAL CAPTAIN ERNIE'S SHOWBOAT WEBSITE!
Joined by the Mississippi River, the Quad Cities area includes Davenport and Bettendorf, Iowa, Rock Island, Moline and East Moline Illinois as well as many other adjoining cities. Before cable television arrived in 1972, the surrounding area from Dubuque, Iowa to the north, Burlington, Iowa to the south, Iowa City to the west and Dixon, Illinois to the east was served by one of the original television stations, WOC-TV 6 Davenport, Iowa (originally channel 5). Owned by the local Palmer family of Palmer Chiropractic fame, WOC was a powerhouse station and remains one to this day as KWQC-TV 6. Mr. Ernie Mims, a local television legend, grew up in Nashua, New Hampshire. Even while in grade school, he was always entertaining other children. He recalls having other kids over to play and he was always putting on a show or skit for them. His show business career started when he played the trumpet in the United States Air Force Band alongside Tommy Newsom of The Tonight Show fame. Ernie attended a thirteen week broadcasting school in Boston and learned of an opening at WQUB radio in Galesburg, Illinois. G. Laverne Flambo, a P.T. Barnum of radio, was the owner of WQUB as well as WQUA in the Quad Cities. It was at WQUB where Ernie Memos' name was changed to Ernie Mims. Ernie said that he was told while at WQUB that it was "the thing to do" in the industry, to change your name to something similar in nature. Hence, Ernie Mims was born. WOC hired on Ernie after he had accepted a transfer to WQUA and he started his career serving various duties crossing between WOC-TV and WOC Radio 1420 AM as most WOC employees did. His various jobs included announcing the news, presenting commercials live on the air as well as behind the scenes work. Working at WOC provided him with the opportunity to present cartoons on Sunday mornings. WOC manager Ray Guth noticed the success of the Cartoon Showboat which ran Monday thru Friday afternoons and decided that it would be a good idea to continue a cartoon show on Sunday mornings as well. Wes Holly who was Cowboy Wes on the Circle 6 Ranch, which was the immediate predecessor to The Showboat, had just left his popular Cartoon Corral show which aired on Sunday from 8am to 10am. So, starting in the shadow of local children's tv personality Captain Ken, he became Uncle Ernie after originally introducing himself as the tv station's janitor. Many ideas were tossed around for an idea of whom would lead the show. The standard fair of clowns and ventriloquist were presented but Mr. Guth liked Ernie's idea of just being the janitor of the station. So, on Sunday mornings, Ernie wore a thick bushy mustache as well as baggy pants and a janitor's uniform. On the first show, he was mopping the floor and looked into the camera as if he had been interrupted and introduced himself as Uncle Ernie, the janitor of WOC and he let the children know that since they were together, they might as well watch some cartoons and have some fun along the way! In one of the most remembered and favorite segments, in between cartoons, Ernie would take a number such as the number 6 and draw on it until it became a cartoon figure or funny face. This segment carried on throughout his career as a children's host and he is still asked to this day to draw cartoons from numbers on various articles such as napkins if he is spotted in a restaurant! Many children tried their best to stump Uncle Ernie. They would not settle for "easy" numbers to draw characters such as the number "6" or "9". They would choose the hard ones such as "24". One child in particular presented him with his greatest challenge. He tried to outwit Ernie by presenting the following: Uncle Ernie thought fast and was up to the challenge by drawing: To which Uncle Ernie responded "CALL THE T.V. REPAIRMAN!" As time went by and Uncle Ernie's popularity grew, a great opportunity presented itself as the position of Captain became open on the station's popular Cartoon Showboat which aired after school Mondays through Fridays. Many people from clowns to magicians auditioned for the position but Mr. Mims, who is an artist (and musician) in his own right, had the talent and skills it took to make the program work. Preceeded by Captain Ken Wagner in 1958, Captain Vern Gielow in 1959 and Captain Don Warren in 1963, Uncle Ernie had became the fourth Captain of the Dixie Belle on March 24th, 1965 and in the process had become a local icon and hero to thousands of children in a ten year magical run which will most likely never be equalled. The local television scene in the 1960's included local CBS affiliate WHBF and new comer ABC affiliate WQAD. WOC was the NBC station. Channel 2 out of Cedar Rapids could rarely be seen during certain times of year and KRIN/KIIN public television could be watched in the early 1970's with a special antenna attachment. Captain Ernie's showboat was simply THE place to go after school for cartoons and children's programming. Loaded with an arsenal of 250 cartoons which gave the show its competitive edge, the show was simply untouched by its competitors.
