This concludes our broadcast day, thank you and good night.

[CheezeFlixz]

How many of you folks remember this? This is from B.C. ... yep before cable. Another thread was talking about marathon movies and I got to thinking (dangerous I know) about the old Friday and Saturday night movie shows were they showed old B movies until about 1 or 2 in the morning and then it was off the air and you heard the National Anthem the a test tone with a test pattern for a while then snow.

I use to watch "Tales from the Tomb" on Channel 25 they had this guy dress as a ape that got out of a pine coffin and introduced the movie against some cheap cardboard backdrop with cardboard tomb stones, it was always something like "The Brain that Wouldn't Die!" or "The Killer Shrews" something cheap and cheesy.  We're talking *cough* 1968 or 69 to about 1975 or 6 *cough* The station was right behind my house so we (other kids and I) would go over there an watch the movies in the station and sometimes they'd let us on the air, this is back in the day when elementary kids could be out of doors after dark even as late as midnight. I had a couple of the cardboard tomb stones in my room growing up as part of real cinema history I felt at the time, a gift from the ape host of the show. Who know what happened to them.

So anyway did you have any home grown shows like that growing up?

I think those days are long gone now, man what a loss.

(Man kids don't even have to wait until Saturday morning anymore to watch cartoons.)

[Susan]

I admit i have a bit of nostalgia for those days, it was something you could count on. Not mindless infomercials at all hours and crap tv. A few images of fighter jets, amber waves of grain and then snow. Or you got the rainbow screen with the high pitch noise.

And once in awhile, yes folks, i managed to pick up audio on some of those channels for god knows what. But i seem to have this recollection that if you tuned the UHF just right you could get something, maybe it was people talking on a CB i don't remember.

Btw, saturday morning cartoons? That's a joke. There's not all that many, mostly Bratz and that's about it. I remember saturday morning cartoons went on until around 11am close to noon. You could count on them. You waited all damn week for them because i spent the rest of the week watching INcredible Hulk, Fantasy Island, Real People, That's incredible, dance fever..omg i'm giving away my age


nobody uses public access tv here. city counsil meetings and that's it. Back in the day people bought time on it or something and had shows. I know in austin they have lots of local programming. But i always had a fantasy of buying public access time during the olympics or award shows with MY commentary and drawings on the screen...

[Shadow]

Real People, That's incredible,

I remember those. As a kid I thought (the late) Skip Stephenson was cool and Sarah Purcell was hot. Hey, I was a kid. I also recall how the ghost and spooky segments on That's Incredible scared me.

Growing up in the San Francisco bay area, I'd watch Creature Features every Friday and Saturday nights. They always showed a double feature and many times I would be too tired to stay up until the second movie was over. However, on those times that I did, I remember the channel signing off for the day and wishing that there was another horror movie on somewhere to watch. I'd flip through the channels and every now and then I'd luck out and another station would have some old monster movie on.

[CheezeFlixz]

Well I'll show my age, I watched, many of these when they first aired ... Laugh-in, Love American Style, Gilligan's Island, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Dark Shadows, Carol Burnette Show, Sonny and Cher, Hee Haw, Original Wild Kingdom,  The Ed Sullivan Show, American Bandstand, Lost in Space, Land of the Lost, My Three Sons, The Munsters, Get Smart, The Adams Family, Wonderful World of Disney, I Dream of Jeannie (Man she was HOT!) and yes the original Star Trek.

Now I really feel old .... 

[KYGOTC]

Oh, YEA, I VIVIDLY remember these days...! Yea, i have all sorts of memories and the whatnot. Remember that one time where that cool thing happened? ........CUZ I DONT!  *SOB* CURSE YOU MOTHER for having NOT been born EARLY enough to be able to birth me in those BLESSED times!!! CUUUUURRRRSSE YOOOOOOUUUU!!!!

[RCMerchant]

Oh, YEA, I VIVIDLY remember these days...! Yea, i have all sorts of memories and the whatnot. Remember that one time where that cool thing happened? ........CUZ I DONT!  *SOB* CURSE YOU MOTHER for having NOT been born EARLY enough to be able to birth me in those BLESSED times!!! CUUUUURRRRSSE YOOOOOOUUUU!!!!

