What's on TV? Friday, July 21, 1967

Tonight's debut show on ABC is Malibu U., hosted by Ricky Nelson during his "Rick" years. It runs for seven episodes, which is probably all that were planned; still, it's always a bad sign when a variety show has to resort to a "premise," and the premise of this one has Rick as "the dean of a mythical University at Malibu Beach," with a curriculum that covers "surfing, dancing, boy-and-girl watching and educational journeys to bizarre classrooms" including a bikini factory. Why they couldn't have just had people show up and sing, I don't know. Maybe if Dick Clark had been the producer, they would have. Meanwhile, all seven episodes exist on YouTube, and you can see tonight's show here. The listings this week come from the Northern California edition, which is the opposite end of the state from Malibu.

This week in TV Guide: July 15, 1967

I'd suppose most of you are familiar with Desilu Productions, if for no other reason than the number of times its logo appears at the end of your favorite programs, from The Untouchables to Mission: Impossible to Star Trek—and, of course, the series of sitcoms starring its president and 60-percent owner, Lucille Ball. Desilu has, under Lucy's leadership, become the largest TV-producing facility in the world, and as Dwight Whitney picks up the story, Desilu has become the target of Charles Bluhdorn, owner of the $650 million conglomerate Gulf & Western Industries, who not long ago added Paramount to his financial empire.  

The executive suite which Lucy occupies is oak-paneled, once occupied by Joseph Kennedy and Howard Hughes; she gave it a womanly touch that probably would leave Joe shaking his head. But don't think that this is all fun-and-games for her, one of those adventures that her TV-self might be involved in; since buying out her ex-husband Desi Arnaz in 1962, she's turned a loss of more than $665,000 into a profit of $830,000, and she's shown a deft hand at choosing good advisors ("and having sense enough to listen to them"). She has what Whitney describes as an "almost fanatical" loyalty to her people, and evokes a similar loyalty from them. She agreed with Fred Friendly's recent complaint that CBS chose to air a Lucy rerun rather than vital Vietnam hearings. 

She's also proved to be a strong advocate for the shows her studio produces, including Star Trek, which she championed, and Mission: Impossible, "a show which she had bulled through over strong opposition both from within her own studio and, particularly, from [CBS]." And then there's her own show, which CBS values to the tune of $350,000 annually and which she perennially hangs over the heads of network executives, with the threat that "I have other things I want to do." Her most recent contract with CBS provides "financing for the show at a record $90,000 per half hour, two one-hour CBS-financed Lucy specials, and a deal for future daytime stripping of her present series which [her advisor] estimates will bring in excess of $7,000,000 to Desilu before it is through."

Lucy knows that times are changing in the industry. "A company in TV alone cannot survive today’s market. You have to make 20 pilots to get three. How do you amortize that?" She knows that Bludhorn's offer makes sense—it would give her about $10 million of G&W stock, and it would be arranged to give her a "substantial" capital gain—and it would ease the "ataggering interest burden" on the $3 million she borrowed to buy Desi out. Still, she remains reluctant throughout the process until, impressed by Bludhorn, she agrees to the merger. 

Was it worth it? Many people at Desilu will complain in the future about Paramount's management of the company, how it no longer has the buzz of a family enterprise which it once had, and many of its properties will suffer from penny-pinching and corporate interference. Lucy, following the merger, will found her own new production company, Lucille Ball Productions, which continues to profit from residuals from Here's Lucy. And nobody ever thought twice about the idea of a crazy redhead running a major studio.

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While The Hollywood Palace is on summer break, ABC fills the Saturday night time slot with Piccadilly Palace, a London-based variety show starring the iconic British comedy duo of Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise. We'll stop in from time to time during the summer months to see who has the best lineup..
Sullivan:  Ed's guests in this rerun are Ginger Rogers; singers Johnny Mathis, the Lovin’ Spoonful and Abbe Lane; comics Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara, and Bob King; the tumbling Three Kims; and puppet Topo Gigio. 

