This Week in Television History: July 2017 PART III

As always, the further we go back in Hollywood history,
the more that fact and legend become intertwined.
It's hard to say where the truth really lies.

July 22, 1922

Daniel “Dan” Hale Rowan is born. 

He was featured in the television show Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, where he played straight man to Dick Martin. Born on a carnival train near the small town of Beggs, Oklahoma, under the name of “Daniel Hale David”, Rowan toured with his parents, Oscar and Nellie David, who performed a singing and dancing act with the carnival. He was orphaned at age 11, spent four traumatic years at the McClelland Home in Pueblo, Colorado, then was taken in by a foster family at age 16 and enrolled in Central High School (Pueblo, Colorado). 

After graduating from high school, he hitchhiked to Los Angeles, California, in 1940 and found a job in the mailroom at Paramount Pictures; quickly ingratiating himself with studio head Buddy DeSylva, a year later he became Paramount's youngest staff writer.

July 22, 1947

Albert Brooks is born Albert Lawrence Einstein. 

Actor, writer, director son of Thelma Leeds (née Goodman), a singer and actress, and Harry Parke (né Einstein), a radio comedian who performed on Eddie Cantor's radio program and was known as Parkyarkarkus. His brothers are comedic actor Bob Einstein, better known by his stage name "Super Dave Osborne" and Cliff Einstein, a partner and longtime chief creative officer at the Los Angeles ad agency Dailey & Associates and his half-brother was Charles Einstein (1926-2007), a writer who wrote for such shows as Playhouse 90 and Lou Grant. Brooks started his own career in comedy by landing regular roles on variety shows in the late 1960s and gaining popularity on Saturday Night Live in the 1970s. Brooks' first film appearance was Taxi Driver (1976). He began screenwriting and directing in the 1980s, with films including Lost in America (1985), Defending Your Life (1991), The Muse (1999) and Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World (2005). 

To quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Martin Landau

You can have immediate regrets, but if you look at stuff and say, 

'Things happen for a reason', there's a fatalistic thing about it. 

Something will happen that will justify it in some way. 

-Martin Landau

Martin LandauJune 20, 1928 – July 15, 2017

His career started in the 1950s, with early film appearances including a supporting role in Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest (1959). He played regular roles in the television series Mission: Impossible (for which he received several Emmy Award nominations and a Golden Globe Award) and Space: 1999.

Landau received the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture, as well as his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, for his role in Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988); he received his second Oscar nomination for his appearance in Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989). His performance in the supporting role of Bela Lugosi in Ed Wood (1994) earned him an Academy Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award and a Golden Globe Award. He continued to perform in film and TV, and headed the Hollywood branch of the Actors Studio until his death in 2017.

Good Night Mr. Landau

Stay Tuned


Tony Figueroa

Your Mental Sorbet: Quark

Here is another "Mental Sorbet" 

A little spark of madness

that we could use to momentarily forget about those

things that leave a bad taste in our mouths

Quark is an American science fiction sitcom starring Richard Benjamin broadcast Friday nights at 8:00-8:30 PM on NBC. The pilot first aired on May 7, 1977, and the series followed as a mid-season replacement in February 1978. The series was cancelled in April 1978. Quark was created by Buck Henry, co-creator of the spy spoof Get Smart.

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Richard Anderson and Jimmy Weldon: Next on TVC

Actor and producer Richard Anderson and motivational speaker Jimmy Weldon will join us on an encore edition of TV CONFIDENTIAL, airing July 14-17 at the following times and venues:

Share-a-Vision Radio
San Francisco Bay Area
Friday 7/14
7pm ET, 4pm PT
10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Listen Live button at KSAV.org
Use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in KSAV
Hear us on the KSAV channel on CX Radio Brazil
Hear us on your cell phone or landline number by dialing 712-432-4235

Indiana Talks
Marion, IN
Saturday 7/15
8pm ET, 5pm PT
Sunday 7/16
10am ET, 7am PT
Click on the player at IndianaTalks.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in Indiana Talks

WON 920 The Apple
Brooklyn, NY
Saturday 7/15
10pm ET, 7pm PT
Streaming at www.920won.caster.fm

