The R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, manufacturer of Winston cigarettes, pulled its sponsorship of The Beverly Hillbillies in May of 1967 voluntarily in order to fulfill its obligation to the tobacco industry’s advertising code [1]. The code was established in 1964 as an attempt to self-regulate and thus stave off government intervention. The code forbid cigarette advertisements from being shown during programs with a primary audiences under 21. According to Cynthia Lowry, “this means that a program is off limits to a member firm when, in two successive national Nielsen audience reports, the projected statistics of audience composition show that 45 per cent or more of the viewers are under voting age” [2].

The The Beverly Hillbillies had come close to hitting that mark in the past (with around 43% of its audience under 21); its growing popularity among viewers of all ages eventually forced the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. to pull out [3]. The Chicago Tribune noted that “it was a special event in television history, a first of its kind, and an opening to an ironic situation” given that the very success of The Beverly Hillbillies was the reason the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. had to ask CBS to switch its advertising to a different show [4].

CBS broadcast “Beane’s of Boston” (also referred to as “Beanes of Boston” without the apostrophe) on Saturday, May 5th, 1979 from 8:30-9PM. It was indeed an attempt to adapt Are You Being Served? (which had premiered in September of 1972 on BBC1) for American audiences. Set at a large, conservative department store called Beane’s of Boston, the pilot starred Tom Poston as Frank Beane, the owner, and George O’Hanlon, Jr. as his nephew Franklyn Beane, the manager. The storyline saw Frank Beane grudgingly agreeing to hold a beer festival in an attempt to raise money. Jeremy Lloyd and David Croft, creators of Are You Being Served? helped write “Beane’s of Boston” and Lloyd served as a producer. The pilot was directed by Jerry Paris and executive producer by Garry Marshall.

Rounding out the cast were John Hillerman as John Peacock, floor manager, Charlotte Rae as Mae Slocombe, manager of the women’s department, Lorna Patterson as Shirley Brahms, Mae’s assistant, and Alan Sues as George Humphries, the effeminate manager of the men’s department. The characters were based, and in some cases named, after the corresponding characters in the British series. According to The Los Angeles Times, the pilot included a “laughable, even pitiful gay” character [1]. In Are You Being Served? the sexuality of Mr. Wilberforce Clayborne Humphries (played by John Inman) was played for laughs and it is likely that George Humphries was the gay character mentioned by The Los Angeles Times. Whether that had anything to do with the pilot not being picked up is unknown.

The pilot does not appear to be held at any of the largest television archives (the Library of Congress, UCLA’s Film & Television Archive, the Museum of Broadcast Communications and the Paley Center for Media) but that does not mean it is missing or lost. The production company, or whoever owns its library today, probably has the original elements somewhere. I believe it was produced by Paramount Television

Works Cited:

Related posts:

1. CBS Fires, Then Rehires, George S. Kaufman
2. The Karen Valentine Program Opening Credits
3. WTXX in Connecticut Offers Classic Sitcom Marathon

Stump the Stars was an updated version of Pantomime Quiz, a game show styled after charades, that began life as a local Los Angeles program in November of 1947 over station KTLA. It was picked up by CBS in 1950 and would air on all four networks (DuMont included) over the next decade before going off the air on September 28th, 1959. Created by Mike Stokey, the program was revived in 1962 as Stump the Stars and given the the 10:30-11PM time slot on Wednesdays.

Harris Against the World – Jack Klugman and Patricia Barry – October 4th, 1964
Copyright © TV Week/The Houston Chronicle, 1964 [2]

Pat Harrington, Jr. served as host and regular panelists included Diana Dors, Sebastian Cabot, Jan Clayton, Beverly Garland, Ross Martin and Mickey Manners. Guests for the September 17th premiere were Jerry Lewis and Jayne Mansfield. Critic Larry Wolters, writing in The Chicago Daily Tribune, had this to say about the new show:

Stump the Stars is nothing but Mike Stokey’s old Pantomime Quiz in new dress–or lack of dress. Jayne Mansfield and Diana Dors, her British counterpart, as guests on this charade show, didn’t contribute much, but they may revive that old argument of a decade ago about the perils of the plunging neckline. Under Pat Harrington Jr., the panelists had a lot of fun, with too much intrusion, however, by Jerry Lewis. [1]

The episode with the cast of The Dick Van Dyke Show was broadcast on November 26th. Mike Stokey would replace Pat Harrington, Jr. as host the following month and was with the show until it went off the air following the September 16th, 1963 episode. A syndicated version aired in 1964 and again in 1969. An episode guide for the 1962-1963 series can be found at Jim Davidson’s Classic TV Info.

