What's on TV? Thursday, May 9, 1968

This week we're in the Twin Cities to take a look at the listings from 1968.  This is a good issue to look at; while there's nothing particularly remarkable about it, we're not yet into the summer rerun season, so our old dependables are still with us.  This includes The Hollywood Palace, which ABC foolishly moved from its regular Saturday night timeslot to this one on Thursday.  Fortunately, they would recognize their mistake and move it back to Saturday, although Channel 9, the ABC affiliate, would still preempt it for local movies (and the additional ad revenue they brought in) while moving Palace to Sunday afternoons. Oh well.

	KTCA, Channel 2 (Educ.)
	Morning
	08:55a	Classroom
	11:40a	Film
	Afternoon
	12:00p	Classroom
	03:00p	Conversational Spanish
	03:30p	Teaching English
	04:00p	NET Journal
	05:00p	Kindergarten
	05:30p	International Magazine
	Evening
	06:30p	Making Decisions
	07:00p	St. Paul School News
	07:30p	The French Chef
	08:00p	Town Meeting (color)
	08:30p	Private College Concerts
	09:00p	University of Minnesota Presidential Inauguration
	10:00p	Flower Gardening
	10:30p	Profile

A typically workmanlike, dry day of broadcasting at Channel 2.  Those highlights of the inauguration of the University of Minnesota president - that would have been for Malcolm Moos, who came to the U after having been a member of the Eisenhower administration.  (Imagine many colleges with Republican presidents nowadays.)  Moos was the first graduate of the University of Minnesota to become its president.

	WCCO, Channel 4 (CBS)
	Morning
	06:00a	Sunrise Semester (color)
	06:30a	Siegfried and His Flying Saucer (color)
	07:00a	Clancy and Carmen (color)
	07:30a	Clancy and Willie (color)
	08:00a	Captain Kangaroo (color)
	09:00a	Live Today (color)
	09:05a	Merv Griffin (guests Terence Stamp, Jack and Reiko Douglas, Jerry Shane, Fleury D’Antonakis, Gloria Loring) (color)
	10:00a	Andy Griffith
	10:30a	Dick Van Dyke
	11:00a	Love of Life (color)
	11:25a	CBS News (Joseph Benti) (color)
	11:30a	Search for Tomorrow (color)
	11:45a	The Guiding Light (color)
	Afternoon
	12:00p	News (Dean Montgomery) (color)
	12:20p	Something Special (color)
	12:30p	As the World Turns (color)
	01:00p	Love is a Many-Splendored Thing (color)
	01:30p	House Party (guest Dave Barry) (color)
	02:00p	To Tell the Truth (color)
	02:25p	CBS News (Douglas Edwards) (color)
	02:30p	The Edge of Night (color)
	03:00p	The Secret Storm (color)
	03:30p	The Beverly Hillbillies
	04:00p	Mike Douglas (guests Connie Francis, the Temptations, Joey Villa, the Amazing Kreskin, Scott Jacoby) (color)
	05:30p	CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite (color)
	Evening
	06:00p	News (Dave Moore) (color)
	06:15p	Weather (Bud Kraehling) (color)
	06:20p	Sports (Hal Scott) (color)
	06:30p	Mothers’ Day with the King Family (special) (color)
	07:30p	Marshal Dillon
	08:00p	Movie – “Woman of Straw” (color)
	10:00p	The Scene Tonight (color)
	10:45p	Movie – “The True Story of Jesse James” (color)
	12:45a	East Side/West Side

Mothers' Day* with the King Family was a syndicated special, preempting CBS' Cimarron Strip, starring Academy Award nominee Stuart Whitman.  As Strip was a 90-minute show, the remaining 30 minutes were filled with Marshal Dillon, the syndicated version of the half-hour Gunsmoke, which was a staple on WCCO throughout the '60s.  

*Or Mother's Day, if you prefer.  It appears both ways in the advertising and program listing.

A couple other notes: 1) It's very unusual to see East Side/West Side pop up in syndication. Saw a few episodes when it was on Trio years ago, and while it's topically preachy and very dark, it was a quality show as well.  I wish it were out on DVD today.  2) I've probably mentioned it, but bears repeating: The Scene Tonight was Channel 4's 10pm news, and was the first in the Twin Cities to present the anchors on one set, in a unified broadcast, rather than having the separate news/weather/sports programs (often with separate sponsors) that dominated local news throughout the years.

	KSTP, Channel 5 (NBC)
	Morning
	06:15a	David Stone (color)
	06:30a	City and Country (color)
	07:00a	Today (guests Bob and Ray, lady bullfighter Conchita Cintron, author Jose Yglesias) (color)
	09:00a	Snap Judgment (panelists Gig Young, Carol Lawrence) (color)
	09:25a	NBC News (Nancy Dickerson) (color)
	09:30a	Concentration (color)
	10:00a	Personality (panelists Selma Diamond, John Forsythe, Van Johnson, June Allyson) (color)
	10:30a	The Hollywood Squares (guests Hermoine Gingold, Michael Landon, Jan Murray, Soupy Sales, Connie Stevens, Morey Amsterdam, Wally Cox, Charley Weaver, Abby Dalton) (color)
	11:00a	Jeopardy (color)
	11:30a	Eye Guess (color)
	11:55a	NBC News (Edwin Newman)
	Afternoon
	12:00p	News (Gene Berry)
	12:10p	Weather (Pete Evensen)
	12:15p	Dialing for Dollars (color)
	12:30p	Let’s Make a Deal (color)
	01:00p	Days of Our Lives (color)
	01:30p	The Doctors (color)
	02:00p	Another World (color)
	02:30p	You Don’t Say! (panelists Suzy Parker, Paul Winchell) (color)
	03:00p	The Match Game (panelists Soupy Sales, Sheila MacRae) (color)
	03:25p	NBC News (Floyd Kalbur) (color)
	03:30p	Dialing for Dollars (color)
	04:30p	Of Lands and Seas (color)
	05:25p	News (Gene Berry)
	05:30p	Huntley-Brinkley Report (color)
	Evening
	06:00p	News (Bob Ryan) (color)
	06:15p	Weather (Johnny Morris) (color)
	06:20p	Sports (Al Tighe) (color)
	06:30p	Daniel Boone (color)
	07:30p	Ironside (color)
	08:30p	Dragnet (color)
	09:00p	Dean Martin (guests Petula Clark, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, Don Rickles, Flip Wilson) (color)
	10:00p	News (John MacDougall) (color)
	10:15p	Weather (Johnny Morris) (color)
	10:20p	Sports (Al Tighe) (color)
	10:30p	Tonight (guest Host Steve Lawrence, guests Gig Young, Sam Levenson, Godfrey Cambridge, Johnny Mercer, Bobby Goldsboro) (color)
	12:00a	Science Fiction Theater (color)