Piccadilly:  Guests are singer Frankie Avalon and the New Vaudeville Band, with regular Millicent Martin.  Hosts Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise do some wild impressions of Julius Caesar, and Samson and Delilah; and Wise offers an improbable version of Grieg’s Concerto in A Minor. Frankie sings "What Is This Thing Called Love?" and "I Could Write a Book" while the New Vaudevlle Band sings "If I Had a Talking Picture of You" and "Finchley Central." Millicent sings "Window Wishin'"

Piccadilly Palace is just different enough from Ed—the show is centered around the skits of Morecambe and Wise—that the matchups become imprecise. Having said that, I'm no particular fan of either the Lovin' Spoonful or the New Vaudeville Band, and Morecambe and Wise's skits sound ridiculously funny. But Stiller and Meara can be very clever, and with Ginger Rogers and Johnny Mathis, chances are Sullivan takes the week.

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There's a lot of history in this week's programs. Not the kind of history that necessarily shows up in the books, but history all the same. It's something I've stressed since I started this project all these years ago: the idea that TV Guide represents a history book, a pop culture mirror, all kinds of things besides what's on TV tonight.

Here's an example of something that is in the history books, although you might not all be familiar with it. It's the CBS News Special "How Israel Won the War" (Tuesday, 10:00 p.m.), with Mike Wallace leading the look at Israel's devistating victory in what came to be known as the Six-Day War, including interviews with Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan and Army Chief of Staff (and future prime minister) Itzhak Rabin. We've grown used to endless wars, in these last few decades; the idea that a major war could be conducted, and won, in less than a week, is almost hard to imagine. 

Tensions in the Middle East were, then as now, at a heightened level, which came to the boiling point when Egyptian president Nassar closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping, and ordered the UN emergency force out of the area. On June 5, as the UN personel were evacuating, Israel launched a preemptive strike, wiping out Egypt's air defenses and occupying the Sinai Peninsula, the Golan Heights, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip. Jordan and Syria entered the war on Egypt's side, but a ceasefire was agreed to on June 11. There were more than 20,000 Arab casualties, while Israel suffered fewer than 1,000.* The politics, as well as the ramifications from the war, can be debated, but it created a mystique about the efficiency of the Israeli military that would continue for decades. 

*Elsewhere in this issue it is mentioned that Ted Yates, NBC's acclaimed reporter, was killed in Jerusalem during the war.

Next we head ringside, for what's being billed as a "heavyweight elimination fight" between George Chuvalo and Joe Frazier, live from Madison Square Garden in New York (Tuesday, 7:00 p.m., syndicated). This refers to the June 20 decision to strip Muhammad Ali of the heavyweight title after he refused draft induction. (Ali was also sentenced to five years in prison for draft evasion, fined $10,000, and banned from boxing for three years. His conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court in 1971.) 

This "elimination fight" business in the ad is a bit misleading; the World Boxing Association did set up a tournament involving the top eight heavyweights, the winner of which would be their new champion. Frazier, however, declined to take part in the tournament, instead continuing to build up his undefeated record, and Tuesday's fight against Chuvalo will be his toughest test yet, one which he'll pass with flying colors by stopping Chuvalo in a fourth-round TKO. It's likely that the only "elimination" aspect of this fight was that whoever lost was out of the running for the time being. 

In March 1968, Frazier defeats Buster Mathis in the inaugural event at the new Madison Square Garden to win recognizition by the New York State Athletic Commission (and five other states) as its heavyweight champ. Frazier defeats Jimmy Ellis, the winner of the WBA tournament, in February 1970 to win the undisputed championship; he'll retain that title with an epic victory over the reinstated Ali in March 1971.

And then, there's the revolution that wasn't. The supersonic transport—SST—was supposed to be one of the great aviation advancements of the 20th century, revolutionizing transatlantic flight. That it wasn't is a fascinating story in and of itself, but in 1967 the promise of the SST is still alive, if not yet functional, and forms a major thread in "The Aviation Revolution," an NBC News Special reported by Chet Huntley. (Wednesday, 9:00 p.m.) The report looks at the challenges facing commercial aviation, including overcrowding skies, increasing noise pollution, and pressure on designers and builders.

In 1967 the SST is still in the planning stages; the United States, Britain and France, and the Soviet Union are all designing SSTs, with Boeing working on the American version. Controversy continues to dog the plane, though, with concerns about sonic booms and the plane's effect on the ozone layer causing a lengthy and contentious debate that results in Congress killing funding for the SST in 1971, and banning overland commercial supersonic flights over the United States. When the Anglo-French Concorde begins service in the mid-1970s, it's prohibited from flying into New York City, although the ban is eventually overturned. (The Soviet version, the Tupolev Tu-144, began flight in 1975.) Even after environmental concerns are overcome, though, the SST fails to become profitable, and both versions are eventually retired from use. So much for the plane of the future

By the way, here's a footnote for you: In 1967, Boeing was still headquartered in Seattle; when the city was awarded an NBA expansion team (which, ironically, began play in 1967) the team took the name SuperSonics, in tribute to the forthcoming plane. Today, there is no SST, and the Seattle SuperSonics are now the Oklahoma City Thunder. And if you want more irony, the FAA sonic boom tests that so conerned congress were conducted in 1964—in Oklahoma City. 

