Along with donuts and rubber poultry, the topic of “classic” TV came up over the weekend. That’s a flexibly defined thing. Regardless of when you were born, “classic” TV is the first TV you ever watched. For my generation it also turns out to include some of the first TV ever produced.
For no sane reason, I titled Saturday’s entry “Joanie Loves Chachi”, which drew this response from Lisa:
I LOATHED Joanie Loves Chachi. As spinoffs go, my vote goes to Maude, I think. I remember well that, as a child, I was utterly baffled by the relationship between characters on “Green Acres” and “Petticoat Junction.” How did they sometimes end up on each others’ shows? HOw could that BEEEEE?
Lisa, I know you are aware that the people who appear on TV shows live and love and work under different rules than the ones that govern our daily lives. They are more interesting in every way, and less complex. It took me years to come to grips with the realization that TV pacing didn’t translate to real life, and my clever remarks didn’t automatically end the scene. I’d offer up my best at the dinner table thinking if I got a laugh we could break for commercial, and then it would be the next day and I wouldn’t have to finish that pile of green peas on my plate. Fat chance.
Modern “reality” TV has no more truth in it than “Petticoat Junction,” which, you correctly point out, left thoughtful children baffled. I found the show extremely troubling.
I was 8 when that “Petticoat Junction” went on the air. I liked the train in the opening credits but I couldn’t get over the idea of people swimming in the water tank. I was learning to swim at the time and already had some very serious reservations about deep water. Those vertical sides with no pool deck and no sign of a lifeguard heightened my anxiety. And of course the suggestion that the sisters were nude was extremely disturbing. I assumed that the tank held drinking water for The Shady Rest and the health inspector would issue a citation for it, I was certain. When my brother told me the water in the tank was for the steam train, I felt better about it, but only a little. Why would you want to risk messing up a really neat engine with hairy water?
Some brainy commentators say our TV watching is merely a search for self. If so, that would explain my disappointment with Petticoat Junction, Green Acres and The Beverly Hillbillies. The show where I did see myself is one that was just written up in the New York Times for the release of its entire oeuvre on DVD – Leave it To Beaver.
For me, there were surprising parallels. Like any young boy with dark hair and freckles, I was accused of looking like the Beav. Also, I had an older brother, (Wa)Lee.
Hmmm.
Which is which?
Hint: I’m the one who does NOT have a TV star haircut.
This imagined connection heightened my interest in the show, which is described by critics as one of the first TV programs to take a kids eye view of things. The older brother / younger brother dynamic was the greatest attraction and the most profound similarity to what was actually going on. My brother was wise to the world – I was a goofy obnoxious pest. This relationship is timeless.
And then there were coincidences:
One of the co-creators of the show was a guy from New York named Joe Connelly – that’s where we were from, and Joe Connelly is my father’s name!
And the first episode of Leave It To Beaver was broadcast on October 4th, 1957 – my birthday!
Clearly, Leave It To Beaver was my reality TV. Here’s a famous clip:
My friends and I climbed like this on the slippery, craggy rocks along the Hudson River, which was a much dumber choice than scaling a billboard. It also had less comedic potential.
Have you ever seen a TV show that mirrored your actual life?
If you had to invent such a show, what would it be called?
Trail Baboon 
I never thought they were naked…I just thought the “girls” were swimming without their petticoats. What a limited vision of life!
For the record, I did not accept the premise of “My Mother the Car”!
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You’re right, Dale; the resemblance between you and the Beav is uncanny! Like, separated-at-Birth uncanny! Add in the rest of those parallels, and, well, I’d say “Twilight Zone Beaver.”
I have no firsthand, first run experience of LITB; we didn’t get ABC in our small town when I was growing up, just a few years behind you, which makes you just the right age to have been the older brother I desperately wished would come and miraculously replace my older sisters. All it would take was just a wiggle of my mother’s nose…. (“Beaver Bewitched.”)
Has anyone else noticed that the song “Damn that Television” (Talking Heads) is no longer nonsensical, thanks to reality television? (http://www.lyricsfreak.com/t/talking+heads/found+a+job_20135043.html) And while we’re on the subject (i.e. the subject “whatever the heck Lisa happened to be thinking about”), can someone explain the genre in which shows like “Trailer Park Boys” fall?
My screen name today is a reference to that wonderful Lasse Hallstrom film, a reference to the fact that I’m vicariously experiencing life as MY dog today; she tangled with a porcupine yesterday, and, well, let’s say it makes being launched into space seem perhaps not so bad after all. “Leave it to Porquie?”
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Er, that song “Found a Job,” by the Talking Heads.
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From yesterday–what is your connection to Lindstrom?
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I can’t think of a show that I ever “identified” with, but I was never fond of PJ or GA or that ilk. I thought the girls were bathing in the water supply, which always gave me the creeps. And didn’t one of the actresses change during the PJ show?
The pinnacle of TV watching at my house when I was a kid was Sunday night. First Wonderful World of Disney then Bonanza, then the Man from U.N.C.L.E. It was a whole family affair, that I still remember fondly.
