Do You Know This Sweet Story About Mr. Rogers?

Published: January 27, 2026

UNDATED FILE PHOTO: Fred Rogers, the host of the children’s television series, “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood,” rests his arms on a small trolley in this promotional portrait from the 1980’s. “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood” will broadcast its last new episode August 31, 2001 it was announced August 30 in a statement by Rogers from Nantucket, Massachusetts. Rogers died at the age of 74 February 27, 2003 at his Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania home. He had been suffering from stomach cancer. (Photo by Family Communications Inc./Getty Images)

By Kayla DeKraker

Though MISTER ROGER’S NEIGHBORHOOD has been off the air for decades, his legacy and message of hope live on.

Maxwell King, who wrote a biography about Fred Rogers, recalled a time when Mr. Roger’s made the dreams of one little boy with a disability come true.

“In 1975, Jeffrey Erlanger, a five-year-old boy from Madison, Wisconsin, confined to a wheelchair, asked his parents, Howard and Pam, if he could meet Mister Rogers rather than going to Disneyland. It was the family’s own version of ‘Make-A-Wish,’ proposed on the eve of major surgery to fuse Jeff’s spine,” Maxwell wrote, per Guideposts. “When asked in an interview why Jeff chose Fred Rogers, Howard and Pam explained that their son ‘always said that Mister Rogers told him that he was special and that he was just fine the way he was, and it gave him confidence and it made him feel good, and Mister Rogers just seemed to love him.’”

Erlanger’s parents wrote a letter to Mr. Rogers sharing their son’s desire to meet him, and he wrote a kind letter back. Several years later, Mr. Rogers wanted to give a child in a wheelchair the opportunity to be on his show, and he remembered Jeffrey.

“He remembered Jeff, and he told his staff to get Jeff,” the boy’s parents recalled. “The staff said, ‘There’re handicapped kids in Pittsburgh. We don’t have to fly somebody here from Wisconsin and go through all that. We could just go down the block.’ No. Fred insisted it had to be Jeff.”

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Erlanger went on the show at 10 years old and boldly told Mr. Rogers and the audience about his disabilities, which began because of a tumor in his spin.

“It was one of the most stunning moments,” said producer Margy Whitmer. “Here’s this child who has multiple disabilities, and Fred said, ‘Talk to me about that wheelchair. Talk to me about what’s wrong with you.’ And this extraordinary kid talked about it in a matter-of-fact way. Fred…presented it to kids watching the show, as ‘this is just the way he is.’”

Almost 20 years later, Erlanger gave Mr. Rogers a special surprise. In 1999 when Mr. Rogers was being inducted into the Television Hall of Fame, Erlanger surprised him on stage. In an emotional moment, he told Mr. Rogers his own iconic line: “On behalf of millions of children and grown-ups, it’s you I like.”

Mr. Rogers desired to be known for being “compassionate.”

“I just like to be remembered for, for being a compassionate human being who happened to be fortunate enough to be born at a time when there was this fabulous thing called television that that could allow me to use all the talents that I’d been given,” he said in a resurfaced interview posted to Instagram.