KSCO AM-1080 and FM-104.1
San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA
KOMY AM-1340
La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA
Sunday 7/16
9am ET, 6am PT
Also streaming at KSCO.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in KSCO

CROC Radio
Kimberley, British Columbia, Canada
Sunday 7/16
1pm ET, 10am PT
Streaming at CROCRadio.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in CROC

KHMB AM-1710
KHMV-LP 100.9 FM
Half Moon Bay, CA
Sunday 7/16
9pm PT
Monday 7/17
Midnight ET
Click on the Listen Live button at KHMBRadio.com

RadioSlot.com
San Francisco, CA
Monday 7/17
10pm ET, 7pm PT
with replays Tuesday thru Friday at 10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Talk Slot button at RadioSlot.com

PWRNetwork
Ann Arbor, MI ~ Boston, MA ~ Chicago, IL ~ Melrose, FL ~ Los Angeles, CA
Various times throughout the week
on the Entertainment Channel on PWRNetwork.com
and the PWR channel on TuneIn

Most of you know Richard Anderson as either Oscar Goldman on The Six Million Dollar Man and The Bionic Woman, Lieutenant Steve Drumm on the final season of Perry Mason, or Dr. Richard Malcolm, the title character in The Night Strangler. But scroll down the list of Richard’s credits, and you’ll find that he not only appeared in some of the most iconic films of all time—including Forbidden Planet, Seven Days in May, John Frankenheimer’s Seconds, Martin Ritt’s The Long, Hot Summer and Stanley Kubrick’s Paths of Glory—but either worked with, got to know or otherwise crossed paths with some of the most iconic names in motion picture history… one of whom, by the way, played a pivotal role very early in Richard’s career.

Richard talks about these and other key moments in his life in Richard Anderson: At Last… A Memoir—a book that goes behind the scenes of his years as a contract player with MGM, while also revealing some interesting things about the actor that you probably never knew before. Our June 2015 conversation with Richard Anderson will air during in our second hour. Co-hosting the hour will be actor, writer and film historian Alan Doshna. A contributor to such publications as Filmfax magazine, and the associate producer of the documentary The Haunted World of Edward D. Wood Jr., Al was the collaborator on Richard Anderson: At Last… A Memoir.

The first hour of this week’s program will include a replay of our June 2016 conversation with Jimmy Weldon. The voice of Yakky Doodle on Yogi Bear, which continues to air on Cartoon Network and Boomerang, Jimmy also hosted one of the very first local children’s TV shows, The Webster Webfoot Show, which originated in Dallas and aired for many years in Los Angeles and in Fresno. Some of you may remember Jimmy from his many appearances on such classic TV shows as Dallas and The Rockford Files.

Jimmy Weldon has also been one of the country’s leading motivational speakers for more than four decades. He shares many of his ideas in his book, Go Get ’Em Tiger, a part autobiographical, part motivational book that shows that the real definition of success is becoming the person you want to be and doing what you really want to do.

TV CONFIDENTIAL: A radio talk show about television
Fri 7pm ET and PT on Share-a-Vision Radio, KSAV.org and CX Radio Brazil
Sat 8pm ET, 5pm PT and Sun 6pm ET, 3pm PT on Indiana Talks (Marion, IN)
Sat 10pm ET, 7pm PT on WON 920 The Apple (Brooklyn, NY)
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KSCO-AM 1080 (San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA)
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KOMY-AM 1340 (La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA)
Sun 1pm ET, 10am PT CROC Radio (British Columbia, Canada)
Sun 9pm PT, Mon Mid ET on KHMB-AM and FM (Half Moon Bay, CA)
Mon 10pm ET, 7pm PT on The Radio Slot Network (San Francisco, CA)
Replays various times throughout the week on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork
Tape us now, listen to us later, using DAR.fm/tvconfidential
Also available as a podcast via iTunes, FeedBurner, SoundCloud
and now on your mobile phone via Stitcher.com
Follow us online at www.tvconfidential.net
Follow us now on Twitter: Twitter.com/tvconfidential
Like our Fan Page at www.facebook.com/tvconfidential

If you listen to TV CONFIDENTIAL, and like what you’ve heard, please consider supporting our efforts by becoming a patron of our show through Patreon. It’s easy to do, it does not cost much, plus you can receive some cool rewards (such as coupons that will allow you to download up to six free programs every month from the TV CONFIDENTIAL Archives store). For more information, please visit www.Patreon.com/tvconfidential... and thanks!

