Jon Stone

ANYONE can play on the emotions of children. Jon Stone's gift was to teach them useful things while they were falling about with laughter or gripped by a story. What cunning tricks adults do play on children. But perhaps they are grateful later on. Millions of otherwise deprived children have learnt at least the rudiments of knowledge—how to count and spell—by watching “Sesame Street”, an American television show that Mr Stone helped to create. It doesn't sound much, numbers and letters, but unless you make a start you'll never become a brain surgeon. Many Americans who got to university were happy to acknowledge that they grew up on “Sesame Street”.