Posted on 03/28/2016 8:23:05 PM PDT by V K Lee
Just thinking about the I Love Lucy episode where Lucy worked on an assembly line in a candy factory brings a smile to my face. Remembering the family spirit and wholesomeness of other shows like Father Knows Best, Leave It to Beaver, and The Donna Reed Show still warms my heart. These classic television programs made us laugh and cry without the sex and violence that is so commonly associated with television today. No wonder the interest in TV nostalgia is growing by leaps and bounds. Many of us enjoy revisiting the quality programs from the 50's, 60's, and 70's.
Nostalgia Popularity The growing number of rebroadcasts of classic television shows confirms our longing for those wistful days of yesterday. The Internet adds to our enjoyment with a wealth of Web sites devoted to television nostalgia.
Whether you are a baby boomer or are old enough to be the parent of a boomer, looking back brings vivid memories of the earlier days of television. Parents of boomers will remember bringing home their first TV. Baby boomers, the first generation to be raised in front of the TV, will remember many of the greatest shows ever produced.
Even with the plethora of reruns, sometimes simply watching classic TV isn't enough. The Internet steps in with entertaining information and interesting television production stories. If watching reruns on the tube only whets your appetite for more classic TV, you can find details, antidotes, and statistics about your favorite old programs as the Web and the Tube partner up.
(Excerpt) Read more at compukiss.com ...
The woman writes for the site and includes a number of links which might be of interest to you if your are 'into' retro tv classic shows
As a side note here after digital TV came along and stations expanded to include Sub-Stations, we've been able to view Retro TV and Hot TV, both stations showing a number of shows from the 1950's, and beyond The new Roku devise and smart TV have helped to expand the viewing enjoyment immensely .
“No wonder the interest in TV nostalgia is growing by leaps and bounds. Many of us enjoy revisiting the quality programs from the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s.”
True.
But some of the 70’s shows have the rot.
The “Rural Purge” was the start of the downward spiral.
The Odd Couple was great. A TINY bit risqué at times, but compared to now, it was a G movie.
Honeymooners, of course.
they were funnier than ANYTHING out today.
I show this “candy factory” skit to every Biochemistry class I teach. It’s a great way to illustrate how an enzyme’s active site (Lucy and Ethyl) is saturated by ever increasing amounts of substrate (chocolate).
The mention of Father Knows Best triggered a memory of Billy Gray, who played the son, Bud on that show.
Billy was a child actor in the late forties and through out the 50s into the early 60s. However after that in addition to tinkering with mechanical things and doing a little “inventing” and improving things, he was a professional motorcycle racer. Speedway motorcycles, two wheel sprint cars. 500cc engine putting out 60+ horsepower, burning nitro methane fuel until the mid 70s when the nitro was dropped. Then straight methanol. No brakes and weighting about 175 lbs.
I met him first in the mid 80s and again in the early 90s, when he helped us with a couple races by coming to race for darn little money and a chance to hang out and have a beer with us.
A very nice man whom I give what in my circle is a very high complement:
Billy Gray was a Racer. Not the fastest of his era, but by God he was a Racer.
Bookmark.
I watch Hogan’s Heros.....Bob Newhart...Mary Tyler Moore....
Those were quality shows that had no sex, drugs, and not even a token gay...lol.
They still make you laugh....
METV, COZI, and Decade in the Philly area - an Abbott and Costello weekend marathon last month on Decade and the entire Sunday afternoon following Christmas devoted to Ozzie and Harriet Christmas programs on COZI - good times.....
I almost cry when I watch the Route 66 episodes from 1960-63. Those two guys could go to any locale in America and find a job. The country was prosperous back then.
Ain’t it great? We are able to see those in Texas as well. Cozi, Me, Decades, Grit, This,Get,Antenna, Retro, Hot, Movies TV Network and a new PBS sub-station named Create (similar to H&G network)
Life is good :-))
Love Bob Newhart, and MTM show. Have even seen ‘That Girl’ the one with Marlo Thomas on occasion. Dangerous Assignment, now that one I do not remember watching as a tyke. A cheap campy spy show that seems every episode as a mid-east plot. The sets are so cheap, the budget must have been really tight. There was one when Donlevy was in a pergola crossing the gorge. In the background was a painting of another snow topped mountain- it never moved from view. Just sat their so you KNEW the ride was a fake. All in good fun. Then, Get Smart was seen a time or two as well - time marches on. :-))
Stations cut out anywhere from a few to several minutes from all of the old programs in order to squeeze in more commercials. Sometimes the entire episode loses meaning if they cut out a key scene. Really annoying for those of us who remember the original content.
These are channels I didn’t get with cable. I cancelled cable and haven’t missed it one bit. And have more TV programming than I have time to watch.
Father Knows Best is put up there with The Donna Reed Show, Leave It, To Beaver, The days when family was family and was the priority in life. Thank you for the update on ‘Bud’. Paul Peterson began a group for child stars and how they could once again become a whole person so to speak.
When watching the old family shows, it was all peaches and cream but, unfortunately that was not always true. It was rumored that Robert Young? had a drinking problem. At least that is the name remembered. True or not, I don’t know but to watch his show one would have never guessed. And that might have been before the problem; perhaps it occurred while filming Marcus Welby.
All in the Family? Three’s Company? The Ropers? Laugh In? Seldom watched the first three. Did view Laugh In on occasion and would not have missed the one with ‘Here come the Judge, here come the Judge’ Sammy Davis Junior. A most unusual format That and the Smothers Brothers. Those two were watched often.
WOW! Thank you for the link. I’ll add it to my others. You don’t know how much this is appreciated. Thanks again, so much!!
One of my father’s medical association gave an award to Robert Young for his portrayal of Marcus Welby, MD. The award went to him because of its positive portrayal of the practice of modern medicine. Young spoke to the group and joked about how often he was asked questions regarding his “medical expertise”.
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