Throwback Machine

Author: primekutz

  • Circus Boy – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Circus Boy – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Circus Boy

    Circus Boy is an American action/adventure/drama series that aired in prime time on NBC, and then on ABC, from 1956 to 1958.  It was then rerun by NBC on Saturday mornings, from 1958 to 1960.

    Set in the late 1890s, the title of the series refers to a boy named Corky.  After his parents, “The Flying Falcons,” were killed in a trapeze accident, young Corky (Micky Dolenz – billed at the time as Mickey Braddock) was adopted by Joey the Clown (Noah Beery, Jr.), and the whole Burke and Walsh Circus family.
    The young boy quickly found a role with the circus as water boy to Bimbo, a baby elephant whom Corky would come to consider his pet.  Riding Bimbo’s back, Corky dealt with adolescent problems, and helped the show’s adults including Joey, owner/promoter Big Tim Champion (Robert Lowery), and head canvasman Pete (Guinn Williams), keep the circus successful as the traveling show moved from town to town each week.
    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Sunday Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

  • Grand Ole Opry – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Grand Ole Opry

    The Grand Ole Opry started as the WSM Barn Dance in the new fifth-floor radio studio of the National Life & Accident Insurance Company in downtown Nashville on November 28th, 1925.  On October 18th, 1925, management began a program featuring “Dr. Humphrey Bate and his string quartet of old-time musicians.”  On November 2nd, WSM hired long-time announcer and program director George D. “Judge” Hay, an enterprising pioneer from the National Barn Dance program at WLS in Chicago, who was also named the most popular radio announcer in America as a result of his radio work with both WLS and WMC in Memphis, Tennessee.  Hay launched the WSM Barn Dance with 77-year-old fiddler Uncle Jimmy Thompson on November 28th, 1925, which is celebrated as the birth date of the Grand Ole Opry.

    One hour of the Opry was nationally-broadcast by the NBC Red Network from 1939 to 1956; for much of its run, it aired one hour after the program that had inspired it, National Barn Dance. The NBC segment, originally known by the name of its sponsor, The Prince Albert Show, was first hosted by Acuff, who was succeeded by Red Foley from 1946 to 1954.
    From October 15th, 1955 to September 1956, ABC-TV aired a live, hour-long television version once a month on Saturday nights (sponsored by Ralston-Purina), pre-empting one hour of the then-90-minute Ozark Jubilee.  From 1955–57, Al Gannaway owned and produced both The Country Show and Stars of the Grand Ole Opry, filmed programs syndicated by Flamingo Films.
    Top-charting country music acts performed during the Ryman years, including Roy Acuff, called the King of Country Music, Hank Williams, Webb Pierce, Faron Young, Martha Carson, Lefty Frizzell, and many others.

     

    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Saturday Tagged With: , , ,
  • The Mod Squad – ThrowbackMachine.com

    The Mod Squad – ThrowbackMachine.com

    The Mod Squad

    A “hippie” undercover cop show that ran on ABC from September 24th, 1968, until August 23rd, 1973.   It starred Michael Cole as Pete Cochran, Peggy Lipton as Julie Barnes, Clarence Williams III as Linc Hayes, and Tige Andrews as Captain Adam Greer.  The executive producers of the series were Aaron Spelling and Danny Thomas.

    They were The Mod Squad (“One black, one white, one blond”), the hippest and first young undercover cops on TV.  Each of these characters represented mainstream culture’s principal fears regarding youth in the era: Long-haired rebel Pete Cochran was kicked out of his parents’ Beverly Hills home, then arrested and put on probation after he stole a car; Linc Hayes was from a family of 13 children and was arrested in the Watts riots, one of the longest and most violent actual riots in Los Angeles history; beautiful flower child Julie Barnes, the “canary with a broken wing”, was arrested for vagrancy after running away from her prostitute mother’s San Francisco home; and Captain Adam Greer was a tough but sympathetic mentor and father figure who convinced them to form the squad.

