Editing Jim Henson (section)

===Early career: 1954–1961===
Henson began working at [[WUSA (TV)|WTOP-TV]] (now WUSA-TV) in the late spring of 1954, at age {{Age in years|1936|09|24|1954|06|01}}<!-- Age calculated as of June for "late spring" -->, hired to "manipulate marionettes"{{Sfn|Jones|2013|p=33}} on a Saturday morning children's show called ''The Junior Morning Show'', until the show was cancelled only three weeks later. This first break into the television industry was short-lived, but his talent landed him and his puppets an opportunity to continue working at WTOP-TV, [[lip-syncing]] on Roy Meachum's ''Saturday'' show.{{Sfn|Jones|2013|p=33-35}}

Henson's employment at WTOP-TV lasted only until August, when ''Saturday'' was also cancelled. Meachum then referred Jim to the local NBC-affiliate station WRC-TV, where Henson continued performing his puppets with Jane's help. The two were eventually offered a nightly segment{{Sfn|Jones|2013|p=44}} for which they created ''[[Sam and Friends]]'', a three-to-five-minute puppet show that afforded Henson much more freedom to develop his own creative work. The characters on ''Sam and Friends'' were forerunners of the Muppets, and the show included a prototype of Henson's most famous character, Kermit the Frog.{{sfn|Finch|1993|p=102}} He remained at WRC until ''Sam and Friends'' aired its last episode on December 15, 1961.{{sfn|Jones|2013|p=91}}

In the show, Henson began experimenting with techniques that changed the way in which puppetry was used on television, foregoing the convention of pointing the camera at a stationary [[puppet theatre]] [[proscenium]] and instead using the image created by the [[TV camera]] and [[Camera lens|lens]] to dynamically engage with his characters.{{Sfn|Finch|1993|p=18}} He believed that television puppets needed to have "life and sensitivity".<ref name="timehundred">{{cite news |last=Collins |first=James |date=June 8, 1998 |title=Time 100: Jim Henson |url=http://www.time.com/time/time100/artists/profile/henson.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070428125811/http://www.time.com/time/time100/artists/profile/henson.html |archive-date=April 28, 2007 |access-date=May 1, 2007 |magazine=Time}}</ref> Rather than carving wooden puppets Henson built characters from softer, flexible materials like foam rubber;<ref name="sippi2">{{cite web |last=Padgett |first=John B. |date=February 17, 1999 |title=Jim Henson |url=http://www.olemiss.edu/mwp/dir/henson_jim/index.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070829001157/http://www.olemiss.edu/mwp/dir/henson_jim/index.html |archive-date=August 29, 2007 |access-date=June 19, 2007 |work=The Mississippi Writers Page |publisher=[[University of Mississippi]] Department of English}}</ref> his first iteration of Kermit was made from a halved [[Table tennis#Ball|table tennis ball]] and fabric from an old coat belonging to his mother, with denim from a pair of jeans forming the sleeve for the puppeteer's arm.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Original Kermit Puppet |url=https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/nmah_1396955 |access-date=2024-05-05 |website=americanhistory.si.edu |language=en |archive-date=May 5, 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240505193556/https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/nmah_1396955 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Though Henson told people that "Muppet" was a [[portmanteau]] of "[[Puppet#Marionette|marionette]]" and "[[Puppet]]",{{Sfn|Jones|2013|p=41}} many early Muppets were actually [[Puppet#Hand puppet or glove puppet|hand puppets]], [[Puppet#Rod puppet|rod puppets]], or some combination of the two. Direct control over the puppet's mouth, in combination with the softer construction materials, allowed the puppeteer to express a wider range of emotions and to more accurately move the puppet's mouth along with the character's dialogue or while [[Lip sync|lip-syncing]] to music. Commenting on his puppet design philosophy, Henson said,<blockquote>''"A lot of people build very stiff puppets—you can barely move the things—and you can get very little expression out of a character that you can barely move. Your hand has a lot of flexibility to it, and what you want to do is to build a puppet that can reflect all that flexibility."{{Sfn|Jones|2013|p=47}}''</blockquote>''Sam and Friends'' was a financial success, but Henson began to have doubts about going into a career performing with puppets once he graduated. He spent six weeks in Europe during the summer of 1958, originally with the intent to study painting, but was surprised to learn that puppets were considered just as serious of an art form as painting or sculpture. After returning to the United States he and Jane made their partnership official, creating Muppets, Inc. in November of that same year,<ref>{{Cite web |title="Muppets, Inc." Certificate of Incorporation – 1958-11-20 |url=https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/muppet/images/2/25/CertificateOfIncorporation.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20091222203256mpany |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220815083713/https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/muppet/images/2/25/CertificateOfIncorporation.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20091222203256 |archive-date=2022-08-15 |access-date=2024-05-08 |website=Muppet Wiki |language=en}}</ref> then marrying each other in 1959.{{Sfn|Jones|2013|p=73-77}}