I don't often associate Ironside with the rest of the shows on NBC's schedule; for some reason I've always considered that more of a '70s show like, say, The Mod Squad.  But there it is, alongside Daniel Boone.  I wish I could come up with a clip of Dialing for Dollars, since that was such a long-running program on KSTP, but I do have this clip for Bowling for Dollars.

By the way, the news anchor Gene Berry is not to be confused with the actor Gene Barry, who's appearing in both Bat Masterson and Burke's Law on Channel 11.  Idle thought: is this one of the few occasions in which one star appears in two syndicated programs being shown on the same channel in the same timeframe?  Does anyone remember one of their local stations showing both Father Knows Best and Marcus Welby, M.D. in the same timeframe?

	KMSP, Channel 9 (ABC)
	Morning
	07:30a	77 Sunset Strip
	08:30a	Wedding Party (color)
	09:00a	Romper Room (color)
	09:30a	Dick Cavett (guest Angeline Butler) (color)
	11:00a	Bewitched
	11:30a	Treasure Isle (color)
	Afternoon
	12:00p	Dream House (color)
	12:30p	News (Jerry Smith)
	01:00p	The Newlywed Game (color)
	01:30p	The Baby Game (color)
	01:55p	Children’s Doctor (color)
	02:00p	General Hospital (color)
	02:30p	Dark Shadows (color)
	03:00p	The Dating Game (color)
	03:30p	Movie – “The Desperadoes Are in Town”
	04:55p	News (Jerry Smith) (color)
	05:00p	ABC Evening News (Bob Young) (color)
	05:30p	McHale’s Navy
	Evening
	06:00p	Truth or Consequences (color)
	06:30p	The Second Hundred Years (color)
	07:00p	The Flying Nun (color)
	07:30p	Bewitched (color)
	08:00p	That Girl (color)
	08:30p	Peyton Place (color)
	09:00p	The Hollywood Palace (host Sammy Davis Jr., Diana Ross and the Supremes, Burns and Schreiber, Raquel Welch, Baby Lawrence, Joey Bishop) (color)
	10:00p	News (Fahan/Steer) (color)
	10:25p	Sports (Tony Parker) (color)
	10:30p	Joey Bishop (color)
	12:00a	Naked City

I usually think of Dick Cavett in terms of his late-night show or perhaps one of his PBS versions, but of course he got his network start with This Morning, which ran from March of 1968 to January 1969, before moving to prime-time and then to late-night.  

As was usually the case while KMSP was an ABC affiliate (and even before then, to when they were the Twin Cities' independent channel the first time), the station did not present a 6:00pm newscast, and usually aired the network news at 5:00.  (Although as I recall, when ABC's evening news was still a 15-minute program, they did fill the remainder of the half hour with local news.) They may well have won the 6pm ratings with their sitcom reruns.  

	WTCN, Channel 11 (Ind.)
	Morning
	08:40a	News (Gil Amundson)
	08:45a	The King and Odie
	09:00a	Sea Hunt
	09:30a	The Rifleman
	10:00a	Woody Woodbury (guests Victor Buono, Bobby Rydell, Grace Markay, George McKelvey, Polly Rose Gottlieb) (color)
	11:30a	News (Gil Amundson/Warren Martin)
	Afternoon
	12:00p	Lunch With Casey
	01:00p	Movie – “Goliath Against the Giants”
	02:30p	Mel’s Notebook
	03:00p	Virginia Graham (guests Anne Jackson, Jeanne Sinkford)
	03:30p	Patty Duke
	04:00p	Popeye and Pete
	04:30p	Casey and Roundhouse
	05:00p	The Flintstones (color)
	05:30p	Gilligan’s Island
	Evening
	06:00p	The Twilight Zone
	06:30p	Burke’s Law
	07:30p	Perry Mason
	08:30p	Alfred Hitchcock Presents
	09:00p	Movie – “Flame of Barbary Coast”
	11:00p	News (Stuart A. Lindman)
	11:15p	Weather (Rodger Kent)
	11:20p	Sports (Frank Buetel)
	11:30p	Bat Masterson

Channel 11 often eschewed a 10pm newscast, preferring to go with one that followed its 9 pm movie.  Later, in the 70s, the station would introduce a 9:30 pm newscast, which it touted as being for those who couldn't stay up until 10.  One of their best anchors was Don Harrison, who would later go on to considerable recognition on Headline News, back when that station actually offered, you know, news.  As I recall, he was very popular in the Twin Cities - I know I liked him. TV