The Colbert Report
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Above: "Colbert's Very Wanted: Who Took Gumby?" From the Colbert Report, Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2014.
An unsolved local mystery made national television on Wednesday, when the Colbert Report aired a segment about a 7-foot-tall Gumby statue stolen last fall from a Saugerties backyard.
The Saugerties Gumby -- made by local sculptor Ze'ev Willy Neumann, and a longtime fixture in the backyard of Bob Malkin and Barbara Pokras -- made plenty of local headlines after it was stolen last fall. But it took a hard-hitting expose by Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert to connect the dots: In the past few years, backyard Gumbys have also gone missing in Grand Junction, Colorado and Arden, Delaware.
Coincidence? We think so. But Colbert isn't so sure.
Malkin and Pokras were game for an appearance on the show, and even offered up a possible -- if anatomically improbable -- explanation for Gumby's disappearance.
"There are perverts who love sex with cartoon characters, so that could've been the reason," Malkin theorized. "Protect your Gumby," he urged.
The Saugerties couple now has a new Gumby, complete with Pokey sidekick, made by Neumann and exhibited during Saugerties' First Friday celebration earlier this month. Here's hoping Gumby II will avoid his predecessor's unfortunate fate.