Interestingly, although this unsold pilot was broadcast for the first and only time on September 9th, 1967, the story of “Campo 44″ begins in 1964. So I’m not sure it can be called a rip-off of Hogan’s Heroes. The earliest reference I have found is a June 7th, 1964 article in The Chicago Tribune reporting that David Westheimer, author of Von Ryan’s Express, would be developing a comedy titled “Campo 44″ for NBC’s 1965-1966 season [2]. It would follow American and British soldiers at a prisoner of war camp in Italy during World War II. Westheimer served during the war and was shot down in 1942. He spent several years as a prisoner of war and kept copious notes. The article explained that these notes would “be the basis for many stories” [3].

Hedda Hopper reported on July 31st that Buzz Kulik would direct the pilot and producer the series [4]. And on October 25th, an article in The New York Times about Hollywood’s fascination with war noted that MGM was working on a pilot titled “Campo 44″ [5]. Then, for some reason, the project stalled. Perhaps Westheimer was unavailable to work on the pilot because Von Ryan’s Express was being turned into a movie starring Frank Sinatra and Trevor Howard (it was released in June of 1965). Or maybe the pilot was completed in late 1964 or early 1965 and was shelved by NBC for some reason.

Either way, on Saturday, September 9th, 1967 NBC broadcast “Campo 44,” one of more than a dozen pilots it aired during the opening weeks of the 1967-1968 season. It ran from 8-8:30PM; the third season of Hogan’s Heroes began just an hour later on CBS. Vito Scotti, Dino Fazio, Jim Dawson and Phillip Abbott starred. According to Broadcasting magazine, the pilot ranked third in its time slot with a 20.1 Trendex share; The Jackie Gleason Show on CBS was first with a 44.1 share and ABC’s The Newlywed Game was second with a 29.0 [6].

Works Cited:

Image Credits:

Related posts:

1. Status Guide – “Cavalcade of Stars”
2. WBKB Schedule, Week of December 28th, 1946
3. Status Guide – “Stars Over Hollywood”

Interestingly, one of the few references to “Happily Ever After” I found was in The Magic of Bewitched Trivia and More by Gina Meyers. Published in 2004, the book mentions the pilot in a section called “Copycat Shows,” but only briefly. Meyers writes that “as a result of Bewitched’s popularity, CBS and NBC networks tried to replicate the magic. CBS in September of 1965, came out with Happily Ever After, shot at the Metro Goldwyn-Mayer studio. It was a musical comedy starring Shirley Jones as a mind reading housewife” [1]. This seems to suggest that the pilot was broadcast by CBS in September of 1965 but I can find no mention of it in television listings during the month.

I don’t know much about the pilot itself. Hedda Hopper reported on December 11th, 1964 that “Shirley Jones got herself a TV series so she’ll stay put for awhile. It’s ‘Happily Ever After’ for MGM–the creation of Stanley Chase (2-time Tony Award winner) and Bob Kaufman (Emmy-winning writer). Shirley plays a housewife gifted with a 7th sense, and she’ll start filming in January” [2]. Her character’s “seventh sense” was mentioned again in a brief article published in The Los Angeles Times on December 15th; the article noted that the comedy series was “planned for the next season on CBS” [3].

Although the term “planned” suggests that CBS had already decided to order the series, on December 23rd “Happily Ever After” was included in an article by Val Adams as one of 76 pilots in contention for the 1965-1966 season [4]. On January 7th, 1965 Hedda Hopper revealed that filming had already been completed [5]. And on February 19th she reported that the series (now called Dream Wife was “already sold” [6]. It obviously wasn’t or, if it was, never made it to the air.