Hmmm. You might reconsider...ABC,NBC and CBS were the ONLY 3 large broadcast channels.And a LOT of it was crap! Looking back now it's nostalgia...but at the time,it was mindless garbage.UHF played reruns of even older crap. Most of the movies that got continued rotatation we're junk,and cut up with commercials.Watching a widescreen movie was odd,because the ends of the picture couldn't fit onto the screen...as a result,Clint Eastwood or Lee Van Cleffs eyes would be half out of view...and yo'ud get a close up of their nose. Or they would "streach" the image-like a funhouse mirror to fit the screen. I saw every episode of GILLIGAN'S ISLAND a billion times...memorized every Bugs Bunny cartoon,and Sunday afternoons would be golf,or golf or...tennis.
  Of course-you could watch boxing...FREE! PBS ran old silent movies alot-I saw NOSFERATU,DR.MABUSE,CALIGARI and many more silent classics during the PBS pledge drives. Jimmy Cagney and Humphrey Bogart would play on the channel 13 Sunday Mystery Movie  at 6;30 in the morning! Channel 28 outta Southbend Indiana had Double Creature Feature on Saterday Nights,and you could switch to ch.41 outta Kalamazoo to check out Shock Theater (which had some guy dressed up like a witch) at the same time.
Every morning before school was CHANNEL 3 CLUBHOUSE,which had local kids in K-Zoo on,and they played RUFF and READY cartoons. And Channel 13 I got to watch Rem Walt and the Green Valley Boys play bluegrass on the local(from Decauter) GREEN VALLEY JAMBOREE. 
 But you also had endless junk like the CAPTAIN and TENNILE SHOW,APPLE'S WAY,the BRADY BUNCH,the MAC DAVIS SHOW,..(.blahblah...dooders off to sleep...like an old fart...)

[Susan]

RC - but it was a different kind of crap tv.

That's how i started watching b-movies like Squirm and frankly i remember a lot of movies running on the weekend liked that, and even older tv shows that they used to rerun. Good luck finding reruns on the main networks of any show prior to 1980. Because there wasn't a whole lot of stations to compete with the networks really pushed out a lot of popular programming, now half the shows i often wonder after they've been on the air for 5 years "who is watching this crap?"

I remember they had, mostly in the summer, special movie programming like the 3-D features where you had to go out and buy your special glasses. I will never forget the time i was so psyched to watch Alligator and my brother went outside and shut the power down to the house (my folks were out). I was happy when we finally got Cable and i was able to watch Critters and Troll on HBO. No more fine tuning with that tv knob and antenna. And of course back then i remember HBO had more balls to show older stuff, when i had it a few years ago they kept rerunning the same damn movies and didn't show anything older or quality, just some obscure action movie nobody ever saw from 1994.

[RCMerchant]

That's true....where else could you play with the coat hanger ( we use it for a UHF antenna) and tune in HOPALONG CASSIDY on ch.46 on Sundays,or watch old Harold Llyod movies and shorts in the early mornings on ch.3 before the ABC station took the airwaves at night after the local news? And your right about the movies...the first time I saw DRACULA vs. FRANKENSTEIN, FRANKENSTEIN's BLOODY TERROR and Santo's movies were on ch.16 on Saterday afternoons,when a ballgame ended too early,or was cancelled for some reason or another. And the Little Rascals were much more fun on Saterday mornings than on some oddball uhf channel than MTV garbage. And as close as you got to "too much sex and violence" was the reruns of the UNTOUCHABLES,DRAGNET,HIGHWAY PATROL and the  "jiggle" shows-like CHARLIE'S ANGELS,and WONDER WOMAN.

