Yes. And rumor has it Bill Shatner won’t get on an airplane to this very day.
🙂
Posted on 06/28/2025 11:16:11 AM PDT by Borges
Residents of the Binghamton area have been visiting the statue honoring Rod Serling 50 years after The Twilight Zone creator died.
The six-foot statue in Recreation Park on the city's West Side was unveiled last September. It stands in the southeast section of the park, just a short distance from Serling's childhood home on Bennett Avenue.
Although Serling was born in Syracuse, he considered Binghamton to be his hometown.
The legendary television writer and producer died at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester on June 28, 1975. He was 50 years old.
Serling had undergone heart surgery two days before his death.
At the time of his death, he was residing in Seneca County. He made frequent visits to Binghamton to speak at various events.
In her book "As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling," his daughter Anne recalled that she last saw her father in the Rochester hospital, three days before he died.
Anne wrote: "He was just fifty years old, I barely twenty."
In the book, Anne Serling observed that "driving back to his hometown was a pilgrimimage my dad took every summer until his death. I recognized that these visits re-centered my dad."
Rod Serling fans will gather again in Binghamton in a few months for the annual SerlingFest. It will be held from September 19 to 21.
Yes. And rumor has it Bill Shatner won’t get on an airplane to this very day.
🙂
Never heard of The Loner. I’ll check it out. I’m going through The Rifelman right now.
Thanks. It came up when I searched for it.
Combat will do that to one.
I am also watching "Death Valley Days" and finished going through "Tales of Wells Fargo". Both good shows. My current favorite is "The Rifleman", with Chuck Connors. Seems like every episode is so well done.
I have also been watching "The Californians" and I am also in the first season. Yeah, the theme song's a little corny, but a lot of them were back in the day. Good series. There was another series I watched last year (I wish I could remember the name) that had a jazzy, Count Basie type theme song. Other viewers seemed to like it, but it seemed a little incongruous to me. :)
If you haven't seen them yet, I'd recommend "The Rebel" and "Tombstone Territory".
Some of Twilight Zone scared the shit out of me as a teenager. I specifcally remember “Bus Trip to Nowhere” and a similar airliner one. Then there was0 a National Guard crew who seemed to get caught in a time warp while on training in Montana. Got caught up in a Custer like situation...in the 50’s! The guy was a maestro of the macabre right up there with Hitchcock. RIP soldier.
Submitted for your approval.
Trump should use that line.
I have a niece who is a marine biologist, and I looked up some old episodes of The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau thinking she might be interested, and had probably never heard of it. I was surprised to find that Rod Serling narrated them. I had completely forgotten this.
Serling chain smoked like a chimney. Serling was said to smoke three to four packs of cigarettes a day. Besides the pressures of writing/producing, he also drank heavily to try drown out his World War 2 memories. Serling’s unit (Army 511th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 11th Airborne Division) saw heavy combat in the Philippines including battles on Leyte and the liberation of Manila. No wonder that he had a heart attack and age 50 and died.
“Seems like every episode is so well done.”
That’s what really amazes me. The sets are very authentic, the themes very timeless about people and human nature, the acting usually is very good (even with the unknown “B” actors and actresses. Lots of the shows were filmed on location. The fistfights were very well choreographed and usually looked very real. And they made so many of them — a new show every week. It really is amazing.
The only thing that bugs me (having been a Californian since ‘73) is the constant use of the famous boulders near Los Angeles. Their setting of Gold Rush scenes there that are ostensibly in the Motherlode Country irks me. I can see why though — few travel expenses and most people in the country had no idea about the widely varied topography of California.
The other thing that cracks me up is Dale Robertson never takes his spurs off (never!) and he walks silently to sneak up on bad guys!
Great writer, great insights, great American, combat veteran of WW II.
If I remember correctly, Rod Serling was one of the producers for the TV series Playhouse 90 which aired in the late 50’s.
I don’t recall those, but I’ll have to look them up. I remember the aliens who appeared friendly, and then the humans found out that the book entitled “To Serve Man” was a cookbook.
And the one about the abominable snowman on the plane wing that only one man could see.
And Agnes Moorehead trying to kill little aliens which turned out to be humans from earth.
There were countless such memorable tales.
Heard Bill put out a clothing line. Shatner pants didn't sell.
Never forgot the TV cartoons and demon outside on plane wing in “Twighlight Zone the Movie”!
You are assuming the younger generation will be able to comprehend human, enduring mysteries and questions, fears, and needs. And assuming they can talk... doesn’t look too promising ..and Twilight Zone was not in color.
Still in the tippy, tippy top echelon of writing. Amazing stuff. One of my favorite characters is the CHANCELLOR in OBSOLETE MAN.Total bombastic,arrogant, disgusting deep stater. Fritz Weaver was excellent in that role.
I never saw the movie. I feel deprived.
LOL. This is also a pet peeve with me. I was born and raised in Southern California (and lived there for more than 30 years) so the areas and spots where a lot of these shows were filmed --Chatsworth, Thousand Oaks, Vasquez Rocks-- are familiar to me and keep popping up again and again. It doubly stands out to me because now I've lived in Arizona now for about 30 years. As you must know, the deserts of Arizona and California are very different, so when I see a scene that's supposed to be in Arizona that's obviously in California (or vice versa) I notice it right away. One thing that I like about "High Chapparal" is that the setting was supposed to be in Arizona south of Tucson and you can really tell that almost all of the exterior shots are actually that area.
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