As for whether or not CBS and NBC took a look at the success of ABC’s Bewitched and decided to try to imitate it, of course they did. The networks have never shied away from copying popular shows or formats. When westerns were hot, all the networks had westerns. When spies were hot, all the networks had spy shows. And when supernatural sitcoms like Bewitched were hot, all the networks wanted supernatural sitcoms.

Critic Lawrence Laurent, in a February 8th, 1965 article in The Los Angeles Times, wrote that “the plans leaking out of headquarters of the three television networks indicate that the programs being most copied (but differently) are The Fugitive, Bewitched and Peyton Place” [7]. Two days later, Cecil Smith agreed, noting that “any talk of trends for next season is idiotic. All the networks want another Bewitched, another Peyton Place, another Fugitive. Imitation is still the sincerest form of television” [8].

Of course, it wasn’t just Bewitched driving the interest in supernatural sitcoms. My Favorite Martian had premiered the previous season and its success helped pave the way for Bewitched. Indeed, in his review of Bewitched, Jack Gould wrote that the sitcom was “in the supernatural tradition of ‘Topper’ and ‘My Favorite Martian’” [9]. Thus, in a way, My Favorite Martian led to Bewitched and Bewitched led to I Dream of Jeannie.

Works Cited:

Related posts:

1. Q & A: Stump the Stars, “Campo 44″
2. Status Guide – “Vacation Playhouse”
3. Status Guide – “My Living Doll”

Monsters was a half-hour anthology horror series that aired from 1988-1991 in first-run syndication. The opening credits spoofed the idea of the traditional nuclear family (father, mother and daughter) gathered in the living room to watch television. Only in this case the family was made up of monsters (like The Munsters). Over the course of three seasons a total of 72 episodes were broadcast, starring the likes of David McCallum, Soupy Sales, Wil Wheaton, Deborah Harry, Richard Belzer, Steve Buscemi, Matt LeBlanc, Barbara Billingsley, Frank Gorshin, Robert Lansing, Abe Vigoda, Karen Valentine and Meat Loaf. Several episodes were released on VHS in the late 1980s/early 1990s but are long out of print. The series occasionally airs on NBC Universal’s specialty cable channel Chiller.

UCLA’s Film & Television Collection has a print of this half-hour, unsold ABC sitcom pilot starring Barry Bostwick, Pat Morita and Shelley Long. It was broadcast on Thursday, May 24th, 1979. The plot of the pilot involved the inept Guy Christian (Bostwick) attempting to save six lovely contestants in the Miss Planet pageant after they’re kidnapped by the fiendish Dr. Gasss, who will only release them in return for the components to a hydrogen bomb! Morita played Guy Christian’s boss, Professor Mishugi and Long played Mishugi’s daughter, Mia. Surprisingly, the pilot ranked 15th for the week. Les Brown of The New York Times, however, attributed the strong showing to the fact that the pilot followed an episode of Mork & Mindy.

Works Cited:

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1. Book Shelf: The Young Rebels #1
2. Bookshelf: The Young Rebels – The Sea Gold Incident
3. Q & A: One in a Million, Oh Nurse!

I featured Karen Valentine’s 1975 ABC drama series, simply titled Karen, in a Show Spotlight last month. Barry I. Grauman was kind enough to contribute some comments about an earlier, unsold pilot starring Karen Valentine that ABC turned down in 1974. It was called The Karen Valentine Program and, according to its entry in the UCLA Film & Television Archive, was shown on television. If it did, I haven’t find any record of it in television listings.

In a January 24th, 1974 article, The Chicago Tribune reported that Valentine would be shooting the pilot for The Karen Valentine Program, in which she would star as a recently divorced woman looking for work, in February [1]. On May 10th, The Los Angeles Times reported that The Karen Valentine Program would debut in January of 1975 [2]. But on June 10th, Aaron Gold revealed in The Chicago Tribune that Valentine had just been signed by Larry Gelbart and Gene Reynolds to star in a pilot for a potential mid-season replacement, noting that it would be her “third try at a series” [3].