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Something very disturbing did happen with the characters on PJ; you’re right. Or maybe a few disturbing things. One of the older characters (Uncle Joe’s wife?) DIED and was not replaced. Instead, they brought on the “lady M.D.” who, you’ll recall was “as pretty as can be….”
Could I please have this brain storage space back now?
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bea benaderhad was replace with lassies mom june lockhardt but also the blonde in the picture on the laft was replaced by sharon tate until charlie manson killed her. ah the 70’s what a magical time.
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By coincidence, I meant to mention TV shows. Dale, as usual, is ahead of me.
The only show that reflected my life was Northern Exposure. Beyond the north woods setting, I just loved the philosophical tenor of the show, the quirky characters, the storytelling and the unpredictability of it all. It was my life, more than any show I’ve seen, although I fear the woman in my life wasn’t a whole lot like Janine Turner.
Two shows on now are a lot of fun to watch. Both are crime-based, so they aren’t much like my life.
The Mentalist features a fellow who solves crimes by watching people closely and drawing upon a canny sense of how humans act. The cast is terrific. I don’t understand how women see men, but they sure can’t complain here because there is one beefcake fellow who looks good in a tight shirt and the star himself, who is more charming than any lead in a series in my memory. Plots can get a little silly, but the show just seems to have fun.
The other one I’m enjoying is on tonight: Lie To Me. This is presumably the science of body language and facial expressions brought to such a high level that people solve crimes with it. I think there is enough authentic research here to make this show more interesting than most crime dramas. The ensemble cast isn’t as impressive as the cast of the Mentalist, but both series feature high production values. Both shows are good enough I won’t call them “guilty pleasures.”
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Steve – thanks for remembering Northern Exposure – it was a favorite of mine when it was on. I had a NE gathering once… several co-workers were discussing it so I invited them all over that night to watch together. We had sardines and crackers and Moosehead beer to go with the theme. I also found a NE cookbook, with recipes for all the dishes that were mentioned at any point during the show. It’s a hoot!
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Steve I loved Northern Exposure (it’s also on DVD now). It was also one of the first shows to use cool songs near the end of the episodes.
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Ditto for Northern Exposure. Loved that show and the characters–especially the DJ! There was one episode that I taped and used as a therapy exercise in a young men’s group. Ed had a Green Man following him around who represented Ed’s low self-esteem. I’d have the guys watch the episode and then draw their Green Men. Wow, did I get great art work from that exercise.
My favorite episode was the trebuchet and the piano.
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Loved the trebuchet and the piano episode! I’m also a NE fan, but that’s probably not too surprising in this group. Ed was my favorite – shy and quirky and smart.
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I liked that one too. Also the one where Ruth Ann dances on her grave site at the top of the hill/mountain. I think they played Enya to that if I’m not mistaken. Loved that show.
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My mother always referred to it all as “that stupid tv”, but did nothing much to stop us from watching it. Like sherillee, I would like to reclaim the brain space taken up by my encyclopedic knowledge of Gilligan’s Island. It has earned me a couple of nickels at Caribou, so I suppose I shouldn’t kick.
I don’t remember seeing much stuff first-run, most of my watching was the afterschool line-up.
Funnily enough, I worked hard to keep the s&h away from tv, so other than Nova and the World Cup, I haven’t a clue as to what is on these days. Maybe it was having to watch Sponge Bob for work (making a walk-around costume for one of the theme parks) that put me off it. There was a pretty funny picture of me in the Sponge Bob legs and a sweater, holding a very alarmed looking 1 year old s&h. Wonder if that is still around?
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Looking back, I see that was LISA who would like the restoration of brain space-see what I mean, no short-term at all, but Mary-ann’s last name being Summers-don’t even have to search for it, right at my fingertips.
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Hi all! I’ve been a tad distracted lately, but still here in Saint Paul!
TV was huge in our house, six kids made sure it was almost always on. I can’t say that I found much interest past My 3 Sons, I had more affinity for books so I always had my nose in one with the tv babbling nearby. I’m a bit confused about theme songs as a result and no good at triva discussions like this, though I enjoy them, the familiar recognition of time and place I suppose. And of course no other blog measures up!
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I am much more a child of the radio. And being 13 years older than Dale, I found the young ladies of PJ perfectly delightful–perfectly, especially Gordon MacRae’s daughter. And for my intellectual interests, the actor who played Unlcle Joe (I will have to look up his name–old brain here) is one of the marvelous old character actors of radio, film, and TV. And I loved Green Acres, the surreal elements, such as the producer/director/etc. on the eggs was fun. But we had a county agent about as dumb as the one on there.
Northern Exposure is the best TV I know. TC public TV is playing on Sunday nights at 9:30 “Doc Martin,” which is sort of the British version of NE. Very much worth a look.
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Edgar Buchanan was Unlce Joe. Frank Cady, the store keeper, was another of the great character actors. Its the character actors I always track, not the big stars.
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Morning, all! No time for a leisurely read/comment time this morning, drat! If I were writing a TV show it would be called “Life Before Starbucks”, and would take place in and around Seattle from the mid 1950’s to the late 1960’s. There would be a visual focus on the Pike Place Market (flying fish market, street people, street musicians), and a story focus on the turbulent times. These all would be viewed through the eyes of young girl from a large, creative, funny and troubled family. Has to end by the 1970’s because that’s when the first Starbucks store appeared in the Pike Place Market.