This Week in Television History: July 2017 PART II

As always, the further we go back in Hollywood history,
the more that fact and legend become intertwined.
It's hard to say where the truth really lies.

July 12, 1937

William "Bill" Henry Cosby, Jr. the American comedian, actor, author, television producer, and activist is born. 

A veteran stand-up performer, he got his start at various clubs, then landed a vanguard role in the 1960s action show I Spy. He later starred in his own series, The Bill Cosby Show, in 1969. He was one of the major characters on the children's television show The Electric Company for its first two seasons, and created the humorous educational cartoon series Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids, about a group of young friends growing up in the city. Cosby also acted in numerous films. Cosby's net worth is estimated at over $300 million.

July 12, 2002

The first season of Monk began.

Adrian Monk was a brilliant detective for the San Francisco Police Department until his wife, Trudy, was killed by a car bomb in a parking garage, which Monk then believed was intended for him. In a later episode, he discovers the bomb was truly meant for Trudy. He later believes that Trudy's death was part of a larger conspiracy that she had uncovered during her time as a journalist. Trudy's death led Monk to suffer a nervous breakdown. He was then discharged from the force and became a recluse, refusing to leave his house for three and a half years. Until the final episode, Trudy's death was Monk's only unsolved case.

He is finally able to leave the house with the help of his nurse, Sharona Fleming. The breakthrough allows him to work as a private detective and a consultant for the homicide unit despite limitations rooted in his obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD), which had grown significantly worse after the tragedy, along with several other phobias.

Monk's compulsive habits are numerous, and a number of phobias compound his situation, such as his fear of germs. Monk has 312 fears, some of which are milk, ladybugs, harmonicas, heights, imperfection, claustrophobia, driving, food touching on his plates, messes, and risk. He, however, had a breakthrough from claustrophobia later in the series. The OCD and plethora of phobias inevitably lead to very awkward situations and cause problems for Monk and anyone around him as he investigates cases. These same personal struggles, particularly the OCD, are what aid him in solving cases, such as his sharp memory, specific mindset, and attention to detail. In one episode entitled "Mr. Monk and His Biggest Fan", Marci Maven has compiled a list of all of Adrian's fears. In another episode, he tries to conquer his fears by doing various activities which involved his phobias. For example, he tries drinking milk, climbing a ladder, and putting a ladybug on his hand, but when things are scattered unorganized across a table, he cannot resist the compulsion to arrange them neatly.

July 15, 1964

The Universal Studio Tour opened.

The Tour is the signature attraction at the park, and goes into a working movie studio, with various film and Television sets on the lot. In recent years, guests have sat in multi-car trams for the duration of the ride. The Tour lasts about 45–50 minutes and is led by a live tour guide who can be seen throughout the tram on video screens. It travels through the Front Lot, Backlot and various attractions, passing sets and props from movies along the way.

From the beginning, Universal had offered tours of its studio. After Carl Laemmle opened Universal City on March 14, 1915, he would later invite the general public to see all the action for an admission fee of just $0.05, which also included a lunch box containing chicken inside. There was also a chance to buy fresh produce, since then-rural Universal City was still in part a working farm. This original tour was discontinued in around 1930, due to the advent of sound films coming to Universal.

Ironically, the modern Universal Studio Tour was initially reborn as a way to sell more lunches in the Studio Commissary.  The late 50’s and early 60’s were a difficult time for Hollywood studios. The arrival of television had weakened movie attendance and more and more productions were going on location to save costs. The grand old movie back lots were quickly becoming a thing of the past.  In the mid 1950’s, Universal began letting bus companies drive on to the property (the same bus companies that offered guided tours of the homes of Hollywood stars) as a way to increase revenues. The studio charged the bus companies a small fee and also benefited from the extra lunches they could sell to the tourists in the Studio Commissary. The bus drivers were given a hand-typed script to read that highlighted the studio facilities as well as hyped upcoming Universal releases like Bonzo Goes to College and Monster on the Campus.

