He's really most sincerely dead

RIP Meinhardt Raabe. One of the last living munchkins is no more. The coroner from the movie, "Wizard of Oz," just died at the age of 94. He was one of 124 Munchkins in the movie and one of only 9 who had speaking parts. Several years ago I did a "Wizard of Odd" tribute to the movie and used many stamp images I already had plus added a few new ones -- none were of the actual movie characters but were adapted or improvised upon. One of samples we came up with used my stamp "Bulletino" as the coroner with a scroll and the "Certificate of Death." So this is the Carmen's Veranda tribute to Meinhardt Raabe and the movie that has brought so much joy to people for 71 years...and if being a Munchkin wasn't enought, Raabe was also Oscar Mayer's "Little Oscar," and toured the country in the Wienermobile for more than 30 years. I saw him in 1959 at the Ralph's market on Chatsworth in Granada Hills; the same day Engineer Bill appeared at the store and some lucky kids were chosen to play "red light, green light." ...almost too much excitement for one day. Talk about starstruck!