As you know, I’m a huge Disney fan, but I have seen certain trends that seem to exclude all of us that joined the Mickey Mouse Club back in the fifties and I just can’t keep quiet anymore. Is it just me, am I being too critical? I was unable to watch the annual Walt Disney Christmas Parade which is now called a “Frozen” Christmas celebration(?) because I was with family and friends who might not have wanted to watch the Walt Disney World Annual Christmas parade. Of course, being a huge Disney nerd I DVR’d it to watch later.  When I got the chance to watch it, I watched something that was made for mostly 6 to 12-year-old girls and not the wider audience that Disney attracts.

Does Disney really think the only ones that care about everything Disney is 6 to 12-year-old girls? It seems that the Disney Channel is either for kindergartners or 6 to 12-year-old girls. That's fine for certain hours of the day. It is fine for certain special programs as well. What about those of us that have been Disney fans since birth and are now into our golden years.

But let me get back to my subject - the Annual Disney Christmas Parade should be about the parks. The Christmas parade should be about the parade and things that Disney has planned in the future. It should be about the entire family enjoying Christmas. The singers that were picked this year were not of my taste, not that that would have mattered if they had a Christmas parade.

They showed 4 very short scenes of the parade and hardly anything of the parks. I did however like the bringing together of friends and families that they did, that was a wonderful touch. The thing that bothered me the most was that the tradition of Santa Claus being the very last float was gone and as a matter fact you only saw Santa Claus one time for an extremely short scene. I love Frozen but number one, Frozen is not a Christmas movie, has nothing to do with Christmas. Number two, it would have been great to have had some of the Frozen music and even Olaf put in at various points of the parade, but to let it take it over completely The Walt Disney World Annual Christmas Parade and not have the parade or Santa Claus, in my opinion, was just atrocious. This was just my opinion and I'm sure that young girls loved it.

I have every single Christmas parade on VHS tape or DVD since it started. It has been a tradition in my family to watch the Christmas parade from Walt Disney World and now the other theme parks as well. But it almost seemed like Christmas was just something added in here or there with only one traditional Christmas song sung by Tricia Yearwood. Disney has been on a trend since the Disney Channel got rid of Vault Disney many years ago, to eliminate any of their audience over the age of 30, what is with this?

Disney should be ashamed of themselves for putting out a ho-hum, just okay production that in my opinion had little to do with Christmas and celebrating Christmas and, come on, where in the world was Santa Claus? I must say that this was my opinion and I'm sure all the little girls out there loved it, but wasn't it supposed to be for the entire family?

I met a woman today

I met a woman today that came in to buy a television. I was showing her the various models and I told her that, in my opinion, the Samsung had the best overall picture of any of the televisions today. I showed her a Samsung model that was not a smart TV and she said that was okay, that they did not surf the web that much, so I knew that she knew nothing about what a smart TV really was. I explained to her all of the various channels that are available on such things as smart TV’s and Roku streaming boxes. She seemed extremely interested in both the TV and the Roku box. So I explained more of the features of both the TV and the Roku box and how well they would work together to give them as much entertainment value for the least amount of money. As we went to the register to ring her up she explained that she was buying it for her husband who is battling cancer and going through chemotherapy and that 2014 had been an extremely rough year for them. I told her that it also had been an extremely rough year for us. She also explained to me that her husband was pretty well bedridden and unable to do any of the activities that he used to be able to do and that she was doing this to keep him from being bored and worrying about his situation. I almost broke down right there at the register but I fought back the tears as hard as I could not to upset her. I told her that I would keep her and her husband in my prayers and she then told me that she was a breast cancer survivor. So I shared with her that I had lost my mother at age 52 of breast cancer. I could see that we were both at that point holding back the tears, so I quickly finished the sale and wished her an extremely very Merry Christmas.

God takes the opportunities to bless us and tell us that it could be much worse and that he never puts us through more than we can handle. I must confess though, the thought that I might have given her husband a little bit more joy or happiness by explaining to her what the Roku box had to offer that her husband might like was an unexpectedly nice Christmas present for me. I said a little prayer for both of them on my next break and prayed that they would find the Western channels that he loves so much and that he would find a little joy and happiness from my gesture. There are good people everywhere if you only take the time to look for them.

I know I would be completely beside myself if my wife was going through that kind of pain and misery. I am worried sick about my best friend through junior high school and high school because she is going through that kind of pain and misery. I am concerned for my cousin who just had an operation, and her daughter who was recently in a car accident and I pray for them at least three times a day, if not four. I know that it’s not the amount of times that I pray but the sincerity of my prayer and God knows that I am a compassionate and loving person and I pray for everyone that is hurting, suffering or lost. I say my special prayers for my dearest friend and my lovely cousins every time I speak with my Lord. My best friend was like a little sister to me and when the lady at the store told me her story, I was thinking of my best friend. I know it was selfish and I asked the Lord to forgive me before I prayed for the lady and her husband. God bless them and comfort them and healed them. Amen.

The Miracle of the Tree

There was once a young boy who met a lovely young dark-haired green eyed girl at the gates of Graceland. This young boy followed this gorgeous young lass to the land of ice and snow, Canada. Of course, they were wed and worked hard to make a life for themselves. The young man was restless and missed his home in the great state of Tennessee. Things had changed for them in that great land of Canada and they needed to change. The young man was homesick and his young lass perceived his heart ache and craved a bit of adventure for herself too, so she put forth the suggestion that they move back, back to the Tennessee hills where his heart lay. The young man had a hard time making the decision because he knew she was leaving her family behind just like he did. They made the move to the Gateway of the Smokey Mountains in the Tennessee hills. They built a wonderful log cabin that they call home.

