Who are the people in your neighborhood? This Sesame Street founding cast member was one. The author’s chance encounter with him on the trails of Tallman Mountain made an impression that will last a lifetime
It takes a special kind of celebrity to live in Rockland County, just north of New York City in the lower Hudson Valley. It is a magnet for people who want to work in the arts, but who haven’t been sucked up into the Hamptons ethos. I have a special respect for a celebrity who has the means to live wherever they want, but who chooses to live among us. On the banks of the Hudson, we have a diverse range of backgrounds, demographically and economically. It’s not a perfect world, but it feels as though everyone here at least tries to get along.
The local celebrity story I’d like to share isn’t about Bill Murray, Angelina Jolie, or any of the Hollywood superstars who’ve called Rockland their home. It is about a kind, unassuming man who initially came across to me as just one of “the people in my neighborhood.”
It was early March, 2020 – a very worrisome time. Not only was there fear of a novel coronavirus that was making its way through Europe, but my son had just come home ill from college, and although he’s fine now, we hadn’t yet nailed down what was wrong with him. (P.S. – it wasn’t COVID.)
So I did what I normally do. I retreated to the forests and the parks that make Rockland the sanctuary that it is. Long, meditative walks are my exercise of choice, and I often walk in Tallman Mountain State Park. I thrive on walking. It’s great therapy.
One of my usual rest stops along the main north-south Tallman trail is a spot I like to call “the Evan Bench.” (Someone carved the name “Evan” into the seat.) This time, I see an elderly couple on the bench, chatting and relaxing. I didn’t want to rush them by hovering, so I kept my distance. After a couple of minutes, they got up and began walking slowly away, so I started to move in.
“Are you going to sit on that bench?” the woman asked.
“Not if you still need it. Are you through with it?”
“Oh, yes – we’re done.”
I sat down on the bench and started some deep breathing exercises. Then, the man spoke up – a gentle soul with a very inquisitive way about him.
“Have you lived here long?” he asked.
“Yes, I have, actually I’ve lived here almost 25 years.”
“Do you like it here?”
“Oh, I love it here!”
“We just moved here,” he announced.
“Well, you are going to love it here,” I gushed. The man had just hit on one of my favorite topics. “If you love parks, this is the place for you. Each one has a different personality. They provide places for meditation and forest bathing, and they all have different moods.”
I started in with some of the highlights, from the Piermont Pier to the Erie Path to Nyack Beach, all within walking distance.
“Plus,” I added, “this community is brimming with such a rich and varied history. The Tappan Zee, the Lenape people, the Dutch, the Revolution – just so much.”
“Are you a teacher?” he asked.
“Why do you say that?”
“You’re just very animated. You have the energy of a teacher,” he observed. “You seem like you taught young children.”
I actually had taught young children, at the very beginning of my career. How did he pick up on that?
“I see film production crews every now and then around here,” he continued.
“Well, you know, we’re Hollywood-on-the-Hudson,” I said.
“What kinds of things should I watch if I want to see this park?”
“Well, the series You on Netflix, for one. There’s a murder scene that was shot down there closer to the riverbank. Penn Badgley buried the body. There’s The Sinner, Orange is the New Black – a lot of stuff gets shot here in Rockland.”
“You seem to know a lot about television,” he said.
“Well, I used to work in the media, and my husband is a former news anchor.”
The woman spoke up again.
“Do you know who you’re talking to?”
“My new neighbors!” I responded playfully. But she asked me again - a little more slowly and seriously this time.
“But... do you know who you’re talking to?”
I suddenly felt like a third-grade student who didn’t know the answer in class.
“No...”
“Did you ever watch Sesame Street?” she asked.
“Of course! Of course...”
“Well... this is Bob.”
Bob McGrath, a childhood fixture for me and millions of others my age, was now 88 years old. He watched me study his face. I’m a video editor. I examine expressions and do match frames all the time. As soon as that context was there, it didn’t matter how old Bob was. I could see the young man within.
I had watched Sesame Street growing up. I always identified with Oscar the Grouch, thanks in no small measure to my dysfunctional family of origin, where I had been maligned and misunderstood from my earliest years. Of course I loved Grover and Kermit, Bert and Ernie – but for me, it was all about Oscar. Oscar was misunderstood, too.
“Bob, from Sesame Street,” his wife repeated. Bob just stood there, smiling at me. Friendly, very warm, and very, very approachable.
I got a little emotional. I couldn’t help it. My inner child had suddenly come to the surface – and so had Bob’s.
“You’re – you’re Oscar’s best friend!!”
“I am!” he proclaimed.
“I can’t believe – I can’t believe I’m meeting Oscar’s best friend!!”
“Do you know Oscar invited me down to tour his apartment?”
“You went into Oscar’s apartment??”
“I did!” Bob was proud of that.
“Was it nice?”
“As you can imagine, it was a little cramped.”
“Like most New York apartments?”
“Well, it was a little bigger than just the garbage can, you know.”
A flash of all those Sesame Street skits dashed across my mind. Bob did short bits with all the Muppets – but for me, it was primarily about misunderstood Oscar.
