Television: Onward & Upward for Kids

Children have all along been television’s most abject welfare cases. A low-budget parade of foolish old men (“Hi. kids, I’m Cap’n Fun!”) and cartoon clips has spoiled a whole generation’s late afternoons. And when FCC Chairman Newton Minow tried herding television out of “the wasteland” and into the pastures above, the last to abandon the barren soil of silliness were the cornflakes hustlers—and the children rustlers. This season, though, things seem astonishingly different.

The Westinghouse Broadcasting Co., which has outlets in only five cities,* has come up with a new once-a-month series that is the most distinguished of all the new programs for children. In its debut last week. Magic, Magic, Magic was a superb history-by-example conducted with grace by Milbourne Christopher. A peerless magician himself, Christopher showed rare films of Houdini at his moments of narrow triumph, gave teasing explanations of illusion and legerdemain, then performed tricks of his own with Julie Harris and Zero Mostel as his straight men.

In November, Robert Shaw acts as a pubescents’ Leonard Bernstein to explain the makings of music; in December, children will see Black Nativity, with its original New York cast; and in January, they will be inducted into the mysteries of puppetry.

Along with the hardy and worthy perennials (Watch Mr. Wizard, Romper Room, The Shari Lewis Show and Captain Kangaroo), each network has one good new offering:

· NBC’s Exploring (Saturday, 12:30-1:30 p.m., E.S.T.) is hosted by an entertaining but no-nonsense schoolmaster. Puppets act out man’s discovery of arithmetic, for example, and a dance group performs a Hindu legend.

· CBS’s Reading Room (Saturday. 12 :301 p.m.) guides children through the pleasures of books, and a panel of children adds a spelling-bee atmosphere that keeps things lively.

· ABC’s Discovery ’62 precedes the network’s excellent American Newsstand (which tells its young audience an appealing version of the day’s news) at 4:30 p.m. each weekday. Discovery ranges from filmed visits to big Texas ranches to dramatized essays on the history of the dance, is by far the most ambitious of the new shows for children. Provided the pressure of a daily show does not pull down its standards, Discovery should survive the season as television’s Pied Piper.

* WBZ-TV in Boston, KPIX in San Francisco, KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh, KYW-TV in Cleve land, and WJZ-TV in Baltimore.