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Great idea, Thyrkas. Wonder what it would take…
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Dale, I was recently in a local frame shop and got to talking about radio and your silence therein, bemoaning lack of good music and creativity, a ‘woe is us’ hand against my forehead, when proprieter said you found work on some other station. True? I trolled thru blogs looking but not really awake yet so didn’t find anything on this. If true please say what/where on my dial/when…. or otherwise maybe share an update with us?
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Hi Kim,
Thanks for thinking of me. I’m not sure where the information came from, but your Frame Shop Proprietor must have had someone else in mind. I have not found another radio job. Maybe Jerry Mathers wound up with a show somewhere. We’re always being mistaken for each other!
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To actually answer Dale’s question, which I rarely really do, no TV has ever come close to my life. Shows about teachers and schools are always sappy and ridiculous or ugly and ridiculous. Shows about farming were also unreal, which is why I liked Green Acres, which fit the moment in history very well for its surreal quality and making fun of the Thoreauian impulse, which was strong then. But I used to do a unit on creativity and sterotypes in literature and would point out how my family was the perfect TV commercial family. Husband, wife, boy and a girl, boy about two years older than the girl, a cat and a dog, semi-rural or urban setting, big front picture window with glass panes, etc.
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I have never seen a TV psychologist that was in any way an accurate portrayal of what psychologists really do.
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Mental health workers and clergy staff are pretty much always simpering idiots. The most heart-rending portrayal of teachers over was the algebra teacher on the Wonder Years,
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So, you’re saying Bob Newhart wasn’t realistic? Or Richard Dreyfuss in “What About Bob” (with Bill Murray)? I am sooo disappointed … :~)
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Thanks Renee! You are so correct about nothing coming close to what psychotherapist does. The portrayal of therapy as “drama” drives me wild. Most of therapy is consistency which comes across as boring and education, then accountability for behavior. Who wants to show that.
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Insightful Jacque, and so is teaching much like that.
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i’d like to say “Twin Peaks” is most like my life – aimless wonderings of plot and focus. but it’s not really. right now it probably is more like “Green Acres,” Clyde. i wish it were like “Mr Ed” (oohhh Wiiilllllllbbbuuuuuur) but so far i can’t get T (or any other goat) to say my name.
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Great photo Dale! I had a hard time suspending disbelief as a kid so Gilligan’s Island was enormously frustrating to watch after school (how far could they have gotten in three hours and why did the Howells have all that luggage???).
My mother called most television “drivel” especially in the 70s. Great word even if it made me want to watch more.
I always gravitated more to the dramas: Medical Center, Mannix, Hawaii 5-0. Notable exception was Twilight Zone (repeats I guess since I was born in 1961). St. Elsewhere in the 80s was up there with the later arriving Northern Exposure. I miss them.
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Like Clyde, I was a radio kid much more than a TV kid. Early TV was so mediocre that, although we had low standards, there was nothing compelling about it. I didn’t know a single kid who would sit by the hour in front of the tube. That cultural norm developed a bit later. We weren’t too proud to watch. There just wasn’t anything on that was good enough to compete with all the fun we could have running around on bikes, fishing, hiking, swimming, playing games, etc. I didn’t see a TV addict until I got to college.
But radio! There was a super funky station in Little Rock Arkansas that belted out some exciting rhythm and blues stuff in the middle of the night. That music thrilled me, living in the whitest state in the nation. The world I could connect with that way was WAY more exciting than Captain Video or Howdy Doody.
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Yes, Steve! KAAY in Little Rock. I used to listen to it late at night when my parents thought I was sound asleep. Still can’t believe I picked up an AM radio station from Arkansas in SW Minnesota.
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I used to pick up the clear channel stations from all over US and Canada at night. Only remember WLS in Chi and a Toronto station specifically.
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Sorry, Mike, I do not even remember Rawhide, but all tell me it was good. Frankie Lane was one of the hot hot singers of my radio youth.
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Mike Late at night, normal stations dropped out and left the air free for the Clear stations. I used to get a strong signal in Minnesota from a station in Waterloo (10,000 watts of power right smack dab in every direction!) WCCO was a clear station, I think. And sometimes we picked up distant stations because of “skip,” which (since you are an engineer) you’ll have to explain to me.
I’ve read that little Robert Zimmerman and little Garry Keillor were among those tuned into KAAY at night.
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WCCO was clear channel. But I could not get it in TH. Did listen to Waterloo, now that you mention it. A couple in Ohio.
I also used to love when driving listening to the very local stations, that had to go off the air at sunset, the ones that did want ads, funneral announcements, etc. I know a few have survived. Brookings, SD has one.
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A modern version of these childhood memories: I walked into the bedroom yesterday and there lying on our bed were our two grandkids, 5 and 7, listening to my mp3 player, which they know how to use because they have children’s mp3’s. They each had one of the ear buds on. What I had up was Peter Mayer. They fell in love with him. So we listened to that on the car system driving them home.