Thus, it appears the turnaround between The Karen Valentine Program and what would become Karen (apparently originally titled The Karen Valentine Show) was relatively quick. Karen ran for all of thirteen weeks between January and May of 1975. For the record, Valentine’s first sitcom pilot was called The Karen Valentine Show and was produced 1973. Her character was the assistant to a wacky public relations specialist played by Charles Nelson Reilly. It aired on Monday, May 12st, 1973 as part of a two-hour “Comedy Trio” block featuring two other unsold pilots: The Barbara Eden Show (with Barbara Eden and Joe Flynn) and Catch-22 (with Richard Dreyfuss and Dana Elcar).

Works Cited:

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1. Show Spotlight: “Karen” (1975)
2. Bustin’ Loose Opening Credits
3. Janet Dean, Registered Nurse Opening Credits

Supertrain was a costly and embarrassment flop for NBC and especially for Fred Silverman, who championed the series after joining the network in 1978. According to Cecil Smith, the idea for Supertrain came from NBC programming chief Paul Klein. He brought it to the attention of Silverman who, in turn, contacted producer Dan Curtis (best known for his work on Dark Shadows) [1]. Said Curtis:

Like everything in television, they wanted it yesterday. My first reaction was who needs it? Why bust my gut doing a series? I don’t need the money. I’ve got all the work I can handle. But I said yes, dropped “Coffeyville” [The Raid on Coffeyville was the working title for a made-for-TV movie that would air on NBC as The Last Ride of the Dalton Gang in November of 1979] and got started.

I don’t know why. Maybe the challenge. I’m a train buff — who isn’t? I remember as a kid watching the trains pull into Bridgeport, Conn., my hometown–thrilling to the locomotives when that great whoosh of steam poured out. That’s why I insisted on a steam turbine driven by atomic power. [2]

That’s right, the eponymous train in Supertrain was nuclear powered. It could travel from Los Angeles to New York City in just 36 hours and included elegant dining rooms, swimming pools, large suites and a disco. It reportedly cost NBC $10 million to build the sets for the series (they were spread over three sound stages at the MGM studios) as well as two models of the entire train [3].

The production values may have been flashy but according to critics Supertrain had no substance. Tom Buckley, after comparing the series to The Love Boat, wrote that the “major problem with [the premiere] was an absolutely incoherent story” and complained that the directing was slow (Curtis directed the premiere) [4. He also pointed out that the interior of the train was larger than the exterior. Howard Rosenberg noted the size discrepancies in his review as well:

We've seen from ABC's [Battlestar] “Galactica” that a series does not live by sets and special effects along. But even the sets of “Supertrain” though breathtaking at first viewing, were not enough to hold a viewer’s interest for two hours and, in fact, were anything but flawless. The spacious interiors of the train for example, did not square with the exterior shots.

Besides, after the big buildup, one expected something more. Maybe if Supertrain could fly… [5]

The two-hour premiere of Supertrain aired from 8-10PM on Wednesday, February 7th, 1979. It delivered a 32 share of the audience, second in the time slot behind ABC’s Charlie’s Angels, and ranked 17th for the week [6, 7]. The following week’s episode, which was only an hour long, fell to 48th [8]. NBC pulled the series for “retooling” after five episodes; it returned on Sunday, April 7th.

A total of nine episodes were broadcast with the final first-run episode airing on May 5th. Repeats were shown in June and July.

The relationship between Snowfire the 1958 feature film and a television pilot for a potential series is bizarre, to say the least. A television version appears to have been attached to two networks for use during the 1957-1958 season neither actually picked up the series. The movie, despite minor cult popularity, has never been commercially released on VHS or DVD.

On March 26th, 1956 Edwin Schallert wrote in The Los Angeles Times that brothers Stuart and Dorrell McGowan would be directing a film called Snowfire at the Talley Ranch in Hidden Valley, with Don Megowan set to star [9]. On April 28th, Walter Ames suggested in the same paper that filming had already been finished, writing that the McGowans had “fulfilled a lifetime ambition by writing, producing, casting and completing a picture to their own standards [10].

