, an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning force in children’s programming died early Sunday morning after a battle with cancer. He was 80.
“This is a very sad day for my family and I. My wonderful, colorful, fantastic cousin, Stu Rosen died this morning,” wrote Rosen’s cousin Donna Siegel on Facebook. “My heart is broken and I’m sure anyone who has ever met him feels the same way. What a character he was.” She continued, “He is the one I wrote about a few months ago that I gave a birthday party for….but it was really a going away party because he was dying of cancer. I told you all that it was the best party I have ever given.”
Rosen’s was into the industry was as a production assistant at KCET before creating and serving as the co-executive producer of the children’s television program Rosen starred as the titular Dusty in the series that ran from 1970-1980 and featured the puppets of Tony Urbano. Cut from the same cloth of shows like the series featured animal puppets and covered topics like music, school, politics, kindness and behavior.