 When SHOWTIME and MTV first came on the air...I had just got my first apartment. I saw HUMANOIDS of the DEEP, TOURIST TRAP,and cool SHOWTIME 'after hours' movies like SWEET SUGAR, H.O.T.S, LUNCHWAGON GIRLS, and cut up EMMANUALLE movies! Wow! Boobies! On TV!!!! And MTV showed stuff like the Stray Cats, Thomas Dolby, Twisted Sister and Ratt. Fox TV didn't have too much 'original' programming on when it first started in the mid-80's-I believe it had 21 JUMP ST.(with Johnny Depp!),the TRACI ULLMAN SHOW (with SIMPSON's shorts included!!!) and aired off about 9:00,and they would show old movies from the local station,like HITLER-DEAD or ALIVE and the MASK (in 3-D),where you would have to pick up your 3-d glasses at the Tastee Freeze in Paw Paw (with a purchase of a burger or sundae,of course!)

[CheezeFlixz]

Ahh the 1960's morning shows before school  .... Romper Room, Captain Kangaroo, Underdog and Mighty Mouse perhaps those were the days ... then came along the first home satellite disc.
I remember when we finally got a satellite in the mid 70's I was a teenager by this time, you know the satellite I speak of, the big ol 8 to 10 foot disc and NOTHING was scrambled you might have to monkey around moving the disc back and forth with the motor and tuner and you could pick up anything in the sky, even the early adult channels like spiceTV and others.

But yeah early TV had it's charm, sticking a coat-hanger on it with a big aluminum sail to try to get a little better signal, Then years later came to rotary antenna where some one would take tape or a marker an mark the dial to where you could pick up certain stations.   

And while we have 100's a channels of crap to choose from now, I guess the "good ol day" had there charm as it was local, you knew the station, you might even have known the people or their family that worked there, you could see the tower and the flashing red lights from your house like a shining beckon of entertainment mecca just over there, you may have even got to go to the station and be on the air.

I guess it's that sense of community that we've lost on a local level and traded either up or down for that larger community of the internet. Some things were better and some not, it's hard to say which. The quaint simplicities of a less complex time are seemingly gone forever and I'm not so sure that's a good thing, perhaps it's my age, perhaps it's the rose colored rear view mirror,  perhaps it's the truth.

Oh well now I'm depressed ....

[RCMerchant]

 Cheer up!
 It's Saterday morning at the Way Back Machine!

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM9Sf_jfrc0

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOZWYAMCDUU

[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3zr0h6vv7w

[Allhallowsday]

CHEEZEE, I remember all of those shows when first on, except we didn't watch "Gilligan's Island" until it was in reruns.  My earliest TV memory is probably "The Patty Duke Show..."   Used to like "Land Of The Giants" and "Time Tunnel" too...

Anybody remember "Winkydink And You" which was on into the mid 1960s in the early morning? 

I think I was one of those kids who drew right on the TV with a crayon--lacking my "magic screen..."

[CheezeFlixz]

Talk about a blast from the past, I was cleaning out the shop this weekend, trying to get rid of to much stuff and I opened a time capsule. It was a old box that had been stored away and forgotten and it had all kind of goofy stuff in it, but the one thing that caught my eye was a jar of bottle caps that had the cork seal that had been scrapped off to reveal the CA$H prize under it, this was something RC cola use to do, they would have 5¢, 10¢, 25¢, 50¢, and if you were very lucky you'd get a $1. You could take them to the store and cash them in for real money. Non of this annoying ass 16 digit code crap to enter on some website only after you give them a blood sample in addition to your life history for their demographics. Just scrap it off and win or lose .. nothing to answer or mail in you knew right then and there if you won or loss.

Here's a pix online of what cork lined caps looked like for you young whipper-snapper that's never seen them.

[Raffine]

This thread really takes me back. Cheez, what a great experience: getting to visit the local station as they aired the late movie. The thing I remember about those cork-lined caps is you were always certain to scrape your fingers right above the nails trying to pick that cork out. It hurt almost as much as stepping on one of those soda can pop-tops with your bare feet. Mothers lead  us to believe every pop-top was crawling with Tetanus and our jaws would lock immediately if we didn't get doused in iodine or Bactine.

