so sad...
bit/pieces from CNN.com-
"Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" won loads of recognition, including four Emmys and a lifetime achievement award. A cardigan sweater belonging to Rogers hangs in the Smithsonian.
Those sweaters became Rogers' identifying characteristic. He credits his mom for the fashion statement that says, more than anything else, "Won't you be my neighbor?"
"My mother made a sweater a month for as many years as I knew her," Rogers said. "And every Christmas she would give this extended family of ours a sweater.
"She would say, 'What kind do you all want next year?' " said Rogers. "She said, 'I know what kind you want, Freddy. You want the one with the zipper up the front.' "
An ordained Presbyterian minister, Rogers' command of innocence won him thousands of young fans.
"I do think that young children can spot a phony a mile away," he says.
And it also made him the butt of parody by adults like comedian Eddie Murphy, who played his own version of Mister Rogers on "Saturday Night Live."
Rogers knows for a fact that Murphy meant no harm with his humor. In fact, they met once.
"He just put his arms around me and said, 'The real Mister Rogers,' " says Rogers.
On the last show, Rogers enters his home and dons his red zip-up sweater and trades his loafers for a pair of comfy blue sneakers.
The finale ends a weeklong tribute to art, with Rogers leafing through a stack of drawings kids made of the Neighborhood Trolley "to see how different people draw the same thing."
It's a simple message of diversity that will be aired on hundreds of "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" reruns on PBS, and Rogers hopes kids who watch it will take it with them as they grow into adults.
"We all long to be lovable and capable of loving," he says. "And whatever we can do through the Neighborhood or anything else to reflect that and to encourage people to be in touch with that, then I think that's our ministry."
What an incredible, incredible man.
Goodbye Neighbor! You will be missed!
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