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Hi Mike! Thanks for Great Day today. And Dream Again last night.
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THE SINGIN’ PIG! Pulled that one in on my transistor when the vibes were right.
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WLS (Chi-caaaaaa-go) for me.
And what was the station that used to play entire albums in the wee hours? The program was called “Bleaker Street,” I think? Was that in Little Rock?
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I was pretty glued to a TV during my childhood in the 1960’s. I always felt like an oddball when I was in high school since I was about the only one who I knew who watched public television on a regular basis. I got a basic introduction to classic literature by watching Masterpiece Theater. I didn’t have much opportunity to watch TV when I went to college, and watched even watched less in graduate school. When we married, my husband and I couldn’t afford a TV. We purchased our first TV when our son was about 9 and we only watch DVD’s or videos on it. it We have never had one in our home that received signals.
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Back in my high school days I saw “Leave It To Beaver” in reruns, and always dismissed it as a celebration of 50s suburban conformity. We could witness such absurdities as the dad relaxing on a Saturday afternoon wearing a suit and tie, or the Beaver causing a scandal at school for wearing a sweatshirt with a big picture of a robot on it.
But my dad, a child of the Depression era, saw it as a celebration of post-war liberal parenting. Mom and Dad never yelled on the show. They never threatened. Ward did not take the razor strop off the wall when the kids got out of line. Nope, a little talk with an understanding parent would always set things right.
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Greetings! Wow, Dale — you and I have a lot in common, too! My birthday is Oct. 2, 1957 so that’s pretty close!
Shows that resembled my family life? Maybe “8 is Enough” with 7 kids in our family — but it was 6 girls and one boy and we certainly didn’t have a housekeeper or all the cool stuff they had. We watched TV, although my father didn’t care for most of it — even though he was one of the first color TV repairman in our area. My parents enjoyed public television a great deal.
I remember the great dramas and comedies like “Bonanza”, “All in the Family”, the quirky weird ones like “Mary Hartmann, Mary Hartmann.” I still remember coming home one evening to find my father laughing hysterically (a very seldom event) at a scene from that show. I loved “LA Law”, all the CSI shows and of course, anything “Star Trek.” Never got into reality shows — except InXcess.
Some of the shows on TV today are very complex and sophisticated. I enjoyed all the Stargate shows and spinoffs, Battlestar Galactica (new one), Bones, X-Files, etc. Currently, I don’t watch much TV — I’d rather go to karate, read or since RH started — blog.
My husband is a sentimental guy, so he bought all 3 seasons of “Gilligan’s Island,” all the movies they made, books written by cast members, including Mary Ann’s cookbook. While the show was purely entertainment fluff, the humor is timeless and the stories are simple. It’s still a simple show and my youngest (13) absolutely loves it. All those great topical comedies made at that same time seem dated and antiquated now, and I’m not sure the humor translates to our current time very well. But “Gilligan’s Island” will always be funny in it’s own simple, slapstick way. I don’t care for the show, but I still laugh.
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It’s a bit eerie to watch old movies like Errol Flynn’s Robin Hood and watch Allan Hale Sr. (The Captain’s father) because they father and son look and act so much alike.
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Not to mention Bob Denver as Maynerd G. Krebs.
I think I was mostly drawn to the inventions on Gilligan. I’m sure the prop crew probably got tired of bamboo and coconuts, but I never did. Flintstones was sort of the same thing, only with logs and rocks.
My mother had the radio on non-stop when I was growing up (and full-blast, as she was in denial about her congnitive hearing loss-only did something about it when the doctor told her it was something that affected young women)-mostly WHO.
Whatever she was listening to ran old radio comedies on Friday nights, about the time I was getting home from playing in pep band. I can still remember most of the intro tag lines, but not many plots.
“Duffy’s Tavern, where the elite meet ta’ eat an’ Duffy ain’t here. Oh, hello Duffy”. I’m quite certain I was never in such an establishment, but did love rattling that off. Also loved Chester A. Reilly.
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I refuse to bite on old radio shows–too long a list and discussion.
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Well, speaking as the ‘pup’ of the group, I grew up on ’70’s television. And while I watched reruns of Gilligan and the Brady Bunch, their squeaky clean sensibilities seemed out of touch to me even then. I absolutely avoided shows like Beav, Ozzie & Harriet, and the like as I perceived them of being even squeakier cleanier. I enjoyed Lucy, as I saw her as kind of a proto-Carol Burnett (my fave as a kid). The Monkees was an enjoyable romp for me.
