This blue shirt was part of a costume worn by Larry Harmon as the first Bozo the Clown on the children’s television show of the same name from 1949-1954.
Bozo the Clown was originally created by Alan Livingston in 1946 for a children's storytelling album for Capital Records. In 1956, Larry Harmon, an actor who previously portrayed Bozo during promotional events, bought the rights to the clown's image, and over the next fifty years, licensed and franchised Bozo to television stations all over America and the world. Harmon further developed the character during the 1950s and trained over 200 new actors from 1950s through the 1990s to play the clown. Harmon played Bozo on television from 1958-1962. The character of Bozo the Clown peaked in popularity in the 1960s but was beloved by many children for the entire second half of the twentieth century
Our collection database is a work in progress. We may update this record based on further research and review. Learn more about our approach to sharing our collection online.
If you would like to know how you can use content on this page, see the Smithsonian's Terms of Use. If you need to request an image for publication or other use, please visit Rights and Reproductions.