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Here's some more sports: the final round of the British Open, telecast live via Early Bird satellite from the Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake (Saturday, 7:30 a.m., ABC). Unlike major tournaments today, which run from Thursday-Sunday, the Open plays from Wednesday through Saturday, with any playoff round held on Sunday; this schedule lasted until 1980. As for the tournament itself, ◀ Roberto De Vicenzo, whom you may remember from the more unfortunate day when a scoring error cost him the Masters, wins the Open by two shots over the defending champion, Jack Nicklaus.

Competition of a different kind: the Miss Universe Pageant, live from Miami Beach (Saturday, 10:00 p.m., CBS; tape-delayed in PT). Bob Barker is the host in the Convention Center, June Lockhart hosts the TV broadcast, and singer Jean-Paul Vignon is the musical guest. The winner is Miss USA, Sylvia Hitchcock from Alabama. This is, incidentally, the first time hosting the Miss Universe Pageant for Barker; he'll host both this and the Miss USA pageant through 1987.

A quartet of notable guest stars appear on Thursday's reruns, starting with Daniel Boone (7:30 pm., NBC), which has Jimmy Dean playing a banjo-strumming woodsman on the lam from a murder charge. At the same time over on CBS, Tallulah Bankhead plays herself as Lucy's new neighbor on The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour; in order to impress her, Lucy tries to talk Fred and Ethel to pose as her maid and butler. Later on, Vincent Price is Count Sforza on F Troop (8:00 p.m., ABC), and the troopers at Fort Courage are convinced that he's a vampire responsible for the disappearance of Wrangler Jane. And finally, Reginald Owen, known to most people here as  Ebenezer Scrooge in the 1938 version of A Christmas Carol, guests on Bewitched (8:30 p.m., ABC) as Aunt Clara's boyfriend, Ocky, and he comes along just in time: Clara has just blacked out the entire Eastern Seaboard.

Friday night features a couple of classics on local TV. First, on KHSL in Chico, it's the chilling Twilight Zone episode "It's a Good Life" (7:00 p.m.), in which ►Billy Mumy casts anyone who makes him angry into the cornfield. Later, it's the supurb Twelve Angry Men (9:00 p.m., KXTV in Sacramento), with Henry Fonda single-handedly holding up the dignity of the judicial system. Interesting to note that the description refers to it as "an adaptation of Reginald Rose's TV classic"; for many years, the TV version, which appeared on Studio One and starred Robert Cummings in the Fonda role, was thought lost; it's since been recovered, but I'd imagine that nowadays very few people know about it and think only of the movie version. Personally, I think you could make a case that Cummings dones a better job than Fonda, but that's just me.

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On Coronet Blue (Monday, 10:00 p.m., CBS), Denholm Elliott and Juliet Mills guest star in a story that features Alden (Frank Converse) caught between a fugitive revolutionary and the gunmen out to get him. Coronet Blue has been the surprise hit of the summer season—but Richard K. Doan warns its fans that they'd better "prepare themselves to be left dangling." You see, the program, which was approved by Jim Aubrey (one of his "last ventures before his fall as CBS-TV czar") for the 1965-66 season. After Aubrey was bounced, his successor, Jack Schneider, "thought it a poor show and shelved it." However, producer Herbert Brodkin, who had a firm contract with the network for 13 shows, went ahead and shot them. This year, CBS decided to burn off the series in order to recoup some of its investment, and scheduled 11 of the 13 episodes for the summer. Without, of course, an explanation of the cryptic storyline. (Even if CBS wanted to continue the show, star Converse had already moved on (no pun intended) to N.Y.P.D. on ABC.) 

I'm sure many, if not most, of you are familiar with the Coronet Blue debacle, but here's an excellent article at Television Obscurities that goes into detail, including how the mystery was supposed to e wrapped up. You can see it on DVD, and while it may not live up to its mythic status, it's still fun.