I’ve also found that I tend to get really disappointed when I revisit some of what were my favorite programs from the 1970’s. As an example, there was a 1-season show on NBC back in 1973 called ‘Search.’ It was a kind of a detective/action-adventure. The agents doing the legwork carried this little bug with them that would transmit sound, picture, and data back to a home base. The home base had a mammoth bank of computers and could feed information back to the agent. As a 6-year old, this was SO cool. I found some copies of some of these old shows (that are still not available) and they were so BAD. Very disappointing… Same thing with the Buck Jones/Richard Benjamin space sit-com Quark…wow…I remember that being a lot more funny in 1978. I’ve toyed with the idea of trying to track down some others short-livers that I thought were good too at the time (like Sword of Justice…remember that one?) but the more I see these old ones and wince, the more gunshy I get…
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TGiTH — it’s funny, but you can’t go back. As much as I love anything Star Trek, watching some of the old original episodes is painful at times. While many of the story lines are classic, the *special effects*, occasional campiness and Shatner’s questionable acting choices are hard to overlook. With a good director to rein him in, Shatner does quite well, but on his own his overacting is embarassing. He’s become a much better actor with maturity, but he’ll never be a ‘great’ actor.
LOVED Carol Burnett, Laugh-In, Dean Martin — any and all of the variety shows that just aren’t made anymore. The closest thing is watching the awards shows, I guess.
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Check out the new Star Trek: The Remastered Editions. It’s the original series but with new digital special effects. All the good stuff but with much better graphics. It’s actually pretty cool. I’m not saying that it can save an episode like Spock’s Brain but for episodes like The Doomsday Machine…wow…EXTRA cool!
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I have to admire Shatner’s ability to spoof himself. Also some of the casting and script choices make by Gene Roddenbury. He had something to say I doubt anyone else was willing to try at the time.
While there are no end of TV shows involving Catholic priests, there are interestingly enough none that I know of involving a Lutheran minister’s family, so no shows to reflect my childhood.
I always appriciated Pastor Ingkvest of Lake Woebegone for that reason.
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Lutheran is a very regional joke. I once told a Lutheran joke in NC and had people ask me what a Lutheran is. But there was for awhile recently a show on the family network about a pastor and his family. What was his religion? Would look it up but I do not know its name or anyone in it.
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Clyde, I believe you’re thinking of 7th Heaven. I’ve never watched it myself, but I know the family was Protestant.
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Joanne and TGiTH you are so right – you can’t go back to some of those. I loved the movie “With Six You Get Eggroll” because I saw it at an LA movie theater while visiting my aunt and cousins – one of many road trips to the west coast. And it seemed so non-midwestern (I didn’t even know what an eggroll was in 1969). It was on tv a few years ago, and I realized only my eight-year old self thought it was good. Some things are best left in the nostalgia drawer.
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7th heaven–just learned the longest running family drama in TV hostory. No denomination given
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My dad was a huge fan of the original Star Trek. When I see clips of those shows today, I get pretty offended. They were atrocious!
I was a Gilligan’s Island fan. My mom let us watch ONE show after school and that was GI. As a family, we watched Jackie Gleason, Ed Sullivan, Gunsmoke and “specials.”
After that point, I became too obsessed with reading and music to watch much TV at all. I only watched late at night, after my shift was over. Second City TV and the original Saturday Night Live must have been the funniest TV ever. I always listened to the radio and in the mid-80s somebody at MPR came up with the Morning Show. Radio seems like a wasteland now, and TV is only good for Masterpiece Classic and Nova.
More recently, I liked Northern Exposure for the setting and the quirky characters and the X-Files for the characterization and relationship between the two leads.
I doubt anyone would watch a TV show based on my life. It would be filled with pointless wandering; the soul of a poet and musician, seeking love and beauty in a complex world. There is no intense drama, except in my own mind, and these daily meanderings would not entertain a single soul. It’s an interesting thought though…
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Oh, and I eventually discovered and love classic radio. If you think Boris Karloff is creepy when you see him on the screen, you should try it when you ~can’t~ see him. My single favorite radio program is an episode of Inner Sanctum called ‘Death for Sale’ with Karloff. But, on the whole, the best vintage radio program in my opinion was ‘Suspense.’ They had their run of all of Hollywood’s stars and they put them in characters that you’d never see them in on the screen. One episode that really creeped me out starred Gene Kelly as a mentally challenged handyman/drifter that was also a homicidal maniac strangler. “My hands are strong…”
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Look for Inner Sanctum; creepier I thought than Suspense. My brother and I used to listen to it under the blankets, just so it would be dark. Creaking door. “Welcome to the inner sanctum.” Slamming door.
“Quark” was one of those things, like so much R. Benjamin did, you wanted badly to be good, but it wasn’t.
There is something wrong with me. I find so much classic comedy annoying, embarrassing or or frustrating. I know I will get blasted for this. But I do not find very much of the following funny: Charlie Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, Lucy, and Abbot and Costello. I recognize their genius; just cannot repsond to them, except every now and then. I know it’s the German in me, but I get just frustrated that L & H cannot get the darn piano up those stairs.
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It’s ok, Clyde. I can only take so much Marx Bros. and have been both pitied and censured for saying so.
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I agree with the stand-up comedian that said, “You know why women generally think the Three Stooges aren’t funny? BECAUSE THEY AREN’T!”
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“Hello friends of the creaking door…”
And, for something more contemporary that was really good, check out Sci-Fi Channel’s Seeing Ear Theater. They came out on cassette in the late 90’s. They’re out of print now but, if you can find them, they’re really very good.
