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50th Anniversary Viewing
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Adam-12
"North Hollywood Division"
Originally aired January 22, 1974
Wiki said:
Reed is assigned to write an article about Malloy for the LAPD Beat magazine, but is having trouble with the content. Calls include a gas station "robbery", a domestic dispute involving a barking poodle, a woman who tries to get her husband arrested, and a pursuit with a liquor store robber that ends with the suspect barricading himself in a garage.
We see Mac asking an exhausted Reed if he's gotten info about Pete that Public Affairs is asking about. On patrol, Jim explains that he volunteered to write a profile of Pete for
LAPD Beat. The officers happen upon what appear to be gun-firing robbers driving out of a gas station and pursue. They eventually run the car down and make the driver, Daniel Wilson (James Rosin), get out and spread out on the ground. Wilson explains that the shots they heard were the gas station attendant firing at him. They cuff Wilson and take him back to the gas station, where they question the attendant (Johnny Haymer), who says that he fired at the customer for driving off with a dollar's worth of gas that he didn't pay for. The attendant is informed that he'll be charged for ADW...and that if he were a better shot, it could have been murder. Wilson explains to the officers that he lost all his money in a poker game and needed gas to get home.
Afterward Jim further informs Pete that the article is for his tenth anniversary on the force. I'm pretty sure he was supposed to have been an eight-year veteran back in the first episode, but the show was playing pretty fast and loose with the passage of time in its first couple of years at least...particularly where Reed's probationary period was concerned. Jim asks for verification regarding their next call, to investigate a possible lion in a backyard.
Dispatcher: One-Adam-Twelve, roger. Lion. Lincoln-Ida-Ocean-Nora.
The officers are met by a Sheila Turman (Virginia Vincent), whose poodle, Herbie, is frightened by the roaring of a lion coming from the backyard of her neighbor, Abner Hempel (Vic Perrin). It turns out that he's only been playing a recording--enhanced by some remote tree limb shaking--to shut the poodle up...but he admits that the roaring has been driving him just as crazy as the barking. The officers encourage him to try making friends with Herbie, so he approaches Turman, who's impressed at his apparently having tamed a lion, and the two start to hit it off...without Hempel or the officers letting her in on the truth.
Jim's asking Pete about his background when Pete gets out to help what appears to be an attractive young lady having car trouble, but it turns out she was just helping a less attractive lady having car trouble. The officers are then assigned to a 415 domestic dispute between a married couple, Joe and Helen Dugan (William Campbell doing the Mark VII rounds with Chanin Hale). Helen wants the officers to take Joe away because he's been a jobless gambler for most of the twelve years they've been married. When they explain that this is a matter for lawyers and they have no cause to arrest him, she opens a drawer to reveal bags full of narcotics. The officers arrest both of them for possession, and Mrs. Dugan protests at being informed that their unseen children will be placed in protective custody.
Mrs. Dugan: You can't do that to my kids!
Malloy: We didn't, Mrs. Dugan, you did.
Back on patrol, Jim's threatening to turn over the article to Wells if Pete isn't more cooperative when a car speeds through an intersection in front of the unit and the officers pursue. They're informed during the chase that the vehicle is wanted in connection with a 211 at a liquor store. When the car is blocked in an alley and the driver gets out to continue on foot, Malloy jumps out of the car for a change to pursue him, giving Reed a rare but brief opportunity to drive. Jim catches up with Pete outside of a residential garage that the armed suspect has holed himself up in. When a woman drives up in a station wagon (Gina Alvarado, I presume) and informs Reed that it's her house, Jim asks to use the garage door opener clipped to her visor. The officers take up positions beside the garage and Reed hits the button, catching the robber unprepared.
In the coda, Pete informs Jim in the locker room that the magazine has decided to drop the profile in favor of a article about a new police station being built.