During the time they were building their dream home, they had gotten to the point that money was short and there was none for luxuries such as a Christmas tree or even presents for each other this year but they had each other. They had to finish closing in the house because they were expected at her parents’ home in Canada for Christmas. They lacked one thing to completely close in the house so they could leave to go to Canada so the young man raced to the home improvement store in Knoxville, Tennessee and looked around to find this part he needed and he saw outside a stack of Christmas trees. He went over just to smell the fragrance of pine and he actually rubbed one of the trees and walked away to purchase the part he needed to close the house. As he wiped a tear from his cheek a clerk walked up to him and said “Sir, do you need a Christmas tree” and he told him “I would love to have one but I cannot afford one this year”. He said, “don't worry sir, we stopped selling them, if you would like to have one please pick out the one you want and I will help you load it on your truck”. He was astonished and even asked “are you sure” and he said “of course, they're just going to go in the dump if you don't take it”. He paid for the part he’d come for and he and the gentleman walked out to the truck and loaded the tree. He wished the clerk a Merry Christmas and he wished him the same. If the clerk had only known how much he had made his Christmas. No matter how much he thanked him, he could never know what it meant to him and that dark haired, green eyed girl from Canada.

He rushed home to close in the house and hurried to put up the Christmas tree before his wife could get home from her job. He searched through box after box after box in the basement, unable to find our Christmas tree stand and just as he was about to give up, low in behold, there it was laying on the floor. I guess he had knocked it out of one of the boxes and hadn’t noticed. Personally, I think it was divine intervention to find that Christmas tree stand on the floor where it shouldn't have been. He picked it up, climbed the ladder up to the second floor and I mounted the Christmas tree into the stand just as his wife walked through the back door, through the kitchen and into the great room. She said, “I thought we had agreed we could not afford a Christmas tree” and he told her that he had not purchased this tree. “This tree was given to us by a kind clerk at the home improvement store”. They both stood around that Christmas tree hugging each other and cried at the miracle that God had given them, the gift of this tree. Every time they’ve been down and out, God has sent them an angel to remind them of his love and his power.

I hope that your Christmas Angel is watching over you just as ours does for us. God bless you all, God bless you everyone and may you have the merriest Christmas you've ever had.

We are coming into the holiday season and all of the holiday movies and television specials are starting to appear. My greatest pleasure other than talking about movies is to set and watch great classic movies. I know we all have our favorite Christmas movies and we would stand toe to toe with someone and argue over what the best Christmas movie ever is.

I have to say that I have several favorites and I'm sure they're your favorites too, but for me to pick my number one, I have to concur with my wife on her favorite Christmas movie. It's a musical, it's a comedy, it's also a love story and it's about the relationships of friends and sisters. The star power that is in this movie is almost unfathomable today, even the character actors are famous. The stars of this picture are everyone's favorites, above the age of 40. It was shot in VistaVision (a version of Technicolor) which is so much better than what they're calling high-definition in theaters today as far as the color goes.

I can't help but look back on movies like this and wish they made more of those today. I'll keep you in suspense just a second or two longer to tell you that there is an anniversary edition of this out on Blu-ray and DVD. Okay, okay I will tell you now. It is "White Christmas" with Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney and Vera Ellen. It also costarred Dean Jagger and Mary Wicks.

It came out in 1954 and is still broadcast today every Christmas. I must admit I am fonder of comedies than I am of romantic or dramas and I do have a fondness for musicals, but this movie encompasses all of the things that I love about movies. The great music by Irving Berlin and the extremely great color sets and costumes, oh and by the way the costumes are by the icon of movie fashion Edith Head, and it was directed by Michael Curtiz. It has great songs, great dancing, great comedy and gorgeous costumes.This is a movie that can be watched by the entire family without any thing offensive to anyone. So if you happen to see it listed in your TV Guide make it a point to watch this extraordinary Christmas classic.

"Oh Boy!” as Mickey would say

“Oh Boy!” as Mickey would say, I am so stoked. This news could not be any better if Walt himself had planned this collaboration. You know that I had been extremely upset with the Disney Channel when they ended “Vault Disney” that aired on the Disney Channel in the evenings and late-night several years ago for all of us that love the Disney Classics. I kept my feelings as controlled as I possibly could but I am not going to control the jubilation and the joy that I feel over an announcement that I read the past couple of days. For those of us that love classics like “Davy Crockett”, “Pollyanna”, the “Swiss Family Robinson” and the original Disney cartoon shorts that made Disney a household word, this announcement is magical. I don't know if any of you can feel the warmth growing in my heart to know that Disney's vaults have opened up once again and the public will see things that most of them have never seen or heard of that will put Disney back where it belongs entertaining everyone, not just children. Walt Disney said that it is for the young and the young at heart and that encompasses all of us, from children to grandparents.

We have all grown up with Disney and, for a while, Disney was denying the adults like me the programs that they so desperately loved and wanted to see.

Starting on December 21, 2014, the Walt Disney Studios is opening the vault and allowing Turner Classic Movies to showcase the best that Disney has ever offered. Turner Classic Movies has always been that classic and classy network lead by the wonderful Robert Osborne, just what Disney needs to showcase their classic collections. Turner Classic Movies has held their Film Festival cruises on the Disney Cruise Lines and that was an excellent match for both Turner and Disney. I know I speak for many of you out there excited about the combination of Turner Classic Movies and the Disney Classics collections of movies. It is not only an excellent fit, it was their destinies. I am overjoyed in the fact that we are going to see the Disney classic movies on TCM. I hope they keep in mind that we also want to see the Disney made for television specials that have had no place where they could be enjoyed properly, other than on a channel or network like Turner Classic Movies Network.

Support Disney and Turner Classic Movies as they celebrate the premiere presentation of the Disney Vault on TCM, Sunday December 21, 2014 at 8 PM. I believe they will start off with a “Chip’n Dale” cartoon, the “Reluctant Dragon” and then the “Third Man on the Mountain”. All of us that love Disney Classics need to support both Turner Classic Movies and the Walt Disney Company in this collaboration so that we can continue to get these wonderful movies and special television programs that the Walt Disney Company has put out for years.

I am so happy that this is going to happen and that this is not the only collaboration of TCM and the Walt Disney Company. They have also decided to join forces and refresh the “Great Movie Ride” at the “Disney Studios” at WDW. The changes are going to be subtle such as having Robert Osborne narrate a completely revamped introduction to the movies that is seen before boarding the “Great Movie Ride” as not to disturb but enhance this icon that the Disney Parks have to offer and I for one am sure that it will be one of the best joint ventures that Disney has ever entered into. It can only help to enhance one of the greatest TV networks, Turner Classic Movies. So all of you Disney nerds out there, all of you Disney historians, all of you lovers of Disney Parks and people like me that love everything Disney, let us all come together and support this venture that will give us back our “Vault Disney”. Thank you to the Walt Disney Company and the Turner Classic Movies network for this unprecedented collaboration. We love to watch you and support you in this endeavor.