Furthermore, Ames wrote that the brothers “revealed yesterday they also made a TV pilot film during the shooting. It wasn’t hard because they already had Death Valley Days, The Sheriff and Sky King under their wing” [11]. (The brothers were involved in the production of both Death Valley Days and Sky King, which were syndicated.) Thus, it seems the pilot was either filmed simultaneously with the movie or was simply edited from footage for the movie.

On July 7th, Schallert reported that the McGowans had signed Don Megowan to star in another film for them (The Wreath) and wrote that “the McGowans starred Megowan in Snowfire on TV and have also finished a feature picture version of that subject, as yet unreleased” [12]. Had the television pilot been broadcast or did Schallert mean only that a pilot had been completed?

Philip K. Scheuer, also writing for The Los Angeles Times, reported in an August 26th article that he had visited the McGowan Brothers studio in North La Brea and chatted with Dorrell after wondering why four people named McGowan (plus Don Megowan) were involved in one movie [13]. Dorrell explained that he and his brother were both writers and that he typically produced while Stuart directed. Mollie and Melodie McGowan were Dorrell’s daughters and made their acting debuts in Snowfire.

Billboard reported on November 3rd that CBS had purchased a half-hour adventure series called Snowfire from ABC Film Syndication and McGowan Brothers about a white stallion that talks to a little girl and helps her family [14]. On February 6th, 1957, however, Val Adams wrote that Snowfire would debut on ABC in the fall and would star Dolly McGowan (likely a mistake) as the daughter of a widowed rancher who talks to a white stallion named Snowfire. The show would be filmed at Bryce Canyon in Utah [15].

According to the March 2nd issue of Billboard, ABC had given Snowfire the Wednesday 8:30-9PM time slot [16] following Disneyland. Two months later, however, in the May 6th issue, Billboard reported that ABC had turned down Snowfire; thus, production company ABC Film Syndication was planning on trying to sell it into first-run syndication [17].

The New York Times reported on May 23rd that Snowfire was one of several Western pilots still uncommitted for the 1957-1958 season [18]. Why the television series failed to materialize is a mystery. So, too, is the reason behind both CBS and later ABC dropping it after expressing interest. Snowfire, the movie, eventually came out in theaters in 1958.

Works Cited:

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1. The Strange Story of Stage 7
2. Q & A: “The Pied Piper of Hamelin,” Amanda Randolph
3. The Rebel Among Greatest TV Westerns

Like most unsold pilots, “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” hasn’t seen the light of day since its one and only airing on Friday, July 4th, 1975. It wasn’t included as a bonus feature in the 40th Anniversary Edition of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, released in 2008, although there’s no way to know if it was even suggested. Stanley Kramer, who directed and produced the Academy Award winning 1967 movie, also directed and produced a half-hour pilot for this proposed sitcom based on the movie.

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner starred Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn as Matt and Christina Drayton. Their daughter Joey, played by Katharine Houghton, meets and falls in love with an African-American doctor named John Prentice, played by Sidney Poitier. In 1967, interracial marriage was illegal in some states (prior to the movie’s release the Supreme Court ruled that laws banning interracial marriage were unconstitutional), and the movie focuses on the attitudes and prejudices of the couple’s family and friends.

The movie was nominated for ten Academy Awards and won two: Katherine Hepburn for Best Actress and William Rose for Best Screenplay. Flash forward to 1975 and ABC orders a pilot for a sitcom based on the movie. Playing Joey and John Prentice — now married — are Leslie Charleson and Bill Overton, while Richard Dysart and Eleanor Parker take over the roles originated by Tracy and Hepburn. (For some reason, television listings include both Prentice and Prentiss.) Stanley Kramer is approached to produce and direct. He agrees.

ABC decided against picking up the pilot for the 1975-1976 season and it was burned off during the summer of 1975. Weekly listings published on Sunday, May 25th, 1975 in The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times both show the pilot airing on Wednesday, May 28th from 9:30-10PM [1]. Instead, ABC aired “MacLeish and the Rented Kid,” a comedy pilot starring Dick Van Dyke and Shelley Berman [2]. It was eventually broadcast on Friday, July 4th, 1975 from 9:30-10PM as an ABC Special.