A secret weapon in its arsenal was the fact that sister station WHO-TV 13 in Des Moines, Iowa was running its own children's show and also had 250 different cartoons. Midway through the season, WOC and WHO would swap the cartoons between each other to keep the shows fresh. Some pooh-pooh the notion that children want to watch the same cartoons over and over again. Ernie disagrees. He believes that children are comforted by repetition at an early age. He also knows that The Showboat's strength was how there was always another group of kids coming of age who had never seen these cartoons before. It was entirely new to them and their older brothers and sisters were more than happy to introduce Captain Ernie to their siblings and friends! (not to mention the torture that older siblings gave younger ones when written words appeared on Looney Tunes cartoons which the younger set was not able to read!) Among these cartoons were timeless Looney Tunes classics (including the World War II episodes and vintage pre-1940 films. Many to this day can remember exact titles songs and episodes of these cartoons such as "Call for Miss Glory" and "My Green Fedora"), Hanna Barbera classics such as Lippy the Lion and Hardee Har-Har as well as Touche' Turtle. Others included Pixie and Dixie, Snagglepus, Gumby and Pokey and The Three Stooges shorts. Ernie remembers a favorite one that went "I love to singa / About the moon-a and the June-a and the spring-a / I love to singa / About a sky of blue-a or a tea for two-a / Anything with a swinga to an I love you-a / I love to, I love to sing." He explains that the toons were not necessarily geared toward children and that adults got a kick out of watching them too! The Three Stooges shorts were interesting as it seemed as if an entire episode could never be watched. The reason for this, Captain Ernie explains, is that the producers of the show deemed that children were too young to sit still and watch an entire 20 minute Three Stooges episode so it was chopped up into thirds and presented as a series, interrupted by commercials, skits and other cartoons. Captain Ernie would always explain to the children that poking someone in the eye was not appropriate behavior and the reason for which the Three Stooges were funny was because in real life no one would ever do such things as hitting each other. If they did that, it would not be funny.
The Three Stooges fit right in line with the concept of the show. Captain Ernie was more into fun and frolic and less into educational aspects of children's television viewing. It was a program where a child had come home from a day of learning at school. Ernie would tell the children that they had worked hard at school or if you didn't then shame on you. If you have homework to do then do it later on. For awhile here we'll just take a break and have a little fun and let you get your head cleared again.
In one of the most popular segments, Captain Ernie would be joined during the show with his hand puppet friend Sidney. Sidney behind the scenes was a gentleman who was the son of one of the most prominant chiropractors in the area, Dr. Frogley. The Palmer family who owned WOC always encouraged WOC to hire Palmer Chiropractic students because "they needed the money". The segment with Sidney revolved around the Captain's treasure chest which would always have something fun inside of it that everyone wanted to see, a mailbag for postcard drawings and a wire cage spinner which held postcards for an extra special drawing. During these segments Captain Ernie would dig deep into his mailbag and pull out a postcard which a child had sent in. Captain Ernie was overwhelmed with thousands of postcards and would carefully explain to the children when he was going to dump all of the cards out and that they would have to re-send their postcards to have a chance to be picked. In what was probably the most incredible part of the entire show, Captain Ernie would give out a full case of Mountain Dew in glass bottles by drawing some lucky child's name. Captain Ernie laughs and takes credit of the hyperactivity present in our culture today due to the huge volume of sugary sweet Moutain Dew that was given out for free during the decade he was on the air!
The Three Stooges segments were not the only parts of the show which were altered. Mr. Mims believes to this day that producers were in error when they refused to allow longer segments of Captain Ernie conversing with children on live t.v. The producers simply thought that no child would want to sit for a long period of time and watch other children speak and interact with the Captain. How wrong they were as watching the children on the risers talking with Captain Ernie was one of the most memorable segments of the show. Captain Ernie would move over with microphone in hand and speak to some forty to fifty children on what was called the risers (metal bleacher seats in the WOC studio) and speak to them about various topics. As this was taking place, children at home were mesmerized by the children who were all waving what appeared to be postcards at the camera. There was not one child in the WOC viewing area who did not wish to be on these risers with the other children someday. Three special children who secretly appeared on the show at various times were Captain Ernie's own children! Ernie even introduced his son one time and they participated in a skit together. Today, his son is a successful television professional in the state of Florida!
Captain Ernie fan Steven Smith remembers that the "postcards" that the kids were waving madly were manila card stock, like a trimmed file folder which had your name and age on them. In typical children's innocence, the kids on the show would forget their own names and ages or simply be too bashful to speak to Captain Ernie! Writing the names on the back of the cards saved the show on a daily basis, keeping the flow of the interviews running in good measure. If children's names were not a challenge enough, groups such as the "Mothers of Twins Club" would occasionally appear on the show! Captain Ernie flagged each of these children by remembering something unique such as one lock of hair that was combed in a different direction!
Click on the Captain Ernie ad to see the full Sandy's grand opening ad!
