Bozo Passes Away

Larry Harmon, the entrepreneur who brought Bozo the Clown to television as a children's show host in the late 1950s and spent the next 50 years promoting the flame-haired circus character, died Thursday. He was 83. Harmon, who suffered from heart disease, died at his home in Los Angeles, said his wife, Susan.

“Bozo and Larry were one and the same," she told The Times on Thursday. “He's lived it and breathed it since he bought [the rights] from Capitol Records in the '50s. He made it what it is, and it's been his life."

Bozo was created for a series of Capitol children's records in 1946, with Vance “Pinto" Colvig, the voice of Walt Disney's Goofy, providing the clown's voice.

Several years later, Harmon answered a casting call for a clown to make personal appearances to promote the Bozo records. After landing the job, he took over as the voice on the records and then bought the rights to the character.

Harmon launched the first Bozo children's show on KTLA-TV Channel 5 in Los Angeles in 1959, with Pinto Colvig's son, Vance, playing the role. From there, Harmon began franchising Bozo, and the bulb-nosed clown with the big feet became an iconic children's show character around the nation and the world.