Heather Henson at the History Center

Heather Henson the daughter of Jim Henson, of Muppets fame, gave a at a lunchtime bag lunch talk about her fathers work at the History Center. She began the talk by showing early black and white television commercials her dad was doing at the beginning of his career. This early advertising work was surprisingly violent and over the top. The dead pan expressions on the Muppets made the zany skits all the more funny.
There was some trouble with the audio so she began talking over the muffled soundtrack. She explained that Kermit the Frog had originally been made from parts of one of her mother’s coats. In the early days her mom had been much more involved in the day to day production work.
Answering a question from the audience, Heather explained that holidays in the Henson home involved creating everything from scratch. Christmas ornaments would be simple Styrofoam which was then hand decorated by the children.
Heather has formed her own puppet company here in town called Ibex Puppetry and I follow their work as often as I can.