In the media industry, you meet celebrities all the time. Sometimes you even have to work with your idols. Once I realized Bob was going to stick around, I squelched my inner groupie and just enjoyed the moment, human to human.
He asked about my family. I told him my husband Steve and I had met when we both worked at NBC’s headquarters, 30 Rockefeller Plaza.
“We met on the 7th floor, where local news is.”
“I worked at 30 Rock too,” Bob volunteered. “Back when I first came to New York.” I was thrilled that we had this in common.
“Wow! What did you do there?”
“Well, have you ever heard of Mitch Miller?”
“Mitch Miller?” I said. “Isn’t that the guy who had the TV sing-along with the on-screen lyrics?”
Bob McGrath, foreground, on Sing Along With Mitch, NBC-TV, circa 1961.
“Yeah!” Bob smiled, apparently impressed that I knew who Mitch Miller was. Bob was the lead tenor on the 1960’s NBC-TV series Sing Along With Mitch, which was taped in the famous Studio 8-H, which has been home to Saturday Night Live now for almost 50 years.
“My husband told me about watching Mitch Miller as a kid with his family!” I said. “I’ve got to FaceTime him.”
It was a mild March afternoon, and I reached Steve while he was working in our front yard. He was using the unseasonably warm weather to finally take down the Christmas lights. Steve was already in high school when Sesame Street premiered in 1969, so he didn’t grow up with it like I did. But his first job out of college was at a small radio station that featured American pop standards, and the playlist was heavy on Mitch Miller.
Steve and Bob quickly bonded over Sing Along songs - including one of my husband’s favorites, a novelty tune about a midcentury comic strip character named Barney Google.
When Steve’s FaceTime with Bob was done, he handed me back my phone. “I’ve got an idea,” I said. “Could you sing Barney Google for Steve? I’ll record you and bring it back to him.”
Bob was immediately game. Without any warm-up, he was live – singing Barney Google, playing to the lens of my iPhone like the professional he was.
Barney Google
With his goo-goo-goo-galy eyes
Barney Google...
The next lyric actually goes...
...had a wife three times his size...
But Bob didn’t sing that. He looked straight at me, and changed the lyrics on the spot:
Barney Google, has a wife three times YOUR size...
I smiled at Bob. His eyes twinkled back. His kindness with those lyrics made it seem as if he knew about all my struggles with weight.
Of course, Bob was most famous for his song, “Who Are The People In Your Neighborhood?” And here, it was as though we had become instant friends – just like any two people in any neighborhood.
I got the feeling Bob would shoot the breeze with me all day, if he could. His wife was so patient with the thunder I was giving him, but, being married to a former TV figure myself, I was sensitive to her body language. It was time to move on.
The three of us continued south on the Tallman Trail, walking and talking, talking and walking, until we reached the spot where the aqua blaze turns right, onto a narrow dirt path heading into the woods.
“This is a little too treacherous for you,” I told Bob. He had become somewhat bow-legged with age. “Well... until next time!”
I waved goodbye. When we had first met back at the Evan Bench, less than an hour before, we had shaken hands. Little did I know that would be my last handshake with anyone for nearly two years. The following week, the White House banned travel from Europe, and before long, New York and much of the country was on COVID-19 lockdown.
Solitary, socially-distanced walks like mine then became the principal source of exercise for thousands of Rocklanders whose gyms were forced to close. I unearthed an Oscar The Grouch t-shirt I had bought at the Palisades Mall when my son was two years old. I wore it the next few times I went to Tallman, in the hopes of running into Bob again. So much for keeping my inner groupie in check.
But I never thought that encounter, in March of 2020, would be both the first and the last time I would see Bob McGrath.
I recently learned that the Bob of my childhood – Oscar the Grouch’s best friend - died on December 4, 2022, in Norwood, New Jersey, at the age of 90.
If I had a celebrity to choose to run into, in the woods – the place where I walk, decompress, meditate, and try to connect with my adventurous inner child – I couldn’t think of a better person than Bob McGrath. We met while I was out playing in my Tallman playground.
And then I realized I wasn’t being a groupie at all – since it was actually Bob who had befriended me first. To me, he will always be a fine human being. Then, and only then, a celebrity.
When I came home to Steve, I was like a happy child wanting to share what happened at recess. “I just met Oscar The Grouch’s best friend!” I exclaimed with glee. Then, I played him Bob singing Barney Google in the middle of Tallman Park on my smartphone.
On Sesame Street, Oscar The Grouch had a special nickname for Bob. He called him Bright Eyes. Whenever I see Oscar again - whether it’s on TV, on someone’s t-shirt, or just as the love-worn toy my neighbor keeps in her garage - I’ll think of Bright Eyes, too.
Lisa M. Duchin, Dunlop Media’s managing partner, is a longtime Rockland resident, avid hiker, and owl watcher.
© 2026 by Lisa M. Duchin
Listen to Bob singing the tenor part on this 1962 recording of Barney Google with Mitch Miller and the Gang.