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Clyde – you sound a bit like my father — a stoic, German Catholic through and through. That’s why seeing him laugh hysterically at a bizarre scene from “Mary Hartmann, Mary Hartmann” seemed so out of character for him. I don’t think the typical slapstick, physical humor of those performers you mentioned appealed to him, either. And forget about musicals — no suspension of disbelief for him. But he was a gruff, gentle man of high integrity that I miss every day.
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Both of our children have really enjoyed old time radio shows that we purchased for them on tape or cd. Both kids went to sleep many nights listening to the Shadow or old time westerns.
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@thatguyinthehat: You think you’re the pup of the group? I wasn’t even alive in the 70’s, haha. I grew up on cartoons – Duck Tales, Chip & Dale’s Rescue Rangers, Darkwing Duck, Talespin, David the Gnome, Muppet Babies, etc. 80’s television wasn’t too bad. I even watch Fragglerock still, since it’s on Netflix. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen Petticoat Junction, or Gilligan’s Island, and the only radio show I’ve ever listened to is Prairie Home Companion. I used to run around our neighborhood, and we would play until it got dark, but I do remember watching TV as well. Probably on those rainy days or the days when it was too cold to go outside. I also remember getting up early on Saturday mornings (why!?) to watch cartoons. We had cable for awhile, then my parents got rid of it, then when we moved, we got cable again. There weren’t as many kids in our new neighborhood as there were in the old one, and they were all a LOT younger than us (babies, while we were 10-14 yrs old). I did read a lot when I was younger (still do). Our library had a summer reading program where you had to read for 15 minutes a day, and you could bring it in each week to get a stamp or sticker. If you filled up your sheet by the end of the summer, you got a small prize. You had to have your parent sign and prove that you had read. I could fill up a summer’s worth of reading in one week 🙂 Luckily, the librarians knew me pretty well, and let me bring in more than one sheet in a summer. I ended up working there all through high school, so I guess it was a good thing, haha.
I’ve never seen a show that mirrored my life. I don’t think it would be interesting to watch. I enjoy watching The Office (American one), NCIS, Diners Drive-Ins and Dives, Glee, America’s Got Talent. Lately, I’ve been watching shows on Netflix, such as Deadwood and Dexter, shows from HBO and Showtime, channels I don’t get.
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Alanna — I, like you, filled up many summer reading sheets over the years. I remember my mother telling the librarian to just give us the extra sheets now and the librarian not really believing I would read that much. Oh, she of little faith.
In fact, my daughter has a reading incentive program every summer and it always involves a map of some kind on which she has to either write in the books or use stickers or something. This summer it’s a pirate/treasure map theme!
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My wife ran reading programs for many years. She knew perfectly well which kids were really reading and which were maybe lying, but she got very few of the liars. Lots of kids read huge amounts in the summer. Well, a small percentage of the population, but summer reading programs clearly are wonderful for some kids.
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Touche’.
Just bought Freakazoid from Half-Price Books…nouveau classic!
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What? No Animaniacs? Loved that show-found it silly and smart-not easy to find that combination (present company excluded).
Wisconsin Public TV ran old Black and white shows on Saturday mornings in the 80/90s, which is where I saw the Prisoner and a lot of Twilight Zone. I really feel I need to someday get the Prisoner in its entirety and see the whole thing, as I found it intriguing, but completely enigmatic, as I only saw bits and pieces. Rod Serling, what a strange mind……..
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The Prisoner is simply great, but sorry, good friend, it was never finished.
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If I worte a TV show about my life it would be “Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda.”
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The title of Patti Lupone’s recent concert here – anybody see it? I Woulda if I’d been in town.
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The Avengers. Was there ever better style?
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Two items on religion from facebook and then I am going to nap:
1. This quote I posted has gathered a few comments on facbook (it’s not exact but close): “Sometimes we have enough religion to hate and not enough to love.” Jonathan Swift
2. Someone put on my daughter’s fb page a link to a paitning of Jesus healing the Liberty Bell. You cannot make this stuff up. You simply can’t. Tackiness, like William Shatner, will always be a better spoof of itself than anything a normal mind dreams up.
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Love the Jonathan Swift quote. An apt description of religions of exclusion while professing God’s love for all.
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I can’t think of one that reflects my life, but I know which ones I’d like to go and visit via some time-warp, virtual reality spanning device… As many of you have mentioned, Northern Exposure is on the top. (Have the cookbook and 2 mugs found at thrift shops.) I loved the campy ones like Mary Hartmann and Dark Shadows in the 70s, when I did have a TV. Like Renee – we didn’t have one again till our son was 8, this would be 1989. Luckily there were reruns of Star Trek the Next Generation… Son once had laughing gas during a dental appt., and swore he’d actually been on the Enterprise! Now I’m glad that he got to do that.
Catherine – my mother always listened to WHO too, Ames IA, right? Do you remember an a.m. program called the Music Box, with a theme song that sounded like… well, a music box?
TGITH, re: the Three Stooges – I just returned from a college reunion where we actually had some “3 stooges moments” (accidental collisions, etc.), and you’re right, THOSE were probably funnier than just watching them…
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If I am remembering correctly, WHO was Des Moines, WOI was Ames. Don’t remember Music Box-I do remember Duane Elliott hosted something not unlike the show Joyce ??? had on KLBB before it was taken over, with call-ins of recipies and such. He also hosted a kid’s cartoon show with a beagle puppet named Floppy.
