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Saturday Morning Cartoons in 1965

It’s Saturday morning in 1965. You’ve got a bowl of your favorite cereal in front of you, the cartoons are on, and you have absolutely nowhere else you need to be.

So what are you watching?

The Beatles had become so huge that by 1965 they had their own Saturday morning cartoon. The funny part? John, Paul, George and Ringo didn’t provide their speaking voices — although when the music started, you heard the real Beatles recordings.

Then there was Atom Ant — “Up and at ’em, Atom Ant!” — a tiny Hanna-Barbera superhero with enough strength to take on just about anything.

Secret Squirrel gave us Agent 000, essentially a kid-friendly James Bond complete with trench coat, gadgets and Morocco Mole by his side.

And Milton the Monster may have had my favorite premise of the bunch. Professor Weirdo tried to create the perfect frightening monster, but accidentally added too much “tincture of tenderness.” The result was Milton — a monster who looked scary but was really a big softie.

Saturday mornings were different then. You watched what was on when it was on, and if you missed it, you waited until it came around again.

The Beatles, Atom Ant, Secret Squirrel or Milton the Monster — which one would you have been watching?

And what cereal was in your bowl?

Why Did Kids Have to Be Warned About Blasting Caps?

I remember seeing these warnings as a kid. They showed us what blasting caps looked like and told us never to touch one. Even then, I wondered: Why would I ever find one? Why weren’t the adults keeping them locked up?

We recently posted an old public service announcement with Willie Mays warning kids about blasting caps. Seeing it again brought that question right back. The warnings weren’t limited to Boy Scout posters, either. They appeared in films, public service announcements and other safety materials.

The danger was real. An explosives industry report said six boys were injured in five blasting cap incidents in 1989. Its conclusion was that the injuries apparently resulted from adults storing the caps improperly or illegally. A later report described children finding caps beside a road, near a park and even during a school trip to a lighthouse in Connecticut.

Of course kids needed to know: don’t touch one, and tell an adult. But that warning only came into play after someone had left a dangerous explosive where a child could find it.

We don’t see those old television spots much anymore, although the “Don’t Touch” warning still exists. I’m glad Willie Mays told kids to be careful. I just wish the adults handling the blasting caps had always been as careful.

Do you remember seeing these warnings growing up? Did you ever wonder why kids needed them in the first place?

“WHAT IS THIS, SOME SORT OF PEYTON PLACE?”

This was a little before my time, but I certainly remember my parents and other adults saying, “What is this, some sort of Peyton Place?”

For years I understood what they meant even if I didn’t really know why they were saying it.

Take a look at this 1964-65 opening to Peyton Place. A church steeple. Bells ringing. A peaceful little New England town. Then that wonderfully serious voice announces, “This is the continuing story of Peyton Place.”

Everything looks so respectable.

And that was the joke.

Behind those neat houses and small-town manners were affairs, family secrets, violence, alcoholism, mental breakdowns and murder. Peyton Place became so culturally famous that the name itself turned into shorthand for a seemingly respectable place where everybody had something going on behind closed doors. New Hampshire Magazine notes that “Peyton Place” had already become a synonym for scandal after Grace Metalious’ hugely successful 1956 novel.

The television version arrived on ABC on September 15, 1964, starring Dorothy Malone, Mia Farrow, Ryan O’Neal, Barbara Parkins and Ed Nelson. It was revolutionary television — a continuing prime-time story airing not once but twice each week. It became so popular that ABC eventually bumped it up to three nights a week.

And here’s something I never knew about this opening. The announcer is Dick Tufeld. One year later, television audiences would know that same voice as the Robot on Lost in Space — yes, the man behind “Danger, Will Robinson!”

Even the music has history. The theme was composed by Franz Waxman, who had also scored the 1957 Peyton Place movie.

The series lasted until June 2, 1969, producing an incredible 514 episodes.

But I think its greatest legacy may be that the show’s name escaped television entirely.

For a whole generation, you didn’t need to explain the gossip, secrets or drama.

You just called the place “Peyton Place.”

Do you remember your parents saying that — and did you know what they meant even if you’d never watched the show?

THE NIGHT MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL WAS BORN — SEPTEMBER 21, 1970

Can you imagine the NFL without Monday Night Football?

On September 21, 1970, America sat down for the first regular-season broadcast of ABC’s brand-new Monday Night Football — the New York Jets against the Cleveland Browns.

Now here’s something I didn’t realize: NFL teams had played occasional Monday games before this. CBS and NBC had even experimented with a few Monday-night telecasts during the 1960s. But this was different. This was the beginning of a weekly national television institution.

And ABC didn’t treat it like an ordinary Sunday football game moved to Monday.

Producer Roone Arledge wanted a show. He roughly doubled the usual number of cameras, emphasized instant replay and graphics, and put three personalities in the booth: Keith Jackson, Howard Cosell and former Cowboys quarterback Don Meredith. Frank Gifford, who many of us associate with that classic booth, wouldn’t replace Jackson until 1971.

Then there was the game itself.