When MCA purchased Universal in the late 1950’s, they began to look for a way to revive the old Studio Tour as part of a new image for Universal City Studios. In 1963 legendary movie mogul Lew Wasserman, then president of MCA/Universal, asked Vice President Al Dorskind to look into the feasibility of creating a permanent tour. 

The modern tour was established to include a series of dressing room walk-throughs, peeks at actual production, and later, staged events. This grew over the years into a full-blown theme park. 

July 16, 1967

Will Ferrell is born in Irvine, California. 

After rising to fame on TV’s Saturday Night Live, Ferrell starred in a string of big-screen comedies, including Old School and Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby.

 Ferrell graduated from the University of Southern California in 1990 and went on to join The Groundlings, an improvisational comedy group whose members have included Phil Hartman, Jon Lovitz and Lisa Kudrow. In 1995, Ferrell became a cast member of Saturday Night Live (SNL). Over the course of his seven seasons with the show, he became known for his impersonations of such celebrities as President George W. Bush, game show host Alex Trebek and Inside the Actors Studio host James Lipton. Ferrell also became known for the fictional characters he created, including cowbell player Gene Frenkle of Blue Oyster Cult, cheerleader Craig Buchanan and dense nightclubber Steve Butabi.

To quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Your Mental Sorbet: Surviving Gilligan's Island Documentary (2001)

Ed Robertson, Donna Allen-Figueroa and I had a wonderful time chatting with Dawn Wells about her web series Life Interrupted, Still on That Freakin' Island "and the rest" for broadcast later this month on TV Confidential: A radio talk show about television. We also spoke about this TV Special

Here is another "Mental Sorbet" 

A little spark of madness

that we could use to momentarily forget about those

things that leave a bad taste in our mouths

Surviving Gilligan's Island Documentary (2001)

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa

Dee Wallace, 007, and the Most Interesting Man in the World: Next on TVC

Actress, author, teacher and radio host Dee Wallace and actor and author Jonathan Goldsmith will join us this weekend on the next edition of TV CONFIDENTIAL, airing July 7-10 at the following times and venues:

Share-a-Vision Radio
San Francisco Bay Area
Friday 7/7
7pm ET, 4pm PT
10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Listen Live button at KSAV.org
Use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in KSAV
Hear us on the KSAV channel on CX Radio Brazil
Hear us on your cell phone or landline number by dialing 712-432-4235

Indiana Talks
Marion, IN
Saturday 7/8
8pm ET, 5pm PT
Sunday 7/9
10am ET, 7am PT
Click on the player at IndianaTalks.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in Indiana Talks

WON 920 The Apple
Brooklyn, NY
Saturday 7/8
10pm ET, 7pm PT
Streaming at www.920won.caster.fm

KSCO AM-1080 and FM-104.1
San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA
KOMY AM-1340
La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA
Sunday 7/9
9am ET, 6am PT
Also streaming at KSCO.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in KSCO

CROC Radio
Kimberley, British Columbia, Canada
Sunday 7/9
1pm ET, 10am PT
Streaming at CROCRadio.com
or use the TuneIn app on your smartphone and type in CROC

KHMB AM-1710
KHMV-LP 100.9 FM
Half Moon Bay, CA
Sunday 7/9
9pm PT
Monday 7/10
Midnight ET
Click on the Listen Live button at KHMBRadio.com

RadioSlot.com
San Francisco, CA
Monday 7/10
10pm ET, 7pm PT
with replays Tuesday thru Friday at 10pm ET, 7pm PT
Click on the Talk Slot button at RadioSlot.com

PWRNetwork
Ann Arbor, MI ~ Boston, MA ~ Chicago, IL ~ Melrose, FL ~ Los Angeles, CA
Various times throughout the week
on the Entertainment Channel on PWRNetwork.com
and the PWR channel on TuneIn

Known around the world as the mom on E.T., not to mention the legendary “scream queen” of such modern classic horror movies as The Howling, The Frighteners and Cujo, Dee Wallace is also an accomplished teacher, having earned her teaching credentials from The University of Kansas and taught in the public school system. She has also expanded her teaching platform, and the principles that she had found empowering for children, into daily sessions, her weekly radio show, Conscious Creation, and the stuffed bear Buppa LaPaloo, which also serves as an important teaching tool for children ages four to seven.