I guess in those days, it was considered that cartoons were cartoons and therefore kid fodder-saw a lot that must have been made to show before movies in WWII that made little sense when I saw them afterschool in the 70’s, but later gave me a “what the??!!” moment when I saw them before on-campus movies in college.
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Ooh, you’re right, Ames was WOI…
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Rise and Lose your internet connection Babooners!
I’m at Panera sending my few replies of the day–unless I get back here later. We had trouble with our connection all last week, and today it is DOA. I can hardly bear thinking of the blogging going on without me.
My sister and I used to laugh about The Wonder Years. I was the oldest of three siblings and a “hippie chick”. My sister (middle child) says I was SO COOL and above all the younger sibling nonsense–I had the boyfriend, the knit poncho, the attitude. It did not feel that way to me, but that is how she saw it. Although that show was retrospective (came out in the 80’s about the late 60’s and 70’s) we could empathize with the droning social studies teacher, the film projectors, and the era. Also Wayne’s (middle child) sense of fashion was pretty accurate and FUNNY. Plaid polyester pants and leisure suits.
So there it is. My life on TV
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Also forgot the Carol Burnett Show–We lived for that show and would act out the skits all week until the next one came on.
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(Ahem!) let us not come down too harshly on polyester. I used to teach writing classes at the University of MN in polyester bell bottom pants. The only reason my classes didn’t fall out of their chairs laughing is that they were wearing something equally hideous. I had a shirt that looked a lot like the Sergeant Pepper Lonely Hearts Club Band album cover.
I’ll take some pride in never having drooped so low as to buy a Nehru Suit.
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Same here, same clothes never the Nehru. However, men went back to dress in the same dull old clothes. Certainly there is an option in between.
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Wasn’t the Nehru at least make of cotton? Should have been if it wasn’t-Nehru’s must have been.
Sorry about the fabric snobbery, occupational hazard. I remember being delighted with preppy coming in about the same time I started buying my own clothes-could not get enough of real wool and cotton.
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Well, there’s snobbery and then there’s sound judgment and taste.
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Husband had a pretty cool Nehru jacket, but I don’t think he wore it to teach in… saved it for costumes.
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The Nehru jacket’s American TV high water mark – Hadji on the animated cartoon series Jonny Quest.
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i had a nehru at age 14 wore it once and it went out of fashion. clothing and car body styles went in and out of style quickly in those days.
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white belt steve?
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i remember telling a friend of mine we should go tot the plaid lpants bar where all the guys were 40 with white belts and plaid pants and he was amazed that was the scene to a tee.
also remembering all the great new odors that came with those polyester shirts where the big collars hung out over the leisure suit lapel/collar look. i remember wondering what the heck that foul foreign odor was and then getting home and realizing it was me
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I had a navy blue naugahyde mini skirt, a crocheted vest from my grandma and a pair of white kickerinos (is that spelled correctly?) so please don’t feel too badly about your polyester…
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Yep, sounds like my roommate when I started teaching.. 🙂
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you sound hot krista, oo la la
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hee hee
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Well, we don’t STILL, have it, at least I don’t; I doubt Steve does either.
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If Clyde’s tv show is “Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda,” the one based on my life would be “I’ll get to that sometime soon.”
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The difference in our ages, right there.
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Or else you just aren’t as much of a procrastinator. It does help me to be almost 50. I’m starting to actually do things rather than just think about doing them!
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No, now I realize I’m not going to get to it, coulda, woulda, shoulda.
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Speaking of a Brit TV series not finished, one of my favorite quirky TV shows, and I love whimsy and quirkiness, is “Mulberry,” about the son of death who comes to claim an old woman; but he feels sorry for her and tries to make her life better. But it was never finsihed either. Then there is that marvelous long long running BritCom, “The Last of the Summer Wine.”
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Took me the longest time to get into Last of the Summer Wine, now I love it. I especially enjoy the young couple who are ever getting advice from their elders and betters. Also love that the same actor plays Cleggy and Wallace (as in and Grommit).
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He keeps turning down knighthood, too.
I love when all the women drink tea a the same time.
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I aspire to have the strength of character of Nora Butty
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The actor who played Campo is buried in the village in Yorkshire where this was filmed. His son replaced him, as a different seedy character.
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Does anyone know what Jerry Mather’s first film was and who directed him?
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According to the Internet Movie Database (imdb), Jerry Mathers’ first movie role was the uncredited part, “child at finale,” in Son of Paleface (Bob Hope, Jane Russell, Roy Rogers, Trigger) – 1952, directed by Frank Tashlin.
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Then he was in Hitchcock’s wonderful “The Trouble with Harry.”
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hitchcock trouble with harry is where i first saw him. he was the beave in that movie
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Slow end of the day here, so I had to google him. Turns out he has a Facebook page, for those of you who do that. Seems he is ANOTHER Iowa export (Sioux City, just like Ann Landers and Abby van Buren).