A huge 85,703 people packed Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Cleveland jumped out to a 14-0 lead, Homer Jones returned the second-half kickoff 94 yards for a touchdown, and Joe Namath kept fighting back. The Jets actually outgained Cleveland 454 yards to 221.

But with New York trailing 24-21 late in the game, Cleveland’s Billy Andrews intercepted Namath and ran it back 25 yards for the touchdown that sealed a 31-21 Browns victory.

And listen to the music on those early broadcasts. The famous MNF music most of us recognize wasn’t there yet. The original theme was “Score,” written by Charles Fox, with that wonderfully funky Hammond-organ sound of 1970. “Heavy Action” didn’t arrive until years later.

What ABC created that night went far beyond football. Monday night became an event. You knew the voices, you knew the personalities, and if you were a kid, you probably tried negotiating just how much of the game you were allowed to stay awake for.

Were you watching Monday Night Football in those early years — and who do you remember most: Cosell, Meredith, Jackson or Gifford?

Branded

I remember Branded, but what sticks with me most isn’t the stories—it’s that theme song.

And I also remember that we had all kinds of our own reworded versions of it as kids. I can’t remember exactly what ours were anymore, but I know we weren’t singing the real words!

Branded premiered on NBC on January 24, 1965, starring Chuck Connors as former U.S. Army Captain Jason McCord. The entire premise was explained before the episode even started:

McCord was the only survivor of the Battle of Bitter Creek. Because everyone else had died, the Army concluded that he had abandoned his men and fled. He was court-martialed, stripped of his rank and publicly drummed out of the cavalry as a coward.

But McCord wasn’t a coward.

The tragedy had actually resulted from decisions made by his commanding officer, and McCord refused to disgrace the dead by publicly revealing everything he knew. So wherever he went, people knew him as the man who supposedly ran away, and each episode gave him another chance to prove what kind of man he really was.

And that opening was hard to forget — his insignia ripped off, his buttons removed, his sword broken in half and the fort gates slammed behind him.

The theme was written by composer Dominic Frontiere with lyrics by Alan Alch. Frontiere also supplied music for the series. The song was unusual because instead of simply introducing the show, it told you the whole setup in less than a minute.

Branded lasted only two seasons and 48 episodes, ending April 24, 1966. And here’s something I never realized: the television series never gave Jason McCord the big final exoneration the whole story seemed to be building toward. The show simply ended.

Interestingly, a feature-film reworking of the three-part episode The Mission, released as Broken Sabre, reportedly gave McCord a happier resolution in that version — but viewers of the weekly television series never got that ending.

For me, though, it still comes back to that song.

I know we weren’t the only kids who changed the words to the Branded theme. What version do YOU remember singing?

SEARS IN ITS HEYDAY — “THERE’S MORE FOR YOUR LIFE AT SEARS”

Believe it or not, Sears has an early online-shopping story that deserves a report all by itself. I’m working on that one. But for now, let’s go back to Sears during its heyday.

If you were watching football on a Sunday, it seemed like you were guaranteed to see a Sears commercial somewhere along the way. And that memory actually has some history behind it — Sears was buying advertising around NFL broadcasts as far back as the 1970s, including ABC’s NFL coverage and CBS NFC games. By 1981, an NFL executive said the first 32 pages of the Sears Christmas catalog were NFL merchandise.

This commercial comes from 1983, and watch how much Sears manages to squeeze into 30 seconds. Cheryl Tiegs and fashion. Winnie-the-Pooh for the kids. A big stereo. Lamps and home furnishings. Craftsman tools. It’s not really a commercial for any one product — the product is Sears itself.

And then there’s that jingle:

“There’s more for your life at Sears.”

You heard those few notes and immediately knew what was coming.

Cheryl Tiegs was especially important to Sears in this era. She had launched a Sears clothing collection in 1980, and the company used her in its catalogs and television commercials to shake off some of its old-fashioned image. By 1984, TIME was writing about a revitalized Sears, with its catalog reaching roughly 12 million homes and the company operating more than 800 stores and thousands of catalog-sales locations.

And Sears was enormous. In 1984 it reported a record $38.83 billion in revenue and $1.45 billion in net income. This was still the retailer Americans measured everybody else against.

I think that’s what makes this commercial hit differently today. Sears wasn’t trying to convince America that it mattered.

Everybody already knew it did.

Do you remember shopping at Sears — and did Sunday football immediately make you think of that jingle?

Happy Birthday to the United States Air Force!

On September 18, 1947, the U.S. Air Force officially became an independent branch of the military. So today marks its 79th birthday.

I thought this early-1950s recruiting commercial was a great way to look back at just how young the Air Force still was at the time.

The cartoon wasn’t simply advertising enlistment. It was recruiting young men for the Aviation Cadet program, where successful candidates could become pilots or other flying officers.

And check out the sales pitch: jets, travel, officer’s wings — and more than $5,000 a year after graduation.