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MST3K alert: Teen-Age Crime Wave (1955). Three dangerous juvenile delinquents take refuge in the home of a farmer and his family. Tommy Cook, Mollie McCart, Sue England. (Thursday, 3:300 p.m., KHSL) Let's see, so far we've had Teen-Age Caveman, Teen-Age Strangler, and Teenagers From Outer Space, so I suppose this would be the natural succession. Our three stars are the three teens holding the family hostage, but of course one of them has to be the weak link, allowing the plot to fail. Well, what did you expect—In Cold Blood? And if those actors are teenagers, then I'm Truman Capote. TV  

Around the dial

Most of today's commercials are—what would you say? Odes to crass materialism? Of course, that's always been a part of advertising. But sometimes a commercial can evokes an era long left behind, and at Comfort TV, David looks at one such commercial: the 1977 "Here's to good friends" commercial for Löwenbräu. I think you'll know just what David is talking about.

Christmas has produced more than its share of good times, at least for me, and at Christmas TV History Joanna continues her month-long look at some of those memories created by various adaptations of A Christmas Carol. Next up: Ebenezer, a 1998 Western-themed remake with Jack Palance as a terrific Scrooge.

At bare•bones e-zine, Jack continues the Hitchcock Project with the second of Charlotte Armstrong's scripts for the Alfred Hitchcock Presents: "Sybilla," a domestic drama with a very big twist, starring Alexander Scorby and Barbara Bel Geddes.

John takes a break from his American Dream and The X-Files series at Cult TV Blog to watch The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and the second-season episode "The Birds and the Bees Affair," an "insane" story about bees being used as killer weapons. Some of the ideas could have come right out of the CIA handbook. . .

We haven't heard from The Horn Section for awhile, so this week Hal makes up for it with a two-parter from Love That Bob's final season in 1959: "Bob Helps Martha," and "Bob Helps Von Zell." The great Rose Marie plays Martha in the first episode, while Harry Von Zell appears as himself in the second, as does George Burns. 

At Cult TV Lounge, we're up to a fine Tara King episode that I quite enjoyed: "The Interrogators," with Christopher Lee in terrific form as a sinister British office who may or may not be what he seems. Of course, any episode in which Steed gets to use his armored bowler hat is a guarantee.

Martin Grams has some book reviews for you in you're in the mood for some nice reading material. The five books in question are career bios of Betty White, Carol Lynley, Jeanne Eagels, Barbara Nichols, and Sylvia Sidney. A star and an era for just about anyone, I'd say.

Here's something from last week that I'm catching up on: at Television Obscurities, Robert celebrats "Lost TV Day" with a look at the programming shown on ABC on Thursday, January 12, 1961. This inclusive article shows just how difficult it can be to accurately research American television. It also shows how such a valuable archive was treated with so little care.

At  The View from the Junkyard, Roger reviews the Columbo episode "Murder in Malibu," one of the "new" Columbo episodes, and a rarity: a truly bad episode, featuring bad acting from almost everyone, a weak twist, and a case against the killer that's "falling apart at the seams, inside-out, back-to-front, and the label is showing." Ouch!

Travlanche celebrates the 110th birthday of Dave Garroway, and talks about his legacy in television history, especially Today. And if there's anyone who can tell you what that legacy is all about, it's my friend Jodie at Garroway at Large, who wrote the book on Dave. Her book, Peace, is a winner for anyone who wants to know more about both Dave Garroway and television history, and you can buy it here.

Finally, a link to my latest appearance on The Dan Schneider Video Interview. It's a real treat this week, as the aforementioned Martin Grams joins us to talk about The Twilight Zone, and I can't think of anyone more qualified to do so. You can view it here. By the way, things have been a bit busy here, so if you've left a comment on the blog and haven't seen a reply yet, I'll be doing those today. TV  

Burke's Law: the cop show with a heart—or at least wallet—of gold

A badly wanted to do comedy," Gene Barry said in a profile for the November 23, 1963 issue of TV Guide. "I searched the scripts for the inherent comedy that can be found in almost any drama. I searched for the twinkle, the lift of an eyebrow [that] could change the tone of a serious sentence. I read Burke’s Law. I envisioned the twinkle in it."

And so, after three seasons as the Western hero Bat Masterson, after having said he would never do another television series, Barry returned to the small screen to portray Amos Burke, millionaire captain of the LAPD homicide division (and eventual secret agent, but we’ll get to that later), in the whimsical mystery that ran on ABC, in two different formats, for a total of three seasons.