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you know the best thing to come out of iowa?……
interstate 35
do you know why the use artificial turf n the football field at iowa state?…..
to keep the cheerleaders from grazing at halftime.
ba doom boom
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So, I have missed all the fun of talking TV…sigh. Today my life is not a television show – it’s a game. Whack-a-mole. Has been like that for awhile. New person started today at work, so that should help. Maybe then it will be more like “Pushing Daisies” – little mysteries with lots of pie (and the odd song).
Favorites growing up: Laverne and Shirley (harkening back to the weekend’s spinoff discussion – wanted to live like those two with my pal Lisa…I was Laverne, since I was taller, but we wanted better jobs), Carol Burnett (it was a goal to be on her show when I grew up), the old Match Game (though a lot of the “adult” jokes went over my head), Hogan’s Heroes re-runs, Electric Company (I was first-generation Sesame Street, so just the right age for Electric Company when it started – had a huge crush on Morgan Freeman as “Easy Reader” and really like all the stuff Rita Moreno did)…the list could go on, but then it might get embarrassing (and I might admit to that crush on Parker Stevenson on “The Hardy Boys”…oops…)
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Loved the Electric Company. Of more recent vintage, Between the Lions and the newer version of ZOOM were both great. The few episodes of the new Electric Company have not done much for me.
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Darling Daughter is a fan of Curious George and WordGirl on PBS. Also Martha Speaks. All smart, funny shows along the lines of the old Sesame Street and Electric Company. Newer Sesame is great for younger kids, but is definitely skewing younger than when I watched.
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no one ever mention the days and nights of mollie dodd. my personal favorite. i think it went through all three networks and then the lifetime network before it was given up on. bonnie blair from the godfather was the star and it was so quirky it made look like normal folk. i am a beaver andy dobie lucy rob and laura fan from way back , my show would be called “huh” because i seem to laugh about 10 seconds after the punchline sometime and 5 seconds before when i see where its going or come up with a better premise than the show will get to. what ever happened to father knows best, donna reed, the rifleman, topper, my little margie? the disney channel aint doing it for me these days. my kids are going to be messed up in an entirely different way that i am. i don’t know how they’ll ever make it with all their strange ways. i am in so dok this week for baseball. and i will have to sneak the blog in some days and have lots of time others. see you down the trail. oh yeah the roy rogers show, hopalong cassidy, wild bill hickock.
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Absolutely, tim, the Days and Nights of MD… I’d almost forgotten – a friend of mine had them on videotape and I’d borrow them.
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i loaned out my videotapes and never got them back. i’d like to see them again.
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I think one of my favorites was MathNet on PBS in the late 80s, actually part of some other kids’s show I don’t remember. I had watched Dragnet with my dad as a kid and the two adults in the family would be laughing hysterically over the puns while the kids just enjoyed the mysteries and mathematics. Still have tapes of a few of them.
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I spent a year in a house with a television that got only one network–PBS. Since this was up from “zero,” which is what my televisions usually get (I don’t dare have it in the house–I can get sucked into the plot of a commercial for General Mills International Coffee), I was easy prey for MathNet. Incredibly clever show.
The other show this PBS station showed (inexplicably, to me) was “Are You Being Served?” a show that was just like your life if you happen to be an employee of a department store whose entire job is to, oh, spend the night in the basement wearing a rabbit costume with a bunch of your fellow employees.
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expand on that lisa, tell me about you bunny suit. by the way which general mills international flavor was you favorite? irish mocha if i remember correctly. what was that anesthetic taste?
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the bunny suit episode was a real episode of this absurd show…i had no bunny suit of my own, alas.
and i don’t actually LIKE int’l coffee; i’m just a sucker for plot. even the amount of plot in a commercial. E.g.: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMSK4yMZXIg&NR=1
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Late to the party tonight…
I’m was born in the mid ’60s and we only got three TV channels as I grew up; 3, Mason City, 6 Austin and 10 Rochester.
I thrived on Bugs Bunny / Roadrunner cartoons and when VCR’s were first coming out, Daytons had a big display of TV’s and VCRs and there was me in my teens and a bunch of little kids watching Bugs Bunny tapes… 🙂
But also, the Variety shows as mentioned… anyone remember ‘The Hudson Brothers’? And the guy with the Emu under his arm? Loved that guy…
Yep; Carol Burnett… after school it was ‘Bart’s Clubhouse’… Cap’n Kangaroo in the mornings…
Couldn’t get the channels for Sesame Street… or PBS…
I remember Adam 12. And the Munsters (my wife and I were just talking about the new Broadway Musical of ‘The Adams Family’ and neither of us remembers the Adams Family as well as The Munsters. Yep; ‘The Monkee’s’… Partridge Family, …
…well, now I’m just rambling….
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ben if we stop rambling we may as well close the blog. the munsters was by the same guys as leave it to beaver 20 years later if i remember correctly, bob mosher and joe connelly. they did a formula tv schtick and plugged in monsters with a laugh machine. ta da a hit by the 60’s standards
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Oh! And Flip Wilson!
I wrote to him (her? Geraldine!) and got an autographed picture! …lost it somewhere down the road…
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