There was a reason the Air Force was advertising so aggressively. Historical records show it was dealing with a serious shortage of Aviation Cadet applicants in the early 1950s. Requirements were adjusted, the minimum age was lowered to 19, and recruiting teams were sent onto college campuses looking for candidates.

It’s also easy to forget just how new everything was. The Air Force hadn’t even celebrated its tenth birthday yet, and the Air Force Academy didn’t exist when this recruiting push began. Congress wouldn’t authorize the Academy until 1954.

And since we’ve been paying more attention to the music in these old commercials, I looked into that too. I couldn’t find a reliable credit for the jingle used in this particular ad, so I’m not going to guess.

But here’s something I never knew about the official Air Force Song.

Robert Crawford wrote what became “Off We Go Into the Wild Blue Yonder” in 1939 — and according to Air Force history, he first came up with the melody while flying from Bridgeport, Connecticut, to Trenton, New Jersey.

Even better, the first page of Crawford’s original handwritten score eventually went much farther than Bridgeport or Trenton — Apollo 15 carried it to the surface of the Moon in 1971.

From a brand-new independent service in 1947 to the Moon barely 24 years later.

Who Remembers “The New People”?

I remember The New People, but oddly enough I remember the sound of the show more than I remember the stories. There was this strange little segue or transition sound they used between scenes that somehow stuck with me all these years. Hearing it again instantly brought the show back.

The New People premiered on ABC in September 1969 with a very late-’60s premise: a group of college students survives a plane crash on a deserted South Pacific island that had been prepared for an atomic test. The island came complete with buildings, supplies and even nuclear-test mannequins, giving the young survivors everything they needed to try building a new society from scratch.

There were some impressive names behind it. Aaron Spelling helped create the series, and Rod Serling wrote the original pilot. ABC also gave the show an unusual 45-minute time slot and paired it with The Music Scene in an effort to attract younger viewers.

The series only lasted 17 episodes, airing from September 1969 to January 1970, but it had some interesting future stars pass through. Richard Dreyfuss, Billy Dee Williams, Tyne Daly, Susan Howard and A Martinez all appeared during its short run.

The regular cast never produced a huge breakout star, although Tiffany Bolling went on to become a familiar face in cult films and television.

And then there’s that sound.

Does anybody else remember The New People — and do you remember that strange little transition sound too?

Pepsi’s “You’ve Got a Lot to Live Campaign

Do you remember this Pepsi jingle? Because this one was designed to do a lot more than sell you a bottle of soda.

This 1970 commercial, called “Portrait of America,” was part of Pepsi’s “You’ve Got a Lot to Live, and Pepsi’s Got a Lot to Give” campaign. Watching it again, what strikes me is how little time they spend actually selling Pepsi. Instead we see racing, boats, city streets, beaches, children, couples and ordinary Americans simply living their lives.

And then there’s that song.

The music was written by Joseph Brooks, who years later wrote “You Light Up My Life.” Pepsi described the sound as “gospel rock” or “jubilation rock,” with a big communal chorus meant to sound hopeful and uplifting. It reportedly grew out of a protest song Brooks had written before being reshaped into the Pepsi theme.

That makes a lot more sense when you remember what America felt like around 1970. BBDO realized that the carefree “beautiful young people doing beautiful things” advertising of the earlier Pepsi Generation no longer completely reflected a country watching war and social unrest every night on television. Their new goal was to be real and involving, even searching the country for real people doing real things.

Maybe that’s why this jingle stuck. It didn’t tell us Pepsi tasted better. It told us we had a lot to live for.

Do you remember hearing this one on television?

Ford Once Used “Fix It Yourself” to Sell Cars

Could you imagine a car manufacturer running this commercial today?

This is a 1969 commercial introducing the 1970 Ford Maverick, with a group of American Airlines stewardesses practically taking the car apart and putting it back together.

There was actually a reason for it.

Ford marketed the Maverick as “The Simple Machine.” It was supposed to be simple to buy, simple to drive, simple to maintain and — most interesting to me — simple to repair yourself.

And Ford wasn’t kidding.

Period advertising proudly pointed out that the Maverick owner’s manual contained 24 pages explaining maintenance jobs owners could perform themselves, including changing spark plugs and adjusting ignition timing. Ford even advertised that the fenders and grille could be replaced in a matter of minutes.

Think about how different that sales pitch sounds today.

Modern cars are safer, cleaner and far more sophisticated, but they’re also filled with computers, sensors, electronic modules and software. Some repairs now require proprietary diagnostic equipment, programming or electronic authorization. The Federal Trade Commission has even examined manufacturer restrictions involving parts, repair information, diagnostic software and components electronically paired to individual vehicles.

So while you can certainly still work on your own car, there are a lot more barriers between the owner and the machine.

Ford was selling almost the opposite idea in 1969:

Buy our car because you CAN work on it yourself.

The strategy apparently worked. The Maverick started at $1,995, Ford reportedly received more than 22,000 orders in its first three days, and nearly 579,000 were produced during that first model year.

A car company encouraging you to grab a wrench and fix your brand-new car yourself.

Do you miss when cars were simple enough that you could actually work on them in the driveway?