Question: What is the story on the Hoblitt Hotel in Old Town Clovis? There's also a street named Hoblitt in Clovis.

-- Marjorie Dau, Fresno

Answer: Joshua C. Hoblitt and his wife, Fannie Guptill Hoblitt, built the three-story Hoblitt Hotel on the northwest corner of Pollasky Avenue and Fourth Street in 1902, in what today is Old Town Clovis.

Fannie Hoblitt was born in Maine in 1846. She was a teacher, principal and school administrator before she married Joshua Hoblitt in 1900. They moved to Clovis in 1902 and built the hotel, which also was their home.

A biographer of the era said Fannie Hoblitt "has been a tireless worker in the social, moral and educational life" of Clovis.

Hoblitt Avenue is named after the pioneering family.

The high-class hotel was popular with travelers. When it was built, it was the only hotel in town with indoor plumbing on every floor. In 1916, the hotel hosted an annual reunion of Civil War veterans from the San Joaquin Valley.

The Hoblitt Hotel was sold in the 1920s and the new owners renamed it Hotel Lillie Francis for their daughters, Lillie and Francis.

In 1927, the third story of the hotel was destroyed by a fire started by a frying pan left on a hot wood-fueled stove. There wasn't enough water pressure for firefighters to save the top floor, said Peg Bos, curator of Clovis-Big Dry Creek Museum.

The building was repaired, but only to two stories, and its days as a grand hotel were over.

Over the years it housed the Sierra Vista Hospital and doctors' offices. It was later named the Clovis Hotel, with retail space on the first floor and rooms for rent upstairs.

Extensive renovations were completed in 2006. The former hotel was gutted to repair the foundation and replace walls, flooring, windows, plumbing and electrical wiring.

Today, the ground floor houses the Victoria Rose Restaurant, which serves lunch and traditional English tea service, said owner Nathan Lewis-Copeland. The Clovis Community Development Agency has offices upstairs.

Q: When I was a kid, there was a clown on television named Flippo Jr. Was he a local guy and why did the show go off the air?

-- Danny Jones, Reedley

A: Flippo Jr. appeared on a children's show broadcast on Channel 12 -- which later became Channel 30 -- from about 1960 until about 1970, said Marv Harrison, who played the part.

"I'm very much alive and kicking," said Harrison, 75, of Fresno.

There was at least one other Flippo the Clown on local television in Columbus, Ohio, from the early 1950s until 1983.

Harrison said Fresno's Flippo Jr. was created in the late 1950s by Harry White, the station's marketing director, who wore a clown costume at appearances for station sponsors.

He was hired in about 1960 to play Flippo Jr. on Channel 12's children's show. His first costume was made by the theater department at then-Fresno State College.

Harrison, who grew up in Kingsburg, graduated from Fresno State, where he was student body president.

Harrison eventually had three costumes for Flippo Jr., all predominantly blue-and-white and topped off with a signature red wig. "The Beatles were popular then and I got a Beatles wig and dyed it bright red," he said.

In 1969, Harrison said, he discovered that the station was paying White for the rights to use the Flippo Jr. name, so Harrison renamed the clown "Marvo."

Harrison portrayed Marvo for about another year before moving to Los Angeles. He returned to Fresno in about 1976 and went to work for Channel 49 in the late 1980s. He retired five years ago.

He said his work as Flippo Jr. remains "one of the greatest times I had."