 

With That Old Collie Dog

                             With That Old Collie Dog

I saw a flock of birds today. It took me back to a time when I was a little boy on my Papaw’s farm, walking through the fields with my BB gun in tow and that old collie dog following me the whole way as if he was protecting me. Between the fields were the pine thickets. They were put there as a windbreak to reduce soil erosion, but I didn't know anything about any of that in those days. I just knew it was full of critters to hunt because I wanted to be like the men in my family. They were all hunters.

Let's go back to the little boy and the dog marching through the fields. While traversing through the rough fields, that old collie dog and I noticed a flock of black birds waving to the sky as if they were all one solid sheet and waving in the breeze like a flag going from one side of the field to a pine thicket, resting for a minute and then again flying through the air as if they were swaying through the breeze, like a flag flying off the back of a speeding boat, to the other side to the other pine thicket. As we were watching the birds and walking along the field, there was a big huge old stump in the middle of the field. The collie dog and I sat on the shady side of that stump and decided that we would watch these birds. I sat down and the collie dog laid down beside me putting his head across my lap as if to say I'm glad you stopped, I was tired.

Had these birds gone crazy or was it some kind of acrobatic dance that they had to perform before leaving and heading south for the winter. There was a slight chill in the air and almost all of the leaves were off the trees except for the pine trees, they were still green. I thought to myself that must be why they call them evergreens. The collie dog had fallen fast asleep. I guess I had worn him out. I knew he was extremely old but he refused to leave my side any time we came to visit my Papaw and Mamaw. My attention returned to the birds as they flew frantically about. I was so enthralled with their aerial acrobatics that I too soon fell fast asleep.

I was awakened by the sound of someone calling my name. It was my older brother who had been sent by my mother to collect me for it was time to eat and the sun was now setting across that old pasture in the distance. I remember my brother and I running through the field and over the humps of the rows, as fast as we could because our Mamaw had promised us a slice of her Southern pecan cake and it was our favorite.

You know that old collie dog, he kept right up with us and by the time we got back to my Papaw's and Mamaw’s house, that old collie dog was totally exhausted. I knew he had to be hungry because he and I had not eaten since breakfast and I was starving so he had to be too. I went to my Mamaw’s dry safe and got out two dry biscuits and I got a scoop of dog food and the bacon grease from the morning's breakfast and a cup of hot water and mixed it all together and brought it out to that old collie dog. That dog looked at the food and looked at me and chowed down and didn't look back.

Those were good times. I really enjoyed dreaming of being a big game hunter with that old BB gun that would not even hurt a fly, even if you dropped it on that fly. You know, I can't even remember that old collie dog’s name, but I will always remember him, he was my partner. Isn't it silly how much thought we put into something like a flock of birds flying erratically through the air. The time that we spend sharing such memories is a gift to those we love.

   

What has Happened to the Movies

One of my favorite subjects to talk to someone about is movies. I love movies, new ones or old ones, it doesn't matter as long as they’re good movies. I have had my fill with movies that tend to bring you down. I so much love a movie that, when you walk out of the theater, you're feeling good about yourself and the world. I hate the movies that leave you with no hope and tear your spirits down to nothing. I grew up in a generation that had TV from the cradle to the grave. Movies have been a big part of my experience of life. The actors that Star in these movies are just people. I have met several that are outstanding human beings and I have met others that, well frankly, weren't worth meeting, but thankfully they are few and far between, those that aren't worth meeting I mean.

I had a day off and I spent the day watching a mixture of movies, new ones and old ones. The ones that are outstanding are usually the ones that use some kind of a storyline to tell the real human experience of relationships, love and loss and ordinary people just trying to get by. I love the comedies most of all, especially the mystery or detective stories that are mixed with comedy throughout. My second favorite is spooky comedies or better known as “The Old Dark House” comedies. There have been many genres which I have enjoyed watching, but I return time and time again to those that tell the stories of the inner workings of human relationships that solve the problems of living and loving one another and, yes, hating one another as well. It has always been my feeling that human beings are basically good and if given the chance they can be extremely good and that things will usually always work themselves out for the best. I know that's a bit naïve because things very rarely work out the way we want them to, but that doesn't mean that they don't work out for the best.

I love magic and mystery in comedy and well even drama. I won't turn down a chick flick but I prefer a movie that has a mixture of all of those elements in them. When a movie connects with all of the magic and mystery, comedy and drama, life and love, you just can't beat that movie. A lot of people will tell you that the Golden Age of Hollywood culminated in 1939 with some of the best classics ever made, but I'm afraid I would have to disagree. I don't think that movies have reached their potential yet and I don't think that movies will go out of style no matter how they're delivered to the consumer. I believe that when there is an open mind setting down in front of the screen or even a hologram that the magic that comes from a well-written and acted and directed movie will always be the best source of escape from reality that man has or ever will have.

I hope that the actors, actresses, directors and movie studios understand how much they mean and what kind of influence they have on the general public, because movies have become so dark as of late, even my beloved Batman has become more of a horror picture than a hero picture. I just don't understand the mentality that has to make everything look more evil than it really has to be. That's why I love movies like The Good Witch, My Life In Ruins, The Quartet and so many others that have been made here recently. I can't name them all and I'm not going to try. These kinds of movies leave you with a good feeling and hope for tomorrow. That's not to say that the action movies that are being made today are all bad, it's just that most of them are so horrifyingly dark and give no hope for the future of mankind.