The Saturday nights my parents would announce we were 'eating out' always made me edgy. I remember wanting to be near a television on Saturday night by 9:00, because that's when The Carol Burnett Show began.  Then thirty looong minutes of local news, and then it was time for 'Shock Theater'!  I swear the only Universal horror films they had were SON OF FRANKENSTEIN and FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN. Most of the movies were ultra-low budget stuff like THE GIANT GILA MONSTER and EARTH VS. THE SPIDER, but I'd rather had droped dead than miss a second. Our local 'Shock Theater' was on the NBC affiliate station and died the night "Saturday Night Live" premiered.

A couple of our local stations ended their broadcast day with the Air Force poem 'High Flight' instead of The National Anthem: 

HIGH FLIGH
By John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the clouds on laughter- silvered wings.
   
Sunward I've climbed and joined the tumbling mirth of sun-split
clouds-
And done a hundred things you have not dreamed of-
Wheeled and soared and swung high into the sunlit silence.
Hov'ring there, I've chased the shouting winds along and
Flung my eager craft through the footless halls of air.

Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I've topped the wing-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.

And, while with silent lifting mind
I've trod the untrespassed sanctity of space
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

Fade to snow. Time for bed.

[Allhallowsday]

Cheer up!
 It's Saterday morning at the Way Back Machine!

It sure is!  Enjoyed those clips very much and remember most of those shows and some of those promos!  However, the last one for ABC was a lot of shows that then, I thought I was too old for and didn't watch (except for "THE FUNKY PHANTOM" had forgotten about that one!)  Thanks for the memory!   

Talk about a blast from the past...Here's a pix online of what cork lined caps looked like for you young whipper-snapper that's never seen them.

Haven't given a thought to a cork lined cap in decades.  I remember peeling them out with your nail, as Raffine advises, sometimes painfully! 

I remember the "High Flight" poem, maybe even used as late night closer (I stayed up watching Horror movies enough) but the days of a TV station actually ceasing their broadcast day with a poem, a song, and a test pattern seem positively quaint. 

One scary idea to me is that in 20 or 30 years if I'm lucky enough to still be around, will I look back at this time and think these were "good old days?"   

[Flangepart]

This thread really takes me back. Cheez, what a great experience: getting to visit the local station as they aired the late movie. The thing I remember about those cork-lined caps is you were always certain to scrape your fingers right above the nails trying to pick that cork out. It hurt almost as much as stepping on one of those soda can pop-tops with your bare feet. Mothers lead  us to believe every pop-top was crawling with Tetanus and our jaws would lock immediately if we didn't get doused in iodine or Bactine.

The Saturday nights my parents would announce we were 'eating out' always made me edgy. I remember wanting to be near a television on Saturday night by 9:00, because that's when The Carol Burnett Show began.  Then thirty looong minutes of local news, and then it was time for 'Shock Theater'!  I swear the only Universal horror films they had were SON OF FRANKENSTEIN and FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN. Most of the movies were ultra-low budget stuff like THE GIANT GILA MONSTER and EARTH VS. THE SPIDER, but I'd rather had droped dead than miss a second. Our local 'Shock Theater' was on the NBC affiliate station and died the night "Saturday Night Live" premiered.

A couple of our local stations ended their broadcast day with the Air Force poem 'High Flight' instead of The National Anthem: 

HIGH FLIGH
By John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the clouds on laughter- silvered wings.
   
Sunward I've climbed and joined the tumbling mirth of sun-split
clouds-
And done a hundred things you have not dreamed of-
Wheeled and soared and swung high into the sunlit silence.
Hov'ring there, I've chased the shouting winds along and
Flung my eager craft through the footless halls of air.

Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I've topped the wing-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.

And, while with silent lifting mind
I've trod the untrespassed sanctity of space
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

Fade to snow. Time for bed.

Aw,yeah. McGee was a Spitfire pilot killed in the Battle of Britin. John Denver once set it to music for a special with an avation theme, and i've never found a copy of that song. Aw,well...

I remember the local shows. Fritz the Niteowl is still going on radio. Man knows his jazz. I used to stay up late to catch Toho films after the end of the Jerry Beck show.
(Sigh) I miss local TV.