Andy Griffith, Gunsmoke and all the old western series that was popular during my growing up years are my favorite TV shows. The first time I remember watching television was when I was about 14. We didn’t have a TV but my Uncle Arthur Franklin, who lived in the Pleasant Ridge Community of LaSalle Parish – not far from Olla, had a small black and white set.
My Dad really loved wrestling and most Saturday nights, we would load up and head to Uncle Arthur’s house. There was my Mom, Dad, younger sister Katherine, and younger brother, George, and me. KALB-TV in Alexandria was the only station that my uncle could pick up.
When we got to Uncle Arthur’s house, he had his little small TV on and usually it was time for Amos and Andy, a popular comical show about Black folks back in the day. Following the comedy, came about an hour of wrestling.
I always thought the TV wrestling was fake, but we dared not say that to my Dad. He was convinced it was real and no one could change his mind.
When I was 16, we talked Dad into letting us buy a small black and white television set, with a roof top antenna, and put it on his account at Montgomery Ward (we all called it Monkey Ward). George and I drove to Monroe one Saturday morning to make the purchase.
When we got home, we got busy and installed the roof top antenna on a metal pole we had acquired and run the antenna wire into the living room where we set the TV up on a table. George stayed outside to turn the metal pole until the antenna was in the right direction to pick up KNOE-TV in Monroe. To get Monroe, we had turned the antenna north, but if we wanted KALB-TV in Alexandria, the antenna had to be turned south.The best I remember, we mostly watched KNOE-TV.
Like I said, when we got the antenna adjusted and the TV fine tuned, we all sat there and watched every show – I don’t remember even breaking for supper. Anyway, the last show of the night beginning at 9 p.m. was Gunsmoke. At the time, it was a 30-minute black and white production. It became my favorite at the time.
That first night, we stayed tuned until the TV signed off shortly after the news, weather and sports, around 10 p.m. Then a test pattern came on and stayed on for a long time and we sat there and watched that for an extended period of time waiting for something else to come on.
There were a lot of western series during the 1950’s and 1960’s and all were popular at the Franklin house.
A few of them were Bat Masterson, Bonanza, Death Valley Days, The Gene Autry Show, Have Gun – Will Travel, Hopalong Cassidy, Laramie, Maverick, Rawhide, The Rifleman, Roy Rogers Show, Tales of Texas Rangers, The Texan, Tombstone Territory, Wagon Train, and Wanted: Dead or Alive.
My all-time favorite television show was the Andy Griffith Show. An American situation comedy TV series, the show began in October 1960, and ran until April 1968.
The series originated partly from an episode of The Danny Thomas Show. The show starred Andy Griffith as Andy Taylor, the widowed sheriff of Mayberry, North Carolina, a fictional community of roughly 2,000–5,000 people.
Other major characters include Andy’s cousin, the well-meaning and enthusiastic deputy, Barney Fife; Andy’s aunt and housekeeper, Bee Taylor (Frances Bavier); and Andy’s young son, Opie (Ron Howard). Eccentric townspeople and, periodically, Andy’s girlfriends completed the cast.
The show evoked nostalgia even thought it had a contemporary setting.
Even today in 2021, Andy Griffith and Gunsmoke remain my all-time favorites. I have watched and rewatched every episode of each show. And as I age and start not remembering everything I use to, then every show is just like a new episode to me. Just kidding, even at 81, I can almost quote the next line of each character. But I can sit there and laugh over and over at some of the antics that Barney Fife is able to come up with, and the way Andy can draw him into just about anything and then pull a prank on poor ole Barney.
A few nights ago I remarked to Bonita, “How long do you think a good clean, funny and moral show like Andy Griffith would last in today’s culture.”
I might add that my all time favorite movies are those that star John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, and Gary Cooper. Some of the outstanding westerns starring these stars include: John Wayne in Big Jake, The Sons of Katie Elder, and Rio Grande; Clint Eastwood in The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, For a Few Dollars More, The Outlaw Josey Wales, and A Fistful of Dollars; and Gary Cooper in High Noon; and many other action packed movies.
Thanks to all the characters that made these shows popular. As far as I am concerned, nothing coming out of Hollywood today is worth watching.