I met Red Skelton backstage at the Grand Ole Opry House in Nashville as he came off the stage from doing a special performance there. I had broken my ankle and was seated just offstage. (I had backstage access through my press credentials, which I held as a columnist for a monthly country music magazine.) There were others there, gathered around my chair- some were celebrities- who wanted to talk to him, but he told the group to wait. He took off his black patent leather shoes, placed then neatly beside my chair, and disappeared- in his sock feet. He was gone for several minutes. When he returned, he had a red Sharpie in hand. With a black marker he drew a clown on my cast, and then with the red Sharpie he colored the clown's nose in red, and then signed it. That's it. He went to all that trouble to find a red Sharpie somewhere just to color the clown's nose red on my cast. What a nice guy!
I still have that piece of cast from my leg, as well as pics with him and the program for the event, which he also signed, all in a shadowbox in our storage room. He was such a lovely man. (Photos to follow.)