Dee Wallace currently stars in the popular Amazon Prime series Just Add Magic. She also has two movies coming out this year, Red Christmas and Charlie’s Gift—both of which challenged her as an actress, but in completely different ways. We’ll talk about this, and more, with Dee when she joins us in our second hour.

This week’s show will also include a conversation with actor Jonathan Goldsmith, the man known around the world as The Most Interesting Man in the World in a wildly popular series of commercials for Dos Equis beer that ran from 2007 to 2016. Though he patterned his delivery for The Most Interesting Man after his longtime friend Fernando Lamas, Jonathan brought more real world experience to the role than anyone could have imagined, from driving a garbage truck to make ends meet when he first came out to Hollywood, to saving a man from freezing to death in the High Sierras, to saving a woman from drowning, to debunking a mystic healer in the Philippines and defying the legendary curse of the ghost town of Bodie, California.

Jonathan shares these stories, plus many anecdotes from his fifty-year career in film and television, in his new book, Stay Interesting: I Don't Always Tell Stories About My Life, But Wh.... Jonathan Goldsmith will join us in our first hour.

Plus: Tony Figueroa and Donna Allen will pay tribute to the late Roger Moore as part of an expanded edition of This Week in TV History that will include highlights from Ed’s interview with Sir Roger in March 1994 in which the actor discussed his experience as a contract player at Warner Bros. and playing cousin Beau Maverick on Maverick. As Moore did not often speak publicly about his experience on Maverick, this is a rare interview indeed.  

TV CONFIDENTIAL: A radio talk show about television
Fri 7pm ET and PT on Share-a-Vision Radio, KSAV.org and CX Radio Brazil
Sat 8pm ET, 5pm PT and Sun 6pm ET, 3pm PT on Indiana Talks (Marion, IN)
Sat 10pm ET, 7pm PT on WON 920 The Apple (Brooklyn, NY)
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KSCO-AM 1080 (San Jose, Santa Cruz and Salinas, CA)
Sun 9am ET, 6am PT KOMY-AM 1340 (La Selva Beach and Watsonville, CA)
Sun 1pm ET, 10am PT CROC Radio (British Columbia, Canada)
Sun 9pm PT, Mon Mid ET on KHMB-AM and FM (Half Moon Bay, CA)
Mon 10pm ET, 7pm PT on The Radio Slot Network (San Francisco, CA)
Replays various times throughout the week on the Entertainment Channel at PWRNetwork
Tape us now, listen to us later, using DAR.fm/tvconfidential
Also available as a podcast via iTunes, FeedBurner, SoundCloud
and now on your mobile phone via Stitcher.com
Follow us online at www.tvconfidential.net
Follow us now on Twitter: Twitter.com/tvconfidential
Like our Fan Page at www.facebook.com/tvconfidential

If you listen to TV CONFIDENTIAL, and like what you’ve heard, please consider supporting our efforts by becoming a patron of our show through Patreon. It’s easy to do, it does not cost much, plus you can receive some cool rewards (such as coupons that will allow you to download up to six free programs every month from the TV CONFIDENTIAL Archives store). For more information, please visit www.Patreon.com/tvconfidential... and thanks!

This Week in Television History: July 2017 PART I

As always, the further we go back in Hollywood history,
the more that fact and legend become intertwined.
It's hard to say where the truth really lies.

July 3, 2012

TV legend Andy Griffith dies age 86 at his North Carolina home. 

Andrew Samuel Griffith was born on June 1, 1926, in Mount Airy, North Carolina. He majored in music at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, graduating in 1949. Griffith went on to teach school for several years before finding success as a stand-up comedian. In 1957, he made his feature film debut in the critically acclaimed drama "A Face in the Crowd," starring, in a serious role, as a drifter who becomes a manipulative, power-hungry celebrity.