The plot of the pilot was typical sitcom fare: John is concerned when Joanna is offered a job by an ex-boyfriend. On July 13th, Les Brown revealed in The New York Times that the main reason ABC passed on the pilot had to do with a kissing scene in a bedroom [2]. According to Brown, ABC executives at a screening of the pilot “experienced shock” despite knowing full well that the scene was in the pilot [3].

According to one executive, “Kramer did it as tastefully as you could ask for. But the physical contact was clearly going to cause hell out in the boondocks” [4]. The executive explained that although CBS had broadcast an episode of The Jeffersons with a black-and-white kissing scene the previous season, there was a difference: “In ‘The Jeffersons,’ a white woman kissed a black woman and, terrible as it is to say that’s somehow not as objectionable in this society as when the sexes are reversed” [5].

Why ABC ever thought a sitcom version of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner would work is unknown. Just how many jokes can there be about interracial marriage and the many and varied reactions it receives? Brown quotes another executive as saying “the problem with [the pilot] was not just the kissing scene but the fact that the whole story is told in the first episode, and there’s nowhere to go from there except to belabor it” [6]. Obviously, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner was one movie that didn’t need a television spin-off.

Menasha Skulnik, best known for his work in Yiddish theater, starred in a short-lived sitcom called Menasha the Magnificent as the manager of a restaurant owned by the tyrannical Mrs. Davis. It was given a try-out on Monday, February 20th, 1950 from 9:30-10PM as The Magnificent Menasha (also referred to as The Menasha Skulnik Show). A weekly series premiered on Monday, July 3rd, airing from 8-8:30PM.

According to The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows, Mrs. Davis was played by Jean Cleveland in the first episode (presumably the first episode of the weekly series) and by Zamah Cunningham in the rest of the series [7]. Eleven episodes were broadcast during the summer of 1950 with the final episode airing on September 11th. The following week, Menasha the Magnificent was replaced by The Paul Winchell and Jerry Mahoney Show.

Critic Jack Gould, writing in The New York Times, stated that in the premiere Skulnik “had moments of delightful pantomimic clowning, but by and large the script [...] was much too trite” [8]. He continued:

The story followed a well worn norm: First, trouble; two, a bet on a horse; three, a visit to a loan shark, and four, the pay-off on the horse after the original winner is disqualified. What saved the day was Mr. Skulnik’s wonderful, sad-faced rendition of “I’m an Old Cowhand,” which was a gem of artistic nonsense. Give Mr. Skulnik a script with a stronger basic situation and better supporting characterizations and he’ll know what to do. Last night he did not have much of an opportunity. [9]

Skulnik played the part of Uncle David on the radio version of The Goldberg’s for many years. Some sources indicate that he joined the cast of the television series in 1953 as a brief replacement for Eli Mintz. Other sources, however, state that Eli Mintz was the only actor to play Uncle David on television.

Works Cited:

Related posts:

1. New Exhibit: ABC Promotional Artwork, 1971-1975
2. Two of Gene Roddenberry’s 1970s Telefilms Coming to DVD
3. Gunsmoke, Rawhide and Have Gun, Will Travel Coming to Encore Westerns in 2010

The Great Detectives was a potential “umbrella” series produced by Universal Television for ABC. Three made-for-TV movies served as pilot episodes for the series, each featuring a different great detective: Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes, Ormond G. Smith’s Nick Carter and Stuart Palmer’s Hildegarde Withers. Here are the titles and air dates for the telefilms:

The Hound of the Baskervilles (Saturday, February 12th, 1972)
Adventures of Nick Carter (Sunday, February 20th, 1972)
A Very Missing Person (Saturday, March 4th, 1972)

A February 23rd, 1972 article in The Los Angeles Times explained that the concept was thought up by Frank Price of Universal Television and notes that there was never a firm commitment on the part of ABC to pick up The Great Detectives [1]. Here’s how Price described the concept:

The rotation series is much more expensive than the weekly show, but it offers the audience variation and it brings us actors we couldn’t get otherwise. Neither Rock Hudson nor Peter Falk would do a weekly series but they will do six or eight a year. This is true of Stewart Granger.

