Hugh Brannum Dies; TV’s ‘Mr. Green Jeans’

Hugh Brannum, known to a generation of youngsters as the convivial farmer, handyman and frustrated inventor “Mr. Green Jeans” on the long-running television series “Captain Kangaroo,” has died. He was 77.

Brannum was part of the original cast of the CBS morning children’s program when it went on the air Oct. 3, 1955, and he stayed with the show during its 29-year run.

Pamela Spears, a spokeswoman at Pocono Hospital, said Brannum, who suffered from cancer, died Sunday night at the East Stroudsburg, Pa., facility. She said he had been a patient at the hospital several times in recent years.

Bob Keeshan’s “Captain Kangaroo” and Brannum’s overalls-clad “Mr. Green Jeans” were the most popular characters on the program, which also featured Debbie, Dennis, Mr. Baxter and the Banana Man. Brannum remained with “Captain Kangaroo” until the show, renamed “Wake Up” in 1982, was canceled in 1984.

The program originally had been an outgrowth of Keeshan’s local New York program, “Tinker’s Workshop,” and attempted to explain to preschool children the adult world through cartoons, stories, songs and sketches, often with puppets.

“People will remember him for the animals he showed us and the rural America he showed us in a very real way,” Keeshan said Tuesday. “They’ll remember him for his caring and his gentleness, which was very real. So many millions grew up with him as a good friend.”

Brannum, lean and lanky, was born in Sandwich, Ill., and began his show-business career as a bass player in a jazz band, the Four Squires.

Orchestra leader Fred Waring heard them and he hired the quartet. Brannum joined Waring’s Pennsylvanians as “Uncle Lumpy” in the 1930s and stayed with the band and choral group until 1955.

He also wrote songs for children’s records, including “Hubert the Horse” and “Little Orley Stories.”