As one can see, Captain Ernie, in addition to being on live television Monday through Friday for a decade, also made live appearances. One of his favorite memories is giving the private Christmas program at giant Hon Industries in Muscatine Iowa. Captain Ernie was certainly in demand. In one of his greatest schticks, Ernie would ask the children at these parties "who wants to be in a Mountain Dew drinking contest?!" Of course, every kid screamed that they wanted to be in the contest. They would sit at a table only to find out that Captain Ernie had slipped nipples onto the glass Mountain Dew bottles changing them into baby bottles! The children who asked to be in the contest would be ready to die and then succumb to acting like a baby while chugging on the nipple on the bottle. Captain Ernie never played the trick on the air because he knew if the kids saw it, they would tell all of their friends and the gig would be up! Ernie himself would purchase the nipples and would always have to explain to the cashier why he needed so many!
In what was most likely Captain Ernie's greatest gag of all time, one must take into account that he was in live programming, five days a week for a decade. Every show would end with the Captain saying goodbye to his friends at home. On one unassuming Friday afternoon, Ernie was trying to think of some way to sign off the air a little differently. The background for Captain Ernie's showboat was the Mississippi River and there were clouds and a blue sky. To a child, it actually looked as if he was on a riverboat. As he waved goodbye to his fans at home, he fell backwards on purpose over the back railing as if he had fallen off the ship and into the deep Mississippi behind him! Thousands of children were terrorized and WOC-TV phonelines lit up like a Christmas tree with parents expressing their displeasure that their child now thought that Captain Ernie had just fallen off the Dixie Belle! Ernie came back on the air on the following Monday afternoon as if nothing had ever happened. This picture is from Bill Wundram's outstanding book "A Time We Remember" and is used here for reference of what a portion of the set looked like and is copyright Quad City Times. The pilot house was where little hand puppet Sidney ("OHHHH SIDNEY!!!!" as the Captain would call) would converse with Ernie. There were hundreds upon hundreds of pictures such as this taken with the Captain. If you have a picture of the Captain in your family album, please email me! One interesting part of the picture regards the railing that the children and Captain Ernie are posing in back of. This railing was part of the stairwell of the old WOC studios, before WOC relocated to its current residence (see the picture at the top of this website, it is now KWQC TV 6). The railing was painted bright orange and added to the set as a great tribute to this mighty station's former home!
The Showboat was certainly in demand as well. Advertising was cheap on television in the 1960's and early 1970's. The showboat had a lock on the vast majority of children's viewership and companies clamored to be on or advertise on the show. Lofty perks were thrown out to be associated with The Showboat which Ernie feels led to the demise of local children's programming. The captive young audience was very persuadable to want whatever was presented to them. Many, many guest appearances by television stars also occured on The Showboat with Captain Ernie. One appearance was by the legendary Lorne Greene who played the father on the wildly popular "Bonanza". Ernie remembers that Mr. Greene prepaired his voice for the show in the dressing room by singing scales of notes! Mr. Mims speculates that so many stars wanted to be on the program because even though it was children for the most part watching the show, it was still thousands of people in the audience.
Captain Ernie's Showboat was more than a tv show, it was an hour escape from a long day at grade school. It was also a very special place to go to on your birthday with your friends or for cub scouts, bluebird and brownie outings. The lucky birthday child was not only able to see Captain Ernie but also was able to take a picture with the Captain and tour the WOC studio behind the scenes! The risers themselves rose around three to four levels tall. As children waited for Captain Ernie to come over and interview them, they were treated to a tv screen in front of them which was playing non-stop cartoons while the cameras scanned the faces of the unassuming kids! The beauty of the Showboat was it gave mothers and organizations a place to take the kids on a trip as well as a place for kids to be seen on television.
The following is a sample of Captain Ernie's schedule on WOC-TV 6 during his 1965 through 1974 run:
March 1965
3 p.m. Match Game
3:30 p.m. Bachelor Father
4 p.m. Cartoon Showboat
5 p.m. Huckleberry Hound
March 1968
3:30 p.m. Mr. Ed
4 p.m. Cartoon Showboat
5 p.m. Truth or Consequences (with Bob Barker!)
August 1972
3 p.m. Somerset
3:30 p.m. Cartoon Showboat
4:30 p.m. To Tell the Truth
Interestingly, the Showboat did not start at the logical time of 3:30 p.m. in the early to middle years (children leave school at 3 p.m. and arrive home usually by 3:30 p.m.). Also note that adult programming led into Showboat during 1965 and cartoons followed it. In 1968, children's programming led into it and family programming followed it. In 1972, with a 3:30 p.m. starting time, soap operas led into it followed by game shows.
One of the producers of the show came up with a concept where Captain Ernie would have a show which was tailored to adults. It would be along the lines of the Showboat but the segments would only deal with adult issues. Later in his television career, Captain Ernie appeared with WOC's Paula Sands in a show which pre-dates the popular local "Paula Sands Live Show".