I'm sorry but I can't help but think that our youth is getting so conditioned to life being meaningless that that's why so much violence is happening to and among our children. I remember watching the Lone Ranger which I considered a very violent television show that I cannot remember ever seeing blood, but people were shot, people were injured, but I wasn't being desensitized to human emotion and feeling and the fear of death like our children today. I even picked up a comic book which many of our movies and television shows are based on over the years just the other day. It would have been considered pornography or too violent for anyone under the age of 18 in my day. I am no prude. I love seeing a very beautiful woman in all the glory that God created her in, but there's a difference between being sexy and slutty. I wish I had the words to say this more elegantly but here's my stab at it, people look down on a female that gets ahead by using her looks, where nothing is said about a man who gets ahead by using his looks. I have never had what I call “executive hair”. My hair has always been curly and somewhat unruly, so I would never be picked for anything that a person with executive hair would have been picked for. So you see it's not just a double standard for women, it's also a double standard for men. If you don't fit the movie star looks, you're most likely not going to be in a movie. There are actors and actresses today that aren't what I would call raving beauties which gives some hope for the future of normal people like me but there will always be more attention paid to what society thinks entertainment should look like and that's okay with me. I just want, for lack of a better word, Hollywood to try and uplift our society rather than dragging it in the gutter. I see so many bright hopes on television and then all of a sudden they're gone. Maybe I'm the only one that likes a more favorable view of the future.

Those are my thoughts for today. You'll have to forgive me, I have to run, “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” is about to come on.

The seasons change

As the seasons change so did our lives and now I am feeling the autumn of my life so very strong this year. I'm glad that things have slowed down in my life and are not quite as hard as they were because the will is there and the want to is there, but the body does not always cooperate. As it is written, there is a time for everything and as our time comes slowly to an end,

I can't help but feel sad, there are so many more things to do, so much more of the world to see and so much more life to live. I have had the best of times and as they have written, I have had the worst of times, but my life has been an exciting journey through endless wonder and imagination. I know that you, my friends, would say that I'm full of it and I would have to agree. I think that my generous imagination has made my life so much more exciting than it would have been if I had not embellished on what life set before me. I don't mean drama, because one thing I don't need, especially in the latter days of my life, is drama. What I'm talking about is when you see the pyramids in Egypt, do you look at them and say how magnificent or do you look at them and wonder about the people who made them and why they were made and were the people that actually did the construction work on these majestic pyramids just like us, striving to make it through one more day. Did they just want to make a better life for all their descendants, or were they enslaved and beaten and made to work relentless hours of torturous work. When you look at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, can you see the wise men coming upon Joseph and Mary and bestowing gifts upon the Christ child or do you just see a well ornamented church. I see all of these things and much more. When I look upon a piece of history or a marvel of construction from 4000 years ago, I can hear the anguish of those workers after a hard day’s work sitting down to a meal still hurting from their labor. I see the chariots racing across the roads in Luxor headed for the temples.

When I look back at my life, I see extremely humble beginnings that I was proud of what I was given in life. I see a boy growing into a man without a clue of how that process is supposed to happen. I see a man making mistakes and learning by them and keeping his head held high even when he has failed. A wise man once said a young man needs a good failure to help him understand what it takes to be a success. I have always been able to figure out things and work with my hands better than most people I know. I always have told myself that if someone made this, I can fix it or build it myself. That's why I did over 70% of the work on my log house with the help of one friend and my wife. I am proud to say that I built this house with my own two hands. Yes it's not perfect but neither am I. I am just a man longing for enough time in this world to have made a difference. The only thing I have ever wished for that people would say of me is that he is a good soul and I'm glad he passed my way. I have said once before that I believe that my life has been an extraordinary gift and then I celebrate the past, present and the future with all that is within me. This tinker of many trades and master of none has worked hard his entire life.

 October makes me extremely sad but within that sadness I celebrate a young boy who stumbled his way into manhood who can proudly say he did it his way. There has been love lost and love cherished for a lifetime and there's not many men that truly know what true love is all about. I have given my heart to the one I love now and she has graced me with her love. I am the most appreciative to her for that she has been my rock through some of the roughest times in my life. I am also glad that I have reconnected with a lot of the friends that I went to school with, because I never knew how much I cared about them or that they cared about me. I have walked most of my life with depression. It was not a debilitating depression but one that kept me from seeing those that cared. I still fight that battle today but it's not as bad because I have come to know a young boy born at St. Joseph's hospital in February 1956 very well. He wears his feelings on his sleeve because he cares so much about everything and everyone. He has a stubborn streak a mile long that he has learned to use and not abuse. Even though I show you the vulnerability in my writing, it's still extremely hard to actually let go of it in my day-to-day life. I don't think I have ever really been confident about things. I have learned to analyze and be objective and make a decision and stick to it. If that is confidence than I guess I have some, but it has taken a long time for me to realize that. I know that I had learning disabilities that no one knew about back in the days when I was in school. I have learned to overcome them and use them to my advantage when I can. I am not weak and I am not foolish. I am a strong caring person who has done his best and I want to tell you, all of my friends, every one of you, you are exceptional souls and I'm so glad that we shared the time that we had together.

Like most people I don't know when my time will come. I hope its years from now and I hope I have the time to see you all again someday before that time comes. When I pray each day, I pray for those we have lost that were in our neighborhoods and I pray for each and every one of you to have a long and joyful life. We have lost too many of our friends in these past years and, unfortunately, they will not be the last. Even though I mourn their loss, I try to celebrate their life even more. I ask you to keep me in your prayers. I have never forgotten that little house on Durby Street in Memphis, Tennessee and all of those people that lived in our neighborhoods and I hope I never will. God bless you all.

PS I told you I tried not to write sad things in October, but it just comes out that way and, the funny thing about it is, I enjoy the holiday of Halloween as much as any holiday we have. I love the old funny, spooky shows that I always watch on Halloween. I love seeing the kids in their costumes and, let's face it, who doesn't like candy, so why am I so depressed?