It gives us such flexibility. We have the whole field of great detectives to deal with clear back to Edgar Allan Poe. We’re not hooked to any place or any time–we get away from what we call ‘TV Time.’ which says no period works but now and the Old West. Sherlock Holmes is Victorian London; Nick Carter, 1912 America. We’ll even try Poe’s Paris, Willkie Collins’ moors… [2]

The first telefilm, The Hound of the Baskervilles, starred Stewart Granger as Sherlock Holmes and Bernard Fox as Dr. Watson. Also appearing were William Shater, Ian Ireland, Jane Merrow and Anthony Zerbe. It was not well received by critics. Don Page of The Los Angeles Times wrote that “it is laborious, talky, often poorly staged and suffers intermittently with show-and-tell direction. And it never captures the methodically building suspense you normally associate with Sherlock Holmes. Its one redeeming value is that Robert E. Thompson’s script is adequate–only there’s just too much of it” [3

Robert Conrad starred in the second telefilm, The Adventures of Nick Carter, as the titular detective. Pernell Roberts, Shelley Winters, Broderick Crawford and Neville Brand rounded out the cast. The plot involved Carter attempting to track down the killer of one of his fellow private investigators in New York City circa 1912. The death somehow connects to the missing wife of a high society playboy.

The final made-for-TV movie, A Very Missing Person, saw Eve Arden playing Hildegarde Withers, with James Gregory, Ray Danton and Julie Newmar. Hildegarde's friend in the police department asks for her help in finding an heiress (played by Skye Aubrey) who has run off with an awful lot of money. The heiress has fallen in with a bunch of hippies and cultists (played by Newmar and Robert Easton).

Kevin Thomas, also writing in The Los Angeles Times, was impressed with A Very Missing Person. He wrote that "as an entity unto itself it was somewhat less than riveting but was a serviceable launching pad for a series that hopefully will take off" [4].

Why the series failed to materialize is a mystery. It could have been the ratings for the made-for-TV movies, although The Adventures of Nick Carter ranked in the Top 15 [5]. How the others fared is unknown. Maybe the stars declined to continue past their initial telefilms. Or perhaps ABC simply didn’t want an umbrella series with rotating characters.

You’re thinking of ABC’s Journey to the Unknown, an anthology series produced in Britain and broadcast by ABC from September of 1968 to January of 1969. The October 24th, 1968 episode, titled “Miss Belle,” is the one you mentioned. It aired at 9:30PM ET. Here’s the summary from The Los Angeles Times:

George Maharis stars as a handyman who breaks through a wall of fantasy built up by a spinster who has created a private world for herself and a 7-year-old “niece” she has reared since infancy [6]

Journey to the Unknown (often referred to as Journey into the Unknown) premiered on Thursday, September 26th, 1968, running from 9:30-10:30PM. It faced The CBS Thursday Movie and Dragnet/Dean Martin on NBC. The first episode did not do well at all, ranking 74th out of 86 programs for the week [7].

Promotional Image for Journey To The Unknown – September 14th, 1968
Copyright © TV Guide, 1968 [1]

Jack Gould of The New York Times called the series an “exceptionally artistic projection of a fantasy,” while Harry Harris of The Philadelphia Inquirer referred to the series as “sick, sick, sick and slick, slick, slick” [8]. Newsweek’s Harry F. Waters noted that the show “may be the dramatic sleeper of the season” while The Washington Post’s Lawrence Laurent suggested it was “the journey to a short run on TV” [9]. And TIME referred to the series as the “weirdest-and most fascination excursion … since Twilight Zone” [10].

Ratings did not improve and ABC cancelled Journey to the Unknown on November 13th [11]. A total of 17 episodes were broadcast. The final episode aired on January 30th, 1969.

Works Cited:

Image Credits:

Related posts:

1. Los Angeles Pulse Ratings, March 1950
2. Bookshelf: Land of the Giants
3. EW’s 26 Great TV Shows That Got a Quick Hook

This is an interesting question. In the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s there were daytime and prime time programs that ran 15 minutes long. During the daytime it was common to see movies or shows ending at, say, 10:45AM or 1:15PM, often leaving 15 minutes unaccounted for. Cartoons, film shorts and serials were used to fill up gaps in the schedule.