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Hawaii Five-O
"Death with Father"
Originally aired January 22, 1974
Wiki said:
A retired narcotics agent's (Andrew Duggan) son (Peter Strauss) is suspected of manufacturing heroin. This was the first episode to be directed by Jack Lord.
A gas-masked figure is doing the manufacturing with the help of an assistant named Ernie Fallon (Richard Rivera) at that observation/transmitter station location or whatever it is that seems to get used a lot when Five-O and HPD surround the place. Armed guards outside open fire and are taken out by HPD snipers; then Fallon is wounded trying to escape, while the chemist gets away in a pickup truck. Questioned in the hospital, Fallon identifies the chemist as Tom Morgan (Strauss)...whom McGarrett knows as the son of Cliff Morgan (Duggan). Steve goes to see Cliff on his drink machine, where Morgan expresses his resentment at having been kicked off the force just ahead of retirement for not being on board with suspects having rights. Morgan can't believe that his son, a four-year vet and chemistry student, is involved, but proceeds to roughly search Tom before taking him to McGarrett's office. Tom has a story about having been approached for illicit reasons by Fallon a few months prior; and McGarrett's suspicions are raised on the dubious basis that Tom identifies Fallon from a mugshot photo of him sporting a thick mustache that he's been confirmed not to have had at the time.
Tom receives a visit from his girlfriend, Janice Wu (Luella Costello), who's upset at what she's figured he's involved in from the story in the paper. He strongarms her to support his alibi at having been working the school chem lab at the time of the bust, literally smacking her. (Apple, tree.) She's later found OD'ed on 'ludes in her apartment by Danno and dies in the ambulance. Meanwhile, a hitman disguised as hospital staff gives Fallon a fatal shot with what appears to be the Five-O Special--we only get a good look at the silencer. And Ben tails Tom to photograph him from afar having a meeting with a pair of shady figures (Kwan Hi Lim and Seth Sakai), who insist that Tom set up another factory because they've got more raw stock that needs processing--that end of things being so rare on the islands that Five-O finds it intriguing. Tom's subsequently identified at having bought items of interest at a junkyard.
Steve and Danno bring the photos to Cliff's place (For a guy bellyaching about not getting full pension, he doesn't seem to be living worse for the wear.) and inform him that the men Tom's meeting have been identified as top Asian dealers Lee Song and Luu Se Ngu. Cliff continues to defend his son, but Steve argues that the best thing for Tom's own safety would be to get him behind bars. Cliff then confronts Tom, roughing him up again. Tom explains how he had a little speed lab going when the gangsters found and conscripted him; and expresses his issues with his father, which drove him to a lack of concern for his own life in 'Nam, and then caused him to develop a wish to hurt his father. Cliff offers to destroy the evidence against Tom and get him out of the country, and Tom accepts. Cliff subsequently phones in a diversionary errand for Phil Tallman (Bernard Ching), the officer manning the HPD property room; breaks in and steals the $5 million worth of smack in the evidence locker; then makes it look like the locker was busted into more sloppily than it was and slips out past the returning Tallman.
McGarrett sniffs out that it was Cliff's work and confronts him about it, sharing that Five-O has determined--via forensic evidence apparently at the old processing site--the area in which Tom has set up a new lab in a cabin. Persuaded to cooperate for Tom's safety, Cliff is wired with a bug and calls Song to offer him his junk back in exchange for being taken to see his son where he's working. In the cabin, Cliff reveals that he's brought $1 million worth of the goods, and will send the rest annually over four years as insurance for Tom's safety. When Song has taken the bag, Five-O and HPD move in and surround the place, successfully calling for the armed guards outside and then the drug lords to surrender. The Morgans linger behind in the cabin, Tom expressing his disappointment that his father didn't go through with breaking the law for him while fiddling with some gas valves that he'd just been warning his new assistant about. Cliff's trying to convince his son otherwise when Tom pulls out and uses an igniter, sending the lab up in a fireball.