Sadly, Captain Ernie's Showboat left the air on August 2nd, 1974 and was replaced by I Dream of Jeanie. Captain Ernie explains that with the rise of cable tv in the area in 1972, the viewing habits of the population were changing at the expense of local programming. It was just time for a change. It had nothing to do with ratings, which were very good. Business was good, it was very saleable. It was just a management decision to do something different. Another factor that played a part in all children's television shows such as the Showboat was parental groups were increasingly vocal against exploitation of children. Children were seen at the time as very vulnerable to what they were seeing in commercial plugs as well as what they were viewing in sometimes violent cartoons.
The Showboat by this time had been reduced to a half hour show by WOC from 3:30pm to 4:00pm. It was surrounded by the last soap opera of the day, Somerset at 3:00pm and Bewitched which was airing at 4:00 p.m. What did Captain Ernie do immediately following the final show? What more could you ask for, as shown in this clipping from the Moline Daily Dispatch, he made a special appearance at Moline, Illinois' new Shakey's pizza from 6:30pm until 8:00pm! Shakey's was celebrating the grand opening of their 500th store, their first prototype building location. Miss Peggy from Romper Room was there the very next day.
Shockingly, not one piece of film exist of his show. Since it was taped live, it was either taped over or not taped at all. In the ten years that the show was on, some 2,600 shows were aired. In the immediate Quad City area alone, the majority of over 150,000 children watched this show on a daily basis. Over 25,000 children were on this program! Local celebrities such as Paula Sands from WOC/KWQC fame got their start in showbiz by appearing on the risers with Captain Ernie at a very young age. Occasional guest host during Captain Ernie's vacations such as WOC/KWQC news anchor Charles King hosted the show as well.
Whatever happened to The Showboat set? Incredibly, it still exists! The set remained in storage in the basement of WOC in Davenport, Iowa before it was donated to the Putnam Museum in 1996. Today it remains boxed up in sections and as of July 2005 it has been used twice. One occasion was for a baby boomers of the Quad Cities exibit. The other was a celebration of WOC exibit. The following picture is used with permission of the Putnam Museum in Davenport, Iowa. As you can see, the original pilot house of the boat with the classic "Dixie Belle" logo remains. On the floor is the Captain's treasure chest! The railing of the bridge shown here also has a wrap around section that was not used at the time this particular picture was taken. Finally, the giant smokestacks stand proudly in the background. Putnam Museum of History and Natural Science, Davenport, Iowa
Would you like to help keep the memory of Captain Ernie's Showboat alive? If you grew up in the Quad City area and have great memories watching the show, please email me!
If you appeared on the show, have a picture of yourself and the Captain, have a postcard of Captain Ernie which he handed out on the show or at an appearance, have old film of one of Captain Ernie's appearances anywhere from WOC to special appearances at Hon Industries Christmas Party, or just have a question, please email me!
To meet Captain Ernie today, you would have to say that his character equals the legendary icon that he became. He is quite simply one of the nicest guys you will ever meet. Maybe that is why his show was so dear to the hearts of the children who watched it even to this day. His character shows through. Perhaps no other television personality influenced more baby boomers in the Quad City area in how to have fun. To quote Ernie, "If I was offered to do the show one more time, I would do it. I still like entertaining, I am still the showbiz kid." Captain Ernie Mims is a local legend.
If you have any memorabilia, pictures or stories or film of Captain Ernie, please email me!
If you have any memorabilia, pictures, stories or film of any of the other Quad Cities kids show hosts, including; Ken Wagner (Captain Ken), Cowboy Whitey (Walt Reno), Cowboy Wes Holly, Captain Vern Geilow, Captain Don Warren, Cactus Jim (Bob Allard), Acri Creature Feature, Jungle Jay, Chiller Theater, Bozo on WQAD 1960's, Grandpa Happy, Marshal J (WMT Cedar Rapids), or any others from the Golden Age of Quad City television, please email me!
This site is a tribute to Captain Ernie Mims and Captain Ernie's Showboat and has no affiliation with any of the copyrighted material shown or mentioned which are used as reference only. This site is not affiliated with WOC, KWQC TV-6, Bill Wundram, The Quad City Times, Hanna-Barberra, Mountain Dew, The Three Stooges, The Rock Island Argus, The Daily Dispatch or any other identity shown or referred to on this website. All images are presumed to be copyright their respective owners and are used here only for reference under fair use provisions.
Captain Ernie also had promotional picture cards to hand out when he made special appearances. There were a total of three different cards with his picture on them. One of the cards given out to the children can be seen here in this advertisement which appeared in the Rock Island Argus for Sandy's Drive-In, one of the greatest fast food restaurants of all time! 
Please click here to sign Captain Ernie's guestbook! 