Industry on Parade was a long-running series of films produced by the National Association of Manufacturers that were syndicated to local stations beginning in October of 1950. The series ended in 1960 after hundreds of films highlighting the impact of manufacturing on all aspects of everyday life: agriculture, medicine, business, entertainment, among others.

NBC was involved with the production of Industry on Parade for a few years. I haven’t found any reference to This Accident Should Never Have Happened but presumably it was similar series of films. Other “filler” programming was likely locally produced by stations or purchased from distributors or perhaps even delivered with film packages.

The Archives Center at the National Museum of American History has a collection of 428 Industry on Parade films, the bulk of which contain four segments each.

The Chicago Tribune reported in August of 1967 that CBS had a sitcom pilot called Missy’s Men in production as a possible mid-season replacement to be used during the 1967-1968 season [1]. Then, in December of 1967, The New York Times reported that Missy’s Men was one of a handful of sitcom pilots vying for a spot on its 1968-1969 schedule.

According to Broadcasting magazine in December, CBS officials felt it was one of their “most promising pilots” [3]. Finally, in February of 1968 Broadcasting reported that the pilot still had an “association” with CBS in relation to the network’s upcoming fall schedule [4]. Dwayne Hickman and Jack Sheldon were attached to star. The premise would involve three Marines adopting a Korean or Chinese child. I’m not sure who played the third Marine.

Missy’s Men wasn’t picked up, the produced pilot was never broadcast and its whereabouts are unknown.

Television listings refer to this sitcom as both The Gale Storm Show and Oh! Susanna, sometimes at the same time, indicating perhaps that the full title might be The Gale Storm Show: Oh! Susanna. Many sources suggest, however, that Oh! Susanna was the syndicated title for the series. In any case, it was Gale Storm’s return to the world of television following My Little Margie (which ran from 1952 to 1956).

Advertisement for The Gale Storm Show: Oh! Susanna – September 28th, 1956
Copyright © The Chicago Daily Tribune, 1956 [1]

Storm played Susanna Pomeroy, social director for the luxury liner S.S. Ocean Queen. Zasu Pitts co-starred as Elvira “Nugey” Nugent, the ship’s manicurist. Roy Roberts played the ship’s captain, Simon Huxley and James Fairfax played Cedric, a steward. The series was produced by Hal Roach Studios.

Nestle agreed to sponsor the series without seeing a pilot and it was given the Saturday 9-9:30PM time slot on CBS [5]. Along with Hey, Jeannie, which followed it from 9:30-10PM, the series competed with The Lawrence Welk Show on ABC and Caesar’s Hour on NBC. The S.S. Ocean Queen was based on the real S.S. President Cleveland, operated by President Lines. Hal Roach studios built replicas of many of the ship’s features using specifications from President Lines and filled them with some $50,000 worth of actual shipfaring equipment [6].

A special screening for television critics was held aboard the S.S. President Cleveland in September of 1956 before the sitcom premiered. Hedda Hopper called the show “beautifully done” and Gale “refreshing as a summer breeze” [7]. Cecil Smith wrote that “Gale Storm is a lass easy to love. The new series is better done and funnier than [My Little] Margie, but it will undoubtedly sink or float with Gale. She’s her zany self, donning wigs, masquerading, getting into shipboard trouble. And singing and dancing [8].

The series premiered on Saturday, September 29th, 1956. During its second season, running 1957-1958, it ranked 16th in the Nielsen ratings. More than $10,000 was once spent to pour 40,000 gallons of water onto the cast and crew to help simulate just one and a half minutes of stormy weather [9].

In February of 1959, The New York Times reported that ABC had purchased the rights to The Gale Storm Show: Oh! Susanna [10]. The network began airing daily repeats of the first three seasons on April 13th and premiered a new season in September, broadcast from 7:30-8PM on Wednesdays. The series ended after four seasons but repeats continued to be shown in syndication for decades.

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