Also in the guest list is Not That George Kennedy as a Lt. Parish, though I didn't catch which character that was. Possibly a plainclothes cop that McGarrett talks to at the evidence locker.
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The Brady Bunch
"Welcome Aboard"
Originally aired January 25, 1974
Wiki said:
Carol's nephew, Oliver (Robbie Rist), comes to live with the Bradys while his parents are in South America. He nearly wears out his welcome when he is involved in a series of minor accidents in his eagerness to help out.
When Mike comes home, Carol informs him that there's going to be an addition to the family--deliberately letting Mike get the wrong idea, but before she explains, Bobby and Cindy overhear and the fake news spreads through the household. The kids are filled in before Oliver arrives and seem eager to make him feel like part of the family. But in his own eagerness to contribute, Oliver accidentally pounds ketchup onto Greg's shirt; causes Bobby to break some planters in a tug of war; ruins Carol's knitting; and causes a couple of other mishaps that are heard about but not shown. He also snores, to Peter and Bobby's annoyance. Oliver overhears as the younger kids try to convince Greg and Marcia that they've been stuck with a jinx.
Carol learns of this when she finds that Oliver's moved into the Tiger Memorial Doghouse. She and Mike give Oliver an encouraging talking-to, and the younger four of the other kids a corrective one. The others try to make him feel more included in activities, but in a basketball game with the other boys he makes a toss that causes multiple mishaps, ending with breaking a building model of Mike's inside the house.
Still thinking that he's a jinx, Oliver doesn't want to come on a weekend tour of a movie studio, but Carol coaxes everyone to say that they won't go if he doesn't. At the studio, the tour manager, Jim Douglas (John Nolan), informs the Bradys that the ninth member of their party--which is Oliver because Alice is there but Mike isn't--is the studio's one millionth customer, winning them the prize of appearing as extras in a Marathon Studio movie. The film in question is described as a "take-off" of an old-time silent movie, so the Brady party is dressed in period costumes to react as onlookers at a pie fight involving a couple of truck drivers who've had a accident and a keystone cop (Dick Winslow, Ralph Montgomery, and Snag Werris). When Alice becomes collateral damage, it leads to an improvised pie fight between the Bradys. An untouched Oliver is enjoying the spectacle when Carol welcomes him to the family by leading the others to gang up on him...and the director (Judd Laurance) gets some, too.
In the coda, Oliver informs Alice that he plans to put a lizard in Bobby's bed for making Oliver do his chores.
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Emergency!
"How Green Was My Thumb?"
Originally aired January 26, 1974
Wiki and Frndly said:
Roy takes care of a young woman's (Leigh Christian) plants while she is hospitalized. Doctors remove an explosive grenade lodged in a man's abdomen and battle with religious fanatics who refuse treatment for their daughter.
Unfortunately, my recording of this one is faulty, so I'll have to watch for another airing and come back to it when I can.
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The Mary Tyler Moore Show
"Best of Enemies"
Originally aired January 26, 1974
Wiki said:
Mary and Rhoda's friendship takes serious damage when Rhoda reveals a secret about Mary's past to the office.
Seems like Rhoda's getting involved with Mary's work life a little too much lately. She's just itching to be sent packing back to New York, isn't she? Rhoda comes into the newsroom to return the keys to Mary's car, starts gabbing about something that happened to her at work, and it leads to her dropping a reference to how Mary lied on her job application for WJM--Jesus, talk about no common sense! It turns out that Mary only went to college for two years and isn't a graduate as she'd claimed...and Rhoda presses the issue, trying to prove that it's not a big deal, which brings the matter to Lou's attention. The reveal only turns out to be worth a little ribbing from the newsroom staff, but Mary expresses how upset she is to Rhoda not just for sharing it, but for her insensitivity in the matter. Murray ends up driving Mary home and she frets about whether she was wrong. The next day she apologizes to her coworkers for the scene she was a part of, and Lou takes Mary into his office to explain that he hired her for reasons other than what was on her application (including saying "excuse me" when she bumped into an unoccupied desk).