    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Tuesday Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

  • animated Archives – ThrowbackMachine.com

    The New Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

    The New Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

    The New Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is an American children’s television series that originally aired on NBC from September 15th, 1968 through February 23rd, 1969. Produced by Hanna-Barbera and based on the classic Mark Twain characters, the program starred its three live-action heroes, Huck Finn (Michael Shea), Becky Thatcher (LuAnn Haslam), and Tom Sawyer (Kevin […]

    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Sunday Tagged With: , , , , ,

    The Famous Adventures of Mr. Magoo

    famous adventures of mr magoo

    The Famous Adventures of Mr. Magoo is an animated television series, produced by United Productions of America, which aired on NBC for one season (1964 –1965) of 24 episodes.  The television series was based on the original cartoon of the same name, with Jim Backus reprising the voice over of the role he did on […]

    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Saturday Tagged With: , , ,

    Jonny Quest

    Jonny Quest

    Jonny Quest debuted on ABC at 7:30PM EDT on Friday, September 18th, 1964.  This prime time animated TV series is an American science fiction adventure television series about a boy who accompanies his scientist father on extraordinary adventures.  It was produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions for Screen Gems, and created and designed by comic book artist […]

    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Friday Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
  • Here Come the Brides – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Here Come the Brides – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Here Come the Brides

    Here Come the Brides is an American comedy Western series from Screen Gems that aired on the ABC television network from September 25th, 1968 to April 3rd, 1970.  

    The series was loosely based upon the Mercer Girls, Asa Mercer‘s efforts to bring civilization to old Seattle by importing marriageable women from the east coast of the United States in the 1860s, where the ravages of the American Civil War left towns short of men.
    The producers said the show was inspired by the movie Seven Brides for Seven Brothers in an interview with LA Times TV critic Cecil Smith.
    As a television western, the series rarely featured any form of gunplay, and violence was generally limited to comical fistfights.  This was in keeping with the restrictions on television violence at the time.  Stories highlighted the importance of cooperation, racial harmony, and peaceful resolution of conflict.  Plots were usually a mix of drama and humor.  Being one of the first shows targeted at young women, most of the humor was at the expense of the men, but not particularly bitingly so.
    In the pilot episode, fast-talking logging company boss Jason Bolt (Robert Brown) is faced with a shutdown of his operation as lonely lumberjacks are ready to leave Seattle due to the lack of female companionship.  He promises to find 100 marriageable ladies willing to come to the frontier town (population 152) and stay for a full year.  Sawmill owner Aaron Stempel (Mark Lenard) puts up much of the expense money as a wager that Bolt won’t succeed, with the three Bolt brothers betting their mountain (home to their logging company).
    The Bolts travel to New Bedford, Massachusetts, recruit the women, then charter a mule-ship to take them to Seattle.  The local saloon owner, Lottie (Joan Blondell) takes the women under her wing and becomes a mother figure to them, while Bolt desperately works to keep the women from leaving at the next high tide.  Eventually, the women decide to give Seattle and the loggers a chance.  The ship’s captain, Clancy (Henry Beckman), develops a relationship with Lottie and becomes a regular character in the series.
    Much of the dramatic and comic tension in the first season revolved around Stempel’s efforts to sabotage the deal and take over the Bolts’ holdings.  Stempel became more friendly in the second and final season, which focused more on the development of individual characters and the conflicts associated with newcomers and with people just passing through.  Bobby Sherman and David Soul were propelled to pop stardom as Jason’s brothers, Jeremy and Joshua.  Jeremy took a prominent role, not only as the boyfriend of Candy Pruitt (Bridget Hanley), the beautiful leader of the brides, but also as a young man struggling with a conversation-stopping stammer. In one episode, he is temporarily cured of his impediment, following coaching by a traveler who has come to Seattle.  Upon discovering that his benefactor is actually a con artist, his faith is shaken so deeply that the stammer returns.
    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Uncategorized, Wednesday Tagged With: , , , ,

  • 479F61Ec7434954D03D478A9575F4E2694936E24.00000740




  • Appointment With Adventure – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Appointment With Adventure – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Appointment With Adventure

    Appointment with Adventure is a half-hour adventure dramatic anthology television series broadcast live on CBS from 1955-1956.  The program has no host.  It aired at 10 p.m. EST on the Sunday evening schedule between the better known Alfred Hitchcock Presents and What’s My Line?  It ran opposite The Loretta Young Show on NBC and Life Begins at Eighty, a panel discussion series hosted by Jack Barry on ABC.