When you keep finding new-old programs to watch, you have to be careful not to forget the old-old programs you’ve already enjoyed. It's been close to a decade since we last watched Burke's Law, and so last month we reintroduced it into the Saturday night schedule. Sometimes when you revisit an old favorite, you find your ardor somewhat diminished, but it's not the case here; it's every bit as enjoyable now as it was back then. 

I never saw Burke’s Law when it was in first-run. My only recollection of it was from the reruns in syndication in the late-60s, and from that all I can remember is the Rolls Royce tooling down the road while a woman’s voice cooed, "It’s Burke’s Law!" To tell you the truth, that voice kind of scared me a bit. (Of course, I hadn’t yet learned the meaning of the world "sultry.")

Based on the premise alone, it would have been impossible to produce Burke’s Law without that twinkle Barry mentioned. Burke is indeed a millionaire (the source of his money is never definitely stated, though he refers to an inheritance from his father, and implies that he’s multiplied that fortune through shrewd investments*) who lives in a mansion, is often clad in a tuxedo and surrounded by beautiful women, and is chauffeured to crime scenes in a Rolls Royce by his driver/valet, Henry (Leon Lontoc).

*Gene Barry himself was no slouch when it came to investing. That same 1963 TV Guide article mentions Barry’s ownership of a 40-acre orange ranch, mines in Nevada, a half-share of a construction company, and prime land in Los Angeles on which he and his partners planned to put up office buildings and apartments. Substituting Burke for Berry does a pretty good job of filling in the gaps.

Which, of course, begs the question: why does a man who clearly doesn’t have to work for a living choose a profession that’s not only difficult, but dangerous, one that required him to work his way up the ladder from beat cop to captain of homicide and could claim his life at any moment? I don’t know if Barry was one of those actors who composed backstories for each of the characters he played, but he does drop hints as to his concept of Burke. He is "a carry-over of the Old World, but part of this world," cultured, mannered, sophisticated, worldly. "Police work is as important to Amos Burke as building a building is to me. Hell, he wouldn’t be happy sitting in a stock-exchange seat. He is alive, vital, now." Probably the best answer comes from fellow detective Tim Tilson, who in the premiere episode is asked by a bystander at a crime scene why a millionaire would bother being a cop. "Why are you a construction man?" Tilson counters. "That's what I do best," the man says, to which Tilson replies, "That's why he's a cop."

It's a premise that requires some selling, but Barry is just the man to do it. Producer Aaron Spelling describes him as a man "at home in [a tuxedo], secure in it," and his portrayal of Burke owes much to his previous turn as the Western dandy Masterson. In this updated environment Berry is still a crimefighter, albeit with a gun instead of a walking stick. And, as his colleagues are quick to remind others, a millionaire is what he is, but a policeman is who he is.

Given its various elements, Burke’s Law could have gone in several directions, but its success derives from the direction it chose. Neither traditional police drama nor comedy, each episode is centered on a spectacular murder (with the victim identified by the episode title Who Killed …) and a cast of flamboyantly eccentric (to put it lightly) suspects, mostly played by big-name guest stars (listed in alphabetical order in the opening credits, and frequently making little more than cameo appearances). Given that, one could hardly be blamed for expecting the investigating detectives to be just as zany, but far from it: Burke and his two cohorts, Sergeant Les Hart (veteran actor Regis Toomey) and Detective Tim Tilson (Gary Conway), could have been buffoons or broad caricatures, but instead they’re skilled cops who understand that murder is a deadly business and take their jobs seriously (if not always how they do them). They’re very smart, and very, very good.

L-R: Regis Toomey, Gary Conway,
and Gene Barry

The show’s premise also offers Burke an unusual advantage, never overtly stated but often implied, that as a millionaire he has the ability to deal with rich, powerful suspects on an even footing. Their money can’t intimidate him (he’s probably as wealthy as they are), nor can their influence scare him off. He’s beholden to nobody but the public, and he doesn’t scare easily.

