This is an extreme close-up of Bucket #2 from The Grand Prize Game. The ball-in-a-bucket game was featured regularly on The Bozo Show, a highly popular and long-running children's television program that aired on WGN-TV in Chicago and nationally via Superstation WGN.

The Grand Prize Game was created in 1962 by Don Sandburg, a producer and writer for The Bozo Show, and Bob Bell, who played Bozo the Clown.

In the game, a boy and girl from the studio audience tried to toss ping-pong balls into six numbered buckets, each set farther away. Prizes increased in value with each successful bucket, culminating in a cash bonus, Schwinn bicycle, and a trip. A lucky home viewer whose postcard or envelope was drawn from the Bozo Drum won duplicate prizes of everything each in-studio player won.

Fun memories for both Chicago-based kids and those watching outside the Windy City!

A more somber memory of The Grand Prize Game comes from November 22, 1963. A news bulletin reporting that John F. Kennedy had been shot in Dallas, TX, interrupted WGN’s Bozo's Circus (as the show was then called) at the start of The Grand Prize Game.

Years later, The Grand Prize Game would be licensed out for both home and coin-operated versions, the latter of which you can see here.