    The series aired fifty-three episodes, having premiered on April 3rd, 1955, near the end of the regular 1954-1955 television season.  It ran throughout the spring and summer of 1955 and began its fall run on October 2nd, 1955, concluding new segments on April 1st, 1956.  In effect, the series ran for a full year without the summer rebroadcast period standard for most programs.
    Episodes centered upon wars in U.S. history as well as dramatizations from events from many places throughout the world, then and in the past.  In the episode which aired on May 1st, 1955, Polly Bergen, Dane Clark, and Hugh Reilly starred in “Rendezvous in Paris.”  Tony Randall and Jack Klugman, fifteen years prior to their television roles as Felix Unger and Oscar Madison, respectively, in ABC’s The Odd Couple, appeared with Gena Rowlands in the September 4th, 1955, episode entitled “The Pirate’s House.”  Randall also appeared two months earlier in the Appointment with Adventure episode “Caribbean Cruise.”
    John Cassavetes, husband of Gena Rowlands, appeared with Elizabeth Montgomery, later star of ABC’s Bewitched, and Tina Louise, later of CBS’s Gilligan’s Island, in the segment “All Through the Night” on February 5th, 1956.  Montgomery had also appeared in the November 20th, 1955, episode “Relative Stranger.”  John Ericson and Dorothy Malone, later star of Peyton Place, appeared on the New Years Day, 1956, episode “Mutiny.”  Jason Robards appeared with Christopher Plummer and Constance Ford in the March 18th, 1956, episode entitled “A Thief There Was.” 
    The plethora of guests included several other well-known names and some future stars who were beginning their show business, including Philip Abbott, Edie Adams, Gene Barry, Carl Betz, Neville Brand, Patricia Breslin, Geraldine Brooks, Macdonald Carey, Robert Clary, James Daly (“A Touch of Christmas” on December 25th, 1955), Gloria DeHaven (“The Snow People”), Eva Gabor, James Gregory, Pat Hingle, Henry Hull, Kim Hunter, Henry Jones, Louis Jourdan, Don Keefer, Phyllis Kirk, June Lockhart, Jack Lord, Lin McCarthy (four episodes), Peggy McCay, Biff McGuire (episode entitled “Number Seven, Hangman’s Row”), Robert Middleton, Elizabeth Montgomery, Paul Newman, Patrick O’Neal, Patti Page (in “Paris Venture”), Betsy Palmer, Neva Patterson, Mala Powers, Charlotte Rae, Erik Rhodes, and Janice Rule.  Rod Serling, before his The Twilight Zone, wrote the episode “The Faithful Pilgrimage”, which stars Theodore Bikel.  It aired on April 17th, 1955.  Forrest Tucker, later of ABC’s F Troop, appeared in the series finale with the unusually titled episode, “Two Falls for Satan.”
    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Sunday Tagged With: , , , , ,

  • Our Miss Brooks – ThrowbackMachine.com

    Our Miss Brooks

    Our Miss Brooks is an American situation comedy starring Eve Arden as a sardonic high school English teacher.  It began as a radio show broadcast on CBS from 1948 to 1957.  When the show was adapted to television (1952–56), it became one of the medium’s earliest hits.