My History Television

In 1878 William Crookes confirmed the existence of cathode rays by building a tube to display them in, which is what made it possible for cathode rays to produce a luminous image on a fluorescent screen used chiefly in television and computer terminals. The first man to actually make a scanning cathode ray tube was Carl Ferdinand Braun, a German scientist, in 1897. His invention was a CRT with a fluorescent screen, known as a cathode-ray oscilloscope that emitted a visible light when struck by a beam of electrons. A Russian scientist, Boris Rosing, who worked alongside of Vladimir Zworykin manufactured a CRT in the receiver of a television system that was at the cameras end. Needless to say there were many improvements and breakthroughs with the cathode Ray tube through the years all the way up to 1926 when the first moving images were broadcast to the television screen. The very first clear perception of the moving image was displayed at the AT&T Bell Labs in New York City in 1927. The first television magazine for the serious hobbyist was published in 1927.

Hallelujah, the first television station owned by General Electric, WGY – TV in Schenectady, New York broadcast the first television broadcast but the transmission was only a 40 minute stage production, The Queen's Messenger, and they were only broadcast for television sets with the system developed by Dr. Ernst Alexanderson . Fear not though, GE was not the only one experimenting with broadcast television stations. RCA also opened up a television lab and experimental station W2XDS . The first license was issued to W3XK, to Charles Jenkins in Wheaton, Maryland who planned to broadcast radio movies. RKO experimented with their televisions in Schenectady, New York broadcasting up-to-date local news and sportscasts to the movies that were being broadcast. By the time 1932 rolled around, NBC had begun experimenting with their television programming as well.

Even though there were many more innovations and stations and people to mention up to the perfection of what we know as broadcast television today, it didn't really get its start until the FCC authorized commercial television to begin on July 1, 1941 and there was no turning back at that point. There is money to be made in the airwaves across the United States broadcasting programming and commercials to the unwitting public. But the commercial broadcasting was short-lived just as a lot of other industries were put on hold for the war effort after the bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, commercial television broadcasting was just about put on hold till after the war. The Dumont's network had the distinction of having their first network hookup broadcast the news of the atomic bomb being dropped on Nagasaki, Japan.

1946 the war is over and our men are back and there is a desire for relaxation and entertainment. RCA in its wisdom had the first post-war designed television, the 630 TS. It had sold nearly 10,000 sets at $350 each at a time when it was almost 10% of an average yearly salary. Women of the world united to watch the soap opera. One of the biggest expansions in commercial history was the television set. By 1947, 44,000 television sets are in the homes in the United States. Even children were not left out. The Dumont network premiered the first children's programming called the Small Fries Club at 7 PM, Monday through Friday. It was a program that had originated on the radio in 1921. The tradition of using old radio programs in the new mediums that are to come had now started.

Moving ahead to 1949, Milton Berle hosts the first charity telethon. And the Zenith Radio Corporation invents the remote control called the lazy bone. It could turn the television off our on and change channels but it was tethered to the television with a bulky cable. Skipping forward to 1951, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz negotiate a contract with CBS for the right to film I Love Lucy and get 100% ownership, pioneering the rights to residuals and earning more than $1 million a year by the mid-50s. Commercial television was now viable and there is no stopping it.

Skipping ahead to the 1960’s where Irwin Allen seems to own the television audiences with such shows such as Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Lost in Space, the Time Tunnel, Land of the Giants, and several others. And, of course, there were other television shows by other networks and other producers. Here's a short list of some of the best; Andy Griffith Show, the Beverly Hillbillies, Bonanza, I Dream of Jeannie, Have Gun Will Travel, Star Trek, the Brady Bunch, Dick Van Dyke Show, Gilligan's Island, the Ed Sullivan Show, the Addams family, the Munsters, Make Room for Daddy, Gomer Pyle USMC, What's My Line, Bewitched, My Three Sons, the Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, the Flintstones, the Carol Burnett Show, and the Jack Benny program.

I could talk all day about television and which shows I love the most but I won't bore you with what I like the most because I know you all have your favorites as well, but there is one show above all the others that had anybody and everybody who was somebody on it. No, I'm not talking about the Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. Before Johnny Carson was a household name, Ed Sullivan had a show called the Toast of the Town. I guess you could say that show grew up to be more of a variety show.  With the Ed Sullivan Show itself there were rock stars, there were opera stars and there were even Broadway stars. I don't know at that time what show had so much variety of entertainment. Even variety shows at that time could not get the guests that the Ed Sullivan show were able to acquire. I mean, let's face it, they introduced us to the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, to the Birds to the Mamas and the Papas and many other rock 'n roll groups. 

What more could a teenage kid ask for. Oh that's right, I wasn't a teenage kid when the Ed Sullivan Show started, I was what they call now a preteen whatever that means. I was more interested in things like the Flintstones, Lost in Space, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, etc.,  than listening to a bunch of old people singing opera but my parents lived in my house and they control the television, so whether I liked it or not, we watched the Ed Sullivan show. We saw Chinese acrobatics, the Chinese plate spinners and various other artists from around the world. We even saw jugglers and I didn’t even know what a juggler was at that time. We even saw Ed kiss little Topogigo goodnight. But I find myself longing for those more innocent days of the Ed Sullivan Show that tried to give us a little bit of entertainment and a lot of culture.

Today one of my favorite networks is PBS, our Public Broadcasting Stations. Public broadcasting brings you shows like Masterpiece Theatre, News Hour, Sesame Street, Mystery, Sherlock Holmes, Austin City Limits, Frontline, This Old House, Mr. Rogers, Reading Rainbow, Bill Nye the Science Guy, and many more children's programming choices, just as there are many more adult programming choices. Now with the invention of digital television there are three PBS programming channels, the regular PBS we have all known and loved, the second channel is known as PBS World and the third is the PBS Create channel. I can't say enough about today's PBS. It is the channel that informs and entertains and instructs us in our daily way of life, unlike other channels that say things like they are the Travel Channel but the only programming they have is about food. Now I know that I have to eat when I travel but if I'm going to see ancient Egypt, it is only of secondary importance or even less of the adventure of my travels. Don't get me wrong, I do love to experience exotic foods from a faraway land that I am traveling to but if I had to eat at McDonald's every day to see the pyramids and the ruins of Egypt I would do so. It is not my main goal when I travel so as well it is not my main goal when I turn over to the Travel Channel to see what kind of gross food some fool is willing to try. That's enough of my tyrade on channels that are not what they appear to be.

