What Happened to ‘Captain Kangaroo’ Star Bob Keeshan After the Show Ended?

CAPTAIN KANGAROO, Bob Keeshan, 1955-1984, TV — Everett Collection

For nearly three decades, Bob Keeshan was a fixture of American children’s morning routines as the star of the CBS program Captain Kangaroo, which ran from 1955 to 1984. “If you were going to build a monument to commercial children’s television and you had to put a statue on top of it, it would have to be Bob Keeshan,” Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University, told the Los Angeles Times in 2004, after Keeshan’s death.

But what did Keeshan do with his life after Captain Kangaroo? As it turns out, he devoted his last years to children as well, through various professional pursuits. And Keeshan’s devotion to one special kid in his life — his grandson Britton — posthumously took the TV personality’s legacy to new heights.

Bob Keeshan returned to TV with CBS Storybreak

In 1985, the year after Captain Kangaroo’s end on CBS, Keeshan made a comeback with another children’s TV show, CBS Storybreak, in which he introduced animated adaptations of children’s literature. “The challenge is immense,” he told the Canadian Press. “We want to get children to read and use the library.”

He also offered a stern rebuke to parents at the time. “I am so often asked: ‘How do I get my children to read?’ Well, your children are coming home and watching you watch television,” he observed. “You are the role model for your children. If you want them to read, try picking up a book once in a while.”

Keeshan hosted CBS Storybreak for three seasons between 1985 and 1989, and Malcolm-Jamal Warner emceed the program when it made a brief return in 1993.

He co-founded a company called Corporate Family Solutions in 1987

In an off-camera career move, Keeshan teamed up with former Texas governor Lamar Alexander to launch Corporate Family Solutions in 1987. The company operated workplace childcare centers for companies including Sears, Toyota, and Turner Broadcasting, as the Los Angeles Times reported in 1997.

“I’ll never forget it,” Marguerite Sallee, then the company’s president and chief executive, told the newspaper. “One day, the governor said to me, ‘How would you like to go into business with Captain Kangaroo?’”

In the 1990s, Keeshan moved to Vermont and wrote children’s books

Keeshan moved to Vermont in 1990, per the Associated Press, and made a home for himself in the town of Norwich. And later that decade came the publication of children’s books Keeshan wrote, including 1996’s Hurry, Murray, Hurry! and Alligator in the Basement, and 1997’s Itty Bitty Kitty and Itty Bitty Kitty Makes a Big Splash.

Keeshan’s publisher told The New York Times in 1997 that one obstacle in the former TV host’s writing career was the assumption that he’d already died. When interviewed about that misconception, Keeshan told the Times, “Do I need to send you a notarized statement saying I’m alive, so you know you’re not talking to a recording?”

Keeshan died at age 76 in 2004

Exaggerated reports of Keeshan’s death notwithstanding, the man behind Captain Kangarooactually lived into the 2000s. He died on January 23, 2004, at age 76, with his family saying in a statement the cause of death was a “long illness,” according to the Associated Press.

“Keeshan, I think, has a tremendously important place in the history of children’s television,” Washington Post television critic Tom Shales told CBS Radio News at the time, per the AP. “It’s a pity there weren’t more shows like his. Bob Keeshan almost single-handedly was a forerunner to all the children’s programming that’s so acclaimed now.”

A photo of him is buried at Mount Everest’s peak, thanks to his mountaineering grandson

Just four months after Keeshan’s death, his grandson Britton, then 22, he reached the peak of Mount Everest and became the youngest person — at the time, at least — to scale the tallest mountains on all seven continents. Once at Everest’s peak, Britton buried a photo of himself and his famous grandfather in the ice.

“We had a strong relationship,” Britton told USA Today following the feat. “This mountaineering adventure was something he believed in: the endurance, exploring the globe.”

And Britton’s tribute to his grandfather is what Captain Kangaroo was all about, as Keeshan modeled the show off such a bond. When asked about the inspiration behind the Captain Kangaroo character, Keeshan said, “I was impressed with the potential positive relationship between grandparents and grandchildren, so I chose an elderly character.”