    Our Miss Brooks was considered groundbreaking for showing a woman who was neither a scatter-brained klutz nor a homebody, but rather a working woman who transcended the actual or assumed limits to women’s working lives of the time.  Connie Brooks was considered a realistic character in an non-glamorized profession (she often joked, for example, about being underpaid, as many teachers were at the time) who showed women could be competent and self-sufficient outside their home lives without losing their femininity or their humanity.  The show  ran for 130 episodes on television and won an Emmy award before it was cancelled in 1956.
    Filed Under: -Television, Friday Tagged With: , , ,
  • The Lawrence Welk Show – ThrowbackMachine.com

    The Lawrence Welk Show – ThrowbackMachine.com

    The Lawrence Welk Show

    The Lawrence Welk Show is an American televised musical variety show hosted by big band leader Lawrence Welk.  The series aired locally in Los Angeles for four years (1951–55), then nationally for another 27½ years via the ABC network (1955–71).

    In 1951, The Lawrence Welk Show started as a local program on KTLA-TV in Los Angeles, flagship station of the Paramount Television Network.  The original show was broadcast from the since-demolished Aragon Ballroom at Venice Beach.
    The show made its national TV debut on ABC Television on July 2nd, 1955, and was initially produced at the Hollywood Palladium, moving to the ABC studios at Prospect and Talmadge in Hollywood shortly afterwards. For 23 of its 27 years on the air, the show would originate there.
    The 1965-66 season was taped at the Hollywood Palace since that was ABC’s only West Coast TV studio at the time equipped for live or taped color production; Welk had insisted that the show go color in 1965 because he believed that being broadcast in color was critical to the continued success of his program.  Once a couple of studios at the ABC Prospect and Talmadge facilities had been converted to color in 1966, the show moved back there.
    The show aired on ABC until 1971.  When the show was canceled by the head of programming there, Welk formed his own production company and continued airing the show, on local stations and, often from 7 to 8 P.M. Eastern time on Saturdays over some of the ABC affiliates on which he had previously appeared, along with some stations affiliated with other networks.
    When the show began, it was billed as the Dodge Dancing Party from 1955 to 1959.  During 1956–59, Lawrence Welk was broadcast two nights per week.  The second show’s title was Lawrence Welk’s Top Tunes and New Talent Show (1956–58) and then Lawrence Welk’s Plymouth Show, after another Chrysler vehicle (1958–59).  The Plymouth show was the first American television program to air in stereophonic sound. Due to the fact that stereophonic television had not yet been invented (it would be 25 more years before it would become standard), ABC instead simulcast the show on its radio network, with the TV side airing one audio channel and the radio side airing the other; viewers would tune in both the TV and the radio to achieve the stereophonic effect.  Starting with the 1959–60 season the two shows were merged into The Lawrence Welk Show, reverting to monaural broadcasts.
    The primary sponsor of The Lawrence Welk Show was Dodge (automobile marque), later to be followed by Geritol (a multivitamin), Sominex (sleep aid), Aqua Velva (aftershave), Serutan (laxative), Universal Appliances (manufacturer of home appliances), Polident (a denture cleanser), Ocean Spray (fruit juice) and Sinclair Oil (automobile fuel) served as associate sponsors for a short time.
    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Saturday Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
  • High Finance – ThrowbackMachine.com

    High Finance – ThrowbackMachine.com

    High Finance

    High Finance is a quiz show created and hosted by Dennis James which aired on CBS from July 7th to December 15th, 1956.  It followed Gunsmoke on the CBS schedule.  High Finance aired at 10:30 p.m. Saturdays opposite NBC’s Your Hit Parade.

    On the program, contestants answered questions about current events.  The player would be asked five questions based on three newspapers which he or she studied before the show.  Each correct answer earned $300.  Three correct answers allowed the player to play the “investment segment” in which he or she wagered any amount of the money won on answering a question.  A correct answer won the wager and a prize, plus the option to risk any prizes won and return the next week to play another “investment segment” or keep any prizes won and leave the show.  A fourth win would earn that player his or her “dream prize”, such as a miniature golf course or a restaurant.  A fifth successful “investment segment” won that player an additional $75,000.
    Filed Under: -Television, [ source: Wikipedia ], Saturday Tagged With: , ,