The interplay between the three is one of the show’s delights. Hart is the veteran, wizened cop and mentor to the young Tilson, who has an encyclopedic knowledge of almost everything but lacks the experience and intuition to put the pieces together. Burke and Les obviously go back a long way (Les will on occasion drop the formality and refer to Burke as "Amos,"), and while Tim can sometimes be a bit of a showoff, it’s clear that Burke has a paternal affection for the young detective, often imparting a bit of his collected wisdom. ("Never ask a question unless you already know the answer—Burke’s Law.") The three men split up the investigative work, with Burke generally reserving for himself ("Your old Captain") the interrogation of the most interesting suspects. Those suspects are frequently also beautiful women, and their attraction to the handsome, dashing Burke may be genuine—or an attempt to throw him off the trail.

Indeed, Burke is seldom out of the company of an attractive female—the episode often begins with him in the embrace of some such lovely companion—but the moment the phone rings, with Les or Tim calling him to the scene of yet another murder, Burke is all business. The debonair playboy is gone, replaced by the determined homicide captain. There’s never an attempt to avoid his job, just a request to his female companion that she not go away.

And that, I think, is one of the main reasons I find this show so enjoyable. For all of the light touches— and the mix of comedy and drama works surprisingly well—Amos Burke is a policeman before all else, a damn good one who understands the importance of his job. His suspects may include glamorous women, but their beauty never blinds him to the possibility that behind their makeup may be the face of a killer. He’s not afraid to trade either punches or gunshots, and he’s not satisfied until the killer is apprehended.

Then there's that twinkle in the eye that Barry talked about, the priceless reactions when Burke meets yet another crazy suspect or has to listen to yet another ridiculous story. It’s when Burke lets us know that it’s a joke, and that we’re in on it. Throw in some great supporting players, such as Michael Fox as the droll medical examiner and Eileen O’Neill as a desk sergeant who doesn’t have to take second place to any of Burke’s beauties, and you’ve got the ingredients for a great show.*

*And by the way, speaking of beauties, did I mention that Anne Francis’ detective series Honey West was a direct spin-off from Burke? She was introduced in the second-season episode "Who Killed the Jackpot?" and would go on to a one-season run in 1965-66.

Which is why the third and final season is such a disappointment. Caught up in the spy hysteria of the early James Bond years, for 1965 the series changed format completely. Amos Burke was now a secret agent (hence the show’s new title: Amos Burke, Secret Agent), working for a spymaster known only as "The Man" (Carl Benton Reid). It had a flashy opening title and fun gadgets and even more beautiful women, if that was possible. It even had Burke’s Rolls. What it didn’t have was the chemistry of the original. No Les, no Tim, no Henry. It ran for 17 episodes, and by January 1966 it was over.

Apparently, Amos Burke tired of the secret agent business and returned to the LAPD, or at least that’s what had happened in the 1994-95 revival of Burke’s Law. Burke was now a chief, his sidekick was his son Peter (during the intervening years Burke had married and was now a widower), and Henry was back behind the wheel of his Rolls (albeit with a different actor). It was a middling success, running for 24 episodes over two seasons.

Burke’s Law could have been many things. It could have been a comedy, a la Barney Miller or Car 54. It could have been a police procedural, like any one of the cop shows on at the time. Instead, it was a one-of-a-kind, a comedy-mystery, a sophisticated whodunit. Most of all, Burke’s Law was fun. It wasn’t searing drama, it didn’t involve impossibly convoluted plots. It was easy to watch, and easy to enjoy. It has suffered from one of the most frustrating of DVD issues, with the first season coming out in 2008, and nothing since. Fortunately, it has aired on Me-TV in the past (which is where I caught it), and hopefully it will again. It's also available on YouTube—all three seasons, including Amos Burke, Secret Agent. And whether you're watching it for the first time or rekindling an old memory, you'll feel the same way.  TV      

What's on TV? Monday, July 7, 1969

It's always a good idea every once in awhile to take stock of what shows are making the syndication rounds. Many of the shows now fall into the "classic" category, but back then they were only a few years old: Burke's Law, The Real McCoys, Timmy and Lassie, Leave It to Beaver, Gilligan's Island, I Love Lucy, The Patty Duke Show, McHale's Navy, I Love Lucy, The Untouchables, Perry Mason, and Alfred Hitchcock Presents are all part of this Northern California edition. And there are shows like The Andy Griffith Show and The Dick Van Dyke Show that are still running as daytime shows on CBS. I became familiar with most of these shows when they ran in syndicadtion, and I'll bet many of you did as well. Things have changed with the advent of retro channels, but even so, I suspect that Gilligan, Dick Van Dyke, Andy Griffith, and Lucy are always being shown somewhere in this world.