There is a new channel on the horizon of the digital channels that gives me all of the channels that I grew up with; such things as the Man from Uncle, or Hawaii Five-O, so you see this is the channel for me and it is called Me TV. If you love watching television from when you were a kid, a teenager or young child, this is also the channel for you. I could go to the list of programming that they have but there's no need. You know it, you watched it, you lived it back in the 60s and the 70s, so all you have to do is get an antenna for your television set and look for your channel number on your dial.

I also wanted to tell you about a flea market treasure that I found just the other day. It is a photo of Annette Funicello which appears to be from the Spin and Marty series that aired on the Mickey Mouse Club. She actually appeared in the New Adventures of Spin and Marty after the original Spin and Marty had aired and was so popular that Walt Disney had to put on a another serial of Spin and Marty. In the New Adventures they added Kevin Corcoran, Darlene Gillespie and Annette Funicello. I had never seen this particular picture so I bought it because Spin and Marty along with the Annette serial are my utmost favorite television programs of all times, that is other than Tales of the Gold Monkey with Roddy McDowell and Stephen Collins. So I leave you with this from one who was born with television as a pacifier and will go to his grave with television being his biggest source of comfort," there is more to life than television", but it will wait till my program is over with.

1969

The year 1969 has been referred to as many things but whoever it was that said it was the summer of our lives was pretty close to being right. It really was the year that we came of age, with all the rioting in Ireland and the practically every month nuclear tests by either the United States, Russia or China, it seemed that we had to grow up fast because someone was bound to destroy our world.

1969 was also the summer of love from Haight Asbury all the way to Max Yasgur's Dairy Farm in New York State.

The rock and rollers were reminding us that the anthem for our youth was sex, drugs and rock 'n roll. The Beatles had started on a path to their demise, each of them releasing solo works and some of the best Beatles music ever recorded. I don't want to forget any of the other artists such as Crosby Stills Nash and Young or David Bowie, Peter Paul and Mary and the likes of Arlo Guthrie and Donovan.  There were many great artists and great songs released or recorded in 1969, so for music lovers it was a year of music. I know that most people were engulfed by the music of this year and I too enjoyed the music of our time but it wasn't my main concern, so forgive me if I don't write a whole lot at this time about music. Other than that I have said that I was part of the Ed Sullivan generation who was introduced to classical music, operas, operettas, jazz, pop and rock 'n roll. Ed Sullivan had artists of all genres on his show, from all types of entertainment and we always stayed glued to the television when the Ed Sullivan broadcast was on.

The year also brought strides in manned space exploration. There were several Russian manned and unmanned spacecraft launched culminating with the first docking of two manned spacecraft's and the transfer of cosmonauts between those spacecraft. The United States was not to be defeated in the race for space. We had launched several unmanned space exploration crafts ourselves and we successfully put four men on the moon, with Apollo 11 and 12. I can remember sitting in front of the old black and white TV on that July night, extremely excited waiting for the announcements and the play-by-play from Walter Cronkite on what was happening with the moon landing. I had my reel to reel tape recorder with a microphone taped to the speaker of the television recording every single word and every event that was taking place. It's still so real to me that we were sitting in front of those TV sets watching this extremely amazing piece of history unfold right before our eyes. We actually saw the astronauts on the moon. I remember it had to be something extremely special because it was way past my bedtime and my parents had not said a word about us going to bed. At that age I was completely absorbed in the American space program. I had every news clipping, I had listened to every news report that I could get my hands on about anything that NASA was involved with at that time.

Even though 1969 was not the year that I remember as my fondest, it was still one of the most influential years of my life. I have written down some of the major events and I have tried to cross reference the dates with more than one source but when those sources were at conflict, I chose to rely on my memory which isn't as reliable as it used to be, but writing this story gives me the perk of making that decision.

This year I was about to start the greatest adventure of my life at Airways Junior High School in Memphis, Tennessee. It was on Ketchum Street near Charjean Park and little did any of us know that this would be the happiest time in our lives, so really I would have to say that from 1969 to 1972 was almost the best years of my life.

January 3, 1969- 2 Virgins" album declared pornographic in NJ

January 5 -USSR Venera 5 launched for 1st successful planet landing (Venus)

January 6 -WLIW TV channel 21 in Garden City, NY (PBS) begins broadcasting

January 12 -Super Bowl III: NY Jets beat Baltimore Colts, 16-7 in Miami Super Bowl MVP: Joe Namath, NY Jets, QB

January 14 -Soyuz 4 launched; rendezvous with Soyuz 5 two days later

January 16- Soviet Soyuz 4 & Soyuz 5 perform 1st transfer of crew in space

January 17 -Debut album of Led Zeppelin released in US

January 20- Richard M Nixon inaugurated as president

January 23 -Cream releases their last album "Goodbye"

January 25- US-North Vietnamese peace talks begin in Paris

January 27- 9 Jews publically executed in Damascus Syria

January 30- Beatles perform last live gig, a 42-min concert on roof of Apple HQ, London

Feb 4th - The Palestine National Congress appoints Yasser Arafat chairman of the PLO

Feb 5th - US population reaches 200 million

Feb 9th - Boeing 747 made its 1st commercial flight

Feb 17th - Golda Meir sworn in as the first female prime minister of Israel

Feb 24th - Mariner 6 launched for Mars flyby

Mar 2nd - 1st test flight of the supersonic Concorde

Mar 3rd - Apollo 9 launched for 151 Earth orbits (10 days)

Mar 19th - Chicago 7 indicted in aftermath of Chicago Democratic convention

Mar 20th - US president Nixon proclaims he will end Vietnam war in 1970

Mar 25th - John & Yoko stage their 1st bed-in for peace (Amsterdam)

Apr 12th - Simon & Garfunkel release "the Boxer”

Apr 17th - Sirhan Sirhan is convicted of assassinating Sen Robert F Kennedy

Apr 17th - The Band (formerly The Hawks), perform their 1st concert

Apr 22nd - 1st human eye transplant performed

Apr 24th - Paul McCartney says there is no truth to rumors he is dead

Apr 28th - Charles de Gaulle resigns as President of France

May 2nd - British liner Queen Elizabeth II leaves on maiden voyage to NY

May 8th - Pope Paul VI publishes constitution Sacra Ritum Congregation

May 10th - Apollo 10 transmit 1st color pictures of Earth from space

May 14th - Last Chevrolet Corsair built

May 27th - Walt Disney World construction begins

May 31st - John Lennon & Yoko Ono record "Give Peace a Chance" in Montreal hotel room