"The Andy Griffith Show" premiered in the fall of 1960 and quickly became a hit. Griffith played the amiable Sheriff Andy Taylor, a widower raising his young son Opie, played by Ron Howard (now a successful Hollywood director, whose credits include "A Beautiful Mind" and "The Da Vinci Code").  Set in the small, idyllic community of Mayberry (based on Griffith's hometown of Mount Airy), the show included an ensemble of eccentric characters such as bumbling Deputy Barney Fife (played by Don Knotts), prim Aunt Bee (Frances Bavier), gas-station attendant Gomer Pyle (Jim Nabors), Floyd the barber (Howard McNear) and Otis the town drunk (Hal Smith). The folksy sitcom, memorable for its whistled theme song, which played over opening credits featuring Andy and Opie on their way to go fishing, continues to air in reruns. Additionally, the program spawned the TV shows "Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C." (1964-69) and "Mayberry R.F.D." (1968-71).

Mayberry RFD - S01E01 - Andy and Helen Get Married by superannuatedlps
During the 1970s and 1980s, Griffith appeared in several short-lived TV series and various made-for-TV movies before again finding success in the legal drama "Matlock," which originally aired from 1986 to 1995. The actor's final role was in the 2009 feature film "Play the Game." Also in 2009, the Andy Griffith Museum opened in Mount Airy. The TV legend died of a heart attack on July 3, 2012, at his home on Roanoke Island in North Carolina.

July 4, 1927

Playwright and screenwriter Neil Simon born in the Bronx section of New York City. 

In one of his earliest jobs, in the 1950s, Simon wrote for Sid Caesar’s live comedy television program Your Show of Shows, alongside other future greats such as Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner. As Simon went on to write for the stage and big screen, humor would continue to play a major role in his work. Simon’s first Broadway play, Come Blow Your Horn, opened in 1961. He went on to write over 30 plays, including Barefoot in the Park (1963), The Odd Couple (1965), The Last of the Red Hot Lovers (1969), The Sunshine Boys (1972), Chapter Two (1977), the autobiographical trilogy of Brighton Beach Memoirs (1983), Biloxi Blues (1985) and Broadway Bound (1986), Lost in Yonkers (1991) and The Goodbye Girl (1993).

Simon wrote the screenplay for many of his stage productions that were adapted for the big screen. In 1967, Robert Redford and Jane Fonda starred in a cinematic version of Barefoot in the Park, about a young newlywed couple in Manhattan. Redford had also appeared in the original Broadway cast. In 1968, Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau starred in a film version of The Odd Couple, about the mismatched roommates Felix Ungar, a neurotic neat freak, and Oscar Madison, a slob. Matthau also played Oscar Madison in the original Broadway production. The Odd Couple later became a popular TV sitcom that aired from 1970 to 1975 and starred Tony Randall and Jack Klugman. In 1998, Lemmon and Matthau reunited for The Odd Couple II. (The pair appeared in a number of comedic films together, starting with 1966’s The Fortune Cookie and including 1993’s Grumpy Old Men and its 1995 sequel.)

Simon has received four Academy Award nominations for Best Screenplay: for The Odd Couple, The Sunshine Boys (1975), which starred Matthau and George Burns, The Goodbye Girl (1977), which starred Richard Dreyfuss and Marsha Mason (whom Simon was married to from 1973 to 1981) and California Suite (1978), which featured Jane Fonda, Alan Alda, Michael Caine and Richard Pryor.

July 6, 1927

Patrick “Pat” Layton Paulsen was born. 

The comedian and satirist notable for his roles on several of the Smothers Brothers TV shows, and for his campaigns for President of the United States in 1968, 1972, 1980, 1988, 1992, and 1996, which had primarily comedic rather than political objectives, although his campaigns generated some protest votes for him.

July 7, 1927

Carl Hilding "Doc" Severinsen the pop and jazz trumpeter is born. 

He is best known for leading the NBC Orchestra on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. Severinsen was born in Arlington, Oregon, the son of Minnie Mae and Carl Severinsen, who was a dentist. He was nicknamed "Little Doc" after his father, and had originally wanted to play the trombone. But the senior Severinsen, a gifted amateur violinist, urged him to study the violin. The younger Severinsen insisted on the trombone, but had to settle for the only horn available in Arlington's small music store a trumpet. A week later, with the help of his father and a manual of instructions, the seven-year-old was so good that he was invited to join the high school band.

To quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".

Stay Tuned

Tony Figueroa