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Car 54
Sgt Bilko
Amos & Andy **
** Even though the “civil rights” moved campaigned against this show its genius and many black comics such as Red Fox defended the show. Primarily the show depicts hard working black Americans in a middle class setting. The goofballs providing comic relief are Andrew Brown, Kingfish and Algonquin J. Calhoun. Every other black is a hard-working middle class American. The white equivalent is “The Honeymooners”. Ralph and Ed no more represented white American then Andy, Kingfish & Algonquin represented black America. The actors and writers in both cases provided incredible comedy!
That show demonstrated to their white audiences that black families and characters were not much different than them. IMHO it was the one of the few portals other than music that many whites were able to “see” blacks and softened resistance to the civil rights movement in the 1950s and early 1960s