Videolog Television Program

Charley Franks the elephant man died last week. He was 87. You may have seen him in a "Videolog" on KCET. You know, the Los Angeles man reunited in 1988 with Nita, the elephant he gave to the San Diego Wild Animal Park when he retired from the circus 15 years earlier. It was beautiful. After all those years, Nita still knew Charley and walked across the elephant enclosure to greet him like an old friend. She even performed some of her old tricks.

"People in television try to make it sound much more difficult than it is because that justifies their existence," Huell Howser said. Actually good television can be amazingly simple, and Howser proves it. In December he went to a video store and bought a camcorder for $1,700. Then he bought a round-trip ticket to the Soviet Union, flew to Moscow in late January and, with virtually no preparation, spent two weeks there taping extraordinary interviews with ordinary people.

"People in television try to make it sound much more difficult than it is because that justifies their existence," Huell Howser said. Actually good television can be amazingly simple, and Howser proves it. In December he went to a video store and bought a camcorder for $1,700. Then he bought a round-trip ticket to the Soviet Union, flew to Moscow in late January and, with virtually no preparation, spent two weeks there taping extraordinary interviews with ordinary people.

Charley Franks the elephant man died last week. He was 87. You may have seen him in a "Videolog" on KCET. You know, the Los Angeles man reunited in 1988 with Nita, the elephant he gave to the San Diego Wild Animal Park when he retired from the circus 15 years earlier. It was beautiful. After all those years, Nita still knew Charley and walked across the elephant enclosure to greet him like an old friend. She even performed some of her old tricks.