Peaceful Neighbor: Discovering the Counter Cultural Mister Rogers

[RightSaidFred]

A new book comes out tomorrow (already have it preordered on Amazon ;)) about the pacifist and peace waging side of the show and the man. Sounds like a provocative subject matter. I hope it is well researched and not just a ham fisted attempt at cashing in on the man's good name to the far left. We'll see.

[mitsguy2001]

That sounds interesting.  I wonder if it deals with anything that I mentioned in this topic from 3 years ago:
http://neighborhoodarchive.com/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=b9ef1dc479108dfccdef53bf79b2bd81&topic=606.msg2820#msg2820

[RightSaidFred]

An interesting post. You mentioned Fred Rogers' wealth and I hate to admit it but when I learned he came from money (only quite recently) I was disappointed. Mister Rogers was always accessible to me and the knowledge of his wealth seemed to cause a separation. You are correct that people whose family have wealth always carry that cloud over them, that they can't truly relate to the rest of us, whether that is correct or not. My wife mentioned once (sarcastically I'm afraid) no wonder he's so nice, he can afford to be. I like to think now that the money allowe him to be the best person he could be without the shackles of striving so much just to survive this world. Maybe I'm overstating that but I hope you get my point.

As for this new book, I'm a little concerned about the author and him having an "agenda." Again, we'll see.

[mitsguy2001]

Has anybody read this book yet?  My local library doesn't seem to have it.  Is it any good?

[Neighborhood Archive]

I read it cover-to-cover in a day and loved it. There's been some discussion on Facebook regarding the author's possible "hidden agenda" in this book but I personally didn't get that vibe. Either way, I'm going through it a second time now before sharing some thoughts on the site. For me personally, it's one of the better books about Fred and the Neighborhood that I've read.