After Mary and Rhoda have been avoiding each other for days, Georgette drops by Mary's prior to going up to Rhoda's for dinner, and expresses her desire to do something to get the two of them to make up. This continues up at Rhoda's (which is shown in an establishing shot to be in an attic-level tower beside and above Mary's place, whether or not it would actually fit there), where Georgette explains how Mary and Rhoda's friendship is like Pittsburgh, where the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers meet to form the Ohio. When Mary has Lou over for dinner, he tries to break her out of her funk by telling a lame joke about Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs; and ends up having to uncomfortably comfort Mary while she's on the verge of tears about how others make light of her problems. Later Mary bumps into Rhoda in the stairway, and after Mary learns that a "hello" Georgette delivered after dinner was supposed to be from Rhoda, they make small talk about the garbage that they're each taking out...and Rhoda confesses that the bag she's carrying isn't really garbage, she was just using it as an excuse to run into Mary and to back out if things went bad. They end up hugging, making up, and going out for dinner.
After they return to Mary's, Ted drops in and sits the two of them down to chastise them into mending fences on Georgette's behalf, so they pretend to make up in front of him.
Ted (chuckling): I feel a little like Kissinger here...!
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The Bob Newhart Show
"Clink Shrink"
Originally aired January 26, 1974
Wiki said:
Bob gets a suspiciously expensive gift from a client (Henry Winkler) who is an ex-convict.
Isn't that cute? He was looking for work.
Bob's coming home after a rough Monday to settle down in front of the game when Emily informs him that he got a call from Joliet Prison. The official in charge of their rehabilitation program wants him to work with parolees--the catch being that it would be on Monday nights. Then Howard bursts in (wearing his usual uniform) because his apartment has been completely cleaned out. Would robbers really take every piece of furniture in the place--even a waterbed, which would have to be drained? Bob's reassuring Emily that their own lock is good enough when Howard bursts back in through it. At the office, everyone assumes that a tough-looking customer (Len Lesser) is Bob's first parolee, Miles Lascoe...but he's a Mr. Schwab, who's looking to get a nose job from one of the other doctors. When the real Lascoe arrives (
Ayyyyy!), he proves to be much more mild-mannered and respectable-looking. (
Whoa!)
Bob learns that Lascoe, who chats casually about life in the stir, is a two-time armed robber. When it comes up that Bob's concerned about missing football games on Mondays, Miles recommends that he get a videotape machine. Miles subsequently visits the Hartleys bearing a conspicuous gift for Bob--a videotape machine! (I didn't even know these were a thing in the '70s.) Bob's under the impression that it's hot, but Mile insists that he bought it. Bob brings the machine to their next session with the intention of returning it, and finds Miles cuffed to his parole officer, Mr. Coolidge (Russ Grieve). Miles explains that when he contacted some guys he knew to find out if they're the ones who robbed Howard's apartment, he got caught up in serving as the getaway driver for another bank robbery. He explains that he's like Fred Astaire in that he's gotta steal, because he can't dance.
In the coda, Bob's kept the machine, and Howard finds that his stuff has been returned by Lascoe's friends, despite his having already replaced it.
It turns out that Henry had previously guested in one of the MTMs that got skipped this season, "The Dinner Party" (Nov. 17, 1973).
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I didn't really mean it to sound that way. It's a good song, just not one of their blockbusters.
I'll probably get it, but I'm still not feeling it for getting the album.
My main memory of Sha Na Na is their syndicated half-hour TV show, which is probably on the air in the time frame we're doing now. I didn't go out of my way to watch it, but I remember my Mother having it on the little TV in the kitchen while we were eating or doing the dishes or whatever.
'77. It was on regularly in my house.
I also did a quick browse and ran into the same problem, although "Who'll Stop The Rain" seems to fall into that category.
Interesting...I didn't know that, but the reference is pretty brief.