May 31st - Stevie Wonder releases "My Cherie Amore"

Jun 3rd - Last episode of Star Trek airs on NBC (Turnabout Intruder)

Jun 8th - "Smothers Brothers comedy Hour" last airs on CBS-TV

Jun 9th - Brian Jones quits (sic) Rolling Stones because of his drug problems

Jun 15th - "Hee Haw" with Roy Clark & Buck Owens premieres on CBS TV

Jun 20th - Georges Pompidou sworn in as President of France

Jun 22nd - Cleveland's Cuyahoga River catches fire

Jun 27th - 50,000 attend Denver Pop Festival

Jun 29th - 1st Jewish worship service at White House

Jul 1st - Shelby Singleton buys Sun Records from Sam Phillip

Jul 4th - 140,000 attend Atlanta Pop Festival featuring Led Zep & Janis Joplin

Jul 5th - Rolling Stones play a free concert in London's Hyde Park

Jul 8th - US troop withdrawal begins in Vietnam

Jul 11th - David Bowie releases "Space Oddity"

Jul 13th - Russia launches unmanned Luna 15 to Moon

Jul 14th - WMUL (now WPBY) TV channel 33 in Huntington, WV (PBS) 1st broadcast

Jul 16th - Apollo 11, carrying 1st men to land on Moon, launched

Jul 19th - Apollo 11 goes into Moon orbit

Jul 20th - 1st men on the Moon, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin Jr. from Apollo 11

Jul 21st - Neil Armstrong steps on Moon at 2:56:15 AM (GMT)

Jul 21st - Russia's Luna 15 impacts moon after 52 lunar orbits

Jul 24th - Apollo 11 returns to Earth

Jul 25th - 1st performance of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young (Fillmore East, NY)

Aug 9th - Manson family commits Tate-LaBianca murders

Aug 15th - Woodstock Music & Art Fair opens in NY State (Max Yasgur's Dairy Farm) for three days of love, peace and music (and a lot of drugs)

Aug 18th - Woodstock Music & Art Fair closes with Jimi Hendrix / Band of Gypsys as the final act

Aug 22nd - Beatles record a video for "Long & Winding Road”

Sep 18th - Tiny Tim & Miss Vicky get engaged on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson

Sep 20th - Archies' "Sugar Sugar" hits #1

Sep 24th - 1st Elvis convention, 2500 fans attend in Cincinnati

Oct 18th - Rod Stewart joins Small Faces

Oct 22nd - Paul McCartney denies rumors of his death

Oct 27th - Ralph Nader sets up a consumer organization known as Nader's Raiders

Oct 29th - Supreme Court orders end to all school desegregation "at once"

Nov 1st - Beatles' "Abbey Road," album goes #1 in US & stays #1 for 11 weeks

Nov 10th - "Sesame Street" premieres on PBS TV

Nov 12th - US army announces investigating William Calley for alleged massacre of civilians at Vietnamese village of Me Lai

Nov 14th - Apollo 12 (Conrad/Gordon/Bean) launched for 2nd manned Moon landing

Nov 15th -1st Jackson Five record to enter top 100 (I Want You Back)

Nov 15th - 250,000 peacefully demonstrate in Washington DC against Vietnam War

Nov 15th - Wendy's Hamburgers opens

Nov 19th - Apollo 12's Conrad & Bean become 3rd & 4th humans on Moon

Nov 24th - Apollo 12 returns to Earth

Nov 24th - Lt William L Calley charged with massacre of over 100 civilians in Me Lai Vietnam in March 1968, ordered to stand trial by court martial

Nov 26th - Cream's final concert (Royal Albert Hall)

Nov 29th - The Beatles' "Come Together/Something" reaches #1

Dec 6th - 300,000 attend Altamont California, rock concert feature Rolling Stones where one man is murdered in front of the stage

Dec 13th - Arlo Guthrie releases "Alice's Restaurant"

Dec 17th - USAF closes Project Blue Book, concluding no evidence of extraterrestrial spaceships behind thousands of UFO sightings

Dec 21st - Diana Ross final TV appearance as a Supreme (Ed Sullivan Show)

We are the Big Bang Theory

You know I thought about our lives when we were younger and in junior high and high school and how confusing it was. I had a crush on several girls who I never thought they would even look my way let alone like me so I never spoke to them much. I even had a girl that took to the first athletic banquet and I didn't even kiss her. When I did finally get a girlfriend and I was going steady with her, it seemed to be on again off again. So I have come to the conclusion just so that y’all understand perfectly what I’m talking about, the writers of the Big Bang Theory have stolen our lives and put them on television. Now I’m asking you aren’t you upset that we’re not getting any credit for our confused early years of life?
I’m just saying that’s why I love the Big Bang Theory, because it mirrors a lot of the stupid things that happened in my life when I was a kid and who doesn’t love laughing about all the embarrassing moments that happened in their lives. All kidding aside I would I just got through watching a Big Bang Theory that reminded me so much of my life as a teenager. If you haven’t watched the Big Bang Theory you ought to give it a try. It’s now going to be on Monday nights instead of Thursday night’s so don’t for get to program your DVR’s to record it if you’re watching dancing with the stars.

THE MEMPHIS PARK COMMISSIOn

The Memphis Park Commission was one of the best I had ever seen. Each community had its own park and they were landscaped and built with baseball fields and pavilions with bathrooms.  I have lived in a few cities but none of them seem to have the recreational facilities and parks that Memphis had when I was growing up. We seem to have taken that for granted when we were kids.  Memphis, Tennessee was designed for families and communities.  Even in those days that took quite a bit of doing by our city fathers because some of these lands could have been used for commercial projects, apartment buildings are other moneymaking ventures that the city could have undertaken. I’m sure there were businessmen that had begged and pleaded at times to get these properties but in our day the city held fast and they became parks, nature trails and recreation facilities for our youth and the use of the city elders.  Again, I wish to take my hat off to those early developers of Memphis, thank you for giving us the sense of community that these Parks and recreation facilities gave us thank you.  We even had softball tournaments and various other things that the park commission set up for us in the summertime at these Parks.  I’m sure this took its toll on the city budget but as long as I’ve frequented those parks, they always had park commissioners in the summer and organized activities for the kids.  They even opened up the gymnasium at Airways Junior High School to act as a community center for us in the summertime.

