Susan in Wonderville

From a small studio in Chicago's station WBBM came an infectious, high-pitched voice: "Hi, kids, my name's Susan." Then the big, fluttery eyes, shiny bangs and friendly full-moon face of Susan Heinkel, 12, brightened the TV screen. After eight ingratiating months as a mistress of ceremonies, star performer and pitchgirl (13 sponsors, e.g., Kellogg's, Pepsi-Cola) on Chicago's most popular local daytime show, Susan was doing her first network edition of Susan's Show over 69 stations (Sat., 11 a.m. E.D.T., CBS). Unruffled and unassuming ("We must remember," she reminded her mother before air time, "it's just another show"), she mulled over homework in an oversized kitchen (to make her look even tinier than her 4 ft. 9 in.), and with her cairn terrier, Rusty, climbed aboard her -magic chair and soared through the air to Wonderville with much the same success as Judy Garland heading for Oz.

In Wonderville Susan met droll, cantankerous Mr. Pegasus, whose elaborate Cartoon-a-Machine grunted out a canned Terrytoon. In the Foolish Forest she met an all-animal orchestra which included Wolfgang, the violin-playing bear, flop-eared Gregory, the rabbit flutist, and Bruce, the world's only drum-beating gopher--all ingeniously manipulated by wires backstage. Pegasus baited the conductor, Caesar P. Penguin: "He's the world's worst orchestra leader." Said Caesar: "This is not kind. In fact I am going to take umbrage; sometimes I have a headache and I take umbrage." While Caesar took umbrage. Susan took over Caesar's baton, whirled around on her skittish feet and led the band.

Schoolgirl Heinkel has been performing before audiences since she was three. In home-town St. Louis, where her father sells plumbing fixtures, a TV station manager spotted her playing Shirley Temple in a Christmas pageant, put her on a local kiddie show. She won modeling jobs, as well as roles in 13 St. Louis Municipal Opera productions. Chicago producers spotted her on a local TV show, were so impressed that they gave CBS brass in Manhattan a look at her over a closed-circuit broadcast. CBS whipped up a format, wooed Susan to Chicago's WBBM.

In Chicago she goes to St. Mary of the Lake, a parochial school, where she maintains a 97 average in the seventh grade. She arrives at the studio only 45 minutes before the show, ad-libs most of her 17 minutes of lines. With mother in charge, she hurries home, gets to bed by 9. For all her fame and Susan-sized fortune (weekly salary: $600), Susan has not become bratty. Last week her composure was put to the test: when Susan put a dish of dog food before Rusty, he lifted one leg and washed away network hopes of luring a dog-food sponsor. Susan was not fazed. "Some say the camera is a monster," says she. "But I just visualize those little red lights as all the people watching, and I feel fine."

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