I remember that very well because my parents ran a concession stand out the back of Airways Junior High School. They opened up a small room that opened to the outside, and put tables to block off the entrance to that room from the outside and sold cokes, potato chips, popcorn, candy bars and many other items for at least three or four summers that I can remember for the Airways Athletic Boosters Club.  Now I don’t want you to think that it was only my parents or that I think that it was only my parents because it wasn’t, the organization of the Airways Junior High School Boosters Athletic Association was run by almost every parent that was a member of the PTA as well and it did more for the school than just the athletic teams and the band. It gave the school money that it badly needed to give us the education that we got there.  I think we all took for granted everything that we had at Airways, but you know there were a lot of hardworking people and most of those were our parents that made our community as strong as it was.  They looked after us, they worked hard to see that we had the things that we needed to make our communities a home. They did things that parents don’t do today for all of us.  The selflessness of the parents that were in the PTA at Charjean, Bethel Grove and Cherokee Elementary Schools gave us things that no other schools in Memphis had and it was all because of their love for us and our community that made it so strong. When Airways opened and we all got together as one community that love and hard work that our parents put in for those elementary schools continued with this junior high school and our community.  The strongest leaders of the PTAS from those three communities and schools now banded together to make one of the most wonderful and outstanding experiences of my life and I’m sure years too.  This 7th, 8th and 9th grade school that we had was something that the kids do not experience today because of this new development of something called a middle school. 

Personally, I think it was to get rid of all of the extra costs of having sports and athletics and music and bands and these type things.  Our parents would not have stood for this in our day they would have fought tooth and nail for us to have the things that we had in our junior high school.  My father not only worked extremely hard for the Airways Junior High Boosters Club, but he also worked extremely hard with the coaches’ and the Fairview Junior High School Boosters Club when they parked cars every year for the Midsouth Fair and any other thing that needed a helping hand at Fairview.  Fairview made so much money that the Board of Education tried to take the money away from Fairview and give it to other schools as well. My father and other parents that worked to help park these cars for Fairview Junior High School were extremely angry and went to the Board of Education and fought extremely hard to keep this from happening, however they did not win the fight but did come up with a compromise that allowed the Board of Education to share some of the money with the rest of the Memphis City schools but because of the work of my father and other parents, the largest portion stayed at Fairview Junior High School.  My parents continued to work in both of these junior high schools even after both my brother and I had gone on to high school. They took their personal time to help the children of parents that they did not even know.  I don’t think that many of you know that the people that ran the concession stands and parked the cars and worked so that we could have so many things, were my parents.

  There were others that did this too. There were the Bouchers, the Millers and so many others that it’s hard for me to remember them all, so if your parents were not mentioned, please, by all means, mention them. I do not mean to slight them in any way. I just have no recollections of their names as I’m sure you would not remember my parents, but I am sure that you remember the men and women that ran the concession stands during the ball games and the special events that we had at Airways.  Again, thank you for allowing me to come into your life with the memories of my very little life. Your friend always, Keith House 

I just went to the Channel 13 Facebook page and I saw the old Channel 13 building pictured on it and, of course, it brought back a memory.  Richard and Angelo Lindsey and I went to a wrestling match in that building when we were still probably somewhere around 10 to 12 years old.  All of the original cast of characters, Toejoe Yamamoto, the bag lady, Jackie Fargo and the whole cast of characters were there.  Lance Russell and Dave Brown were hosting the wrestling matches in those days.  This was sometime way before the days of Jerry the King Lawler when they had such names as Haystack Calhoun, Gorgeous George and many others. I laugh sometimes so hard I cried at the antics of the bag lady beating the wrestlers with her purse or bag.  It was good clean fun and I loved it.

It was even more thrilling when they added a broadcast of the live Saturday morning wrestling match.  It was even greater to go inside the studio and see what it took to put on this Saturday show.  I’ve been gone so long, I did not even know that the station had changed its affiliate. It just doesn’t seem right to me for it not to be ABC and it shouldn’t Fox and not to hear that famous voice sounding out the call letters of the station like bells ringing “WHBQ”.

Channel 13 did some very incredible original programming for kids back in our day.  With none of the special effects that they would have access to today they were still great programs, but I guess we just weren’t used to all the special effects that they use today at the television stations so we didn’t know any better.  Some of the special programming was done for Christmas and other shows were just put on in the mornings for kids and I remember they tried to have something special on Saturday mornings for kids, not like the other channels in Memphis.  So I really just want to take my hat off and say a warm thank you from the bottom of my heart for the memories that WHBQ Channel 13 ABC gave me when I was a young man.

I don’t want to belittle Channel 3 WREC, the CBS affiliate in Memphis because they brought us the early movie which introduced me to a wide world of the old movies, some of them classics, some of them great and some of them downright bad.  But through this small station in Memphis, Tennessee, I gained a love for movies that I still have today. Any one that comes into my house today will understand that love because in my study there are more than 150 pictures and autographs hanging on the wall of old movie stars and television stars.  I have autographs from such greats as Dale Evans, Roddy McDowell, Keye Luke, Roland Winters, Annette Funicello, Angela Lansbury, Don Knotts, Sally Field and many many others.

Last but not least Channel Five, WMC-TV Channel 5, the NBC affiliate, this is the channel that introduced me to Walt Disney.  If you said nothing else at all about Channel 5, that would be enough to this proud Memphis boy. You see, Channel Five was probably as involved in our communities as any of the television stations in Memphis. Their sports coverage of local teams in schools was as good as any and their coverage of the Memphis State Tigers was bar none the best.