Your Parents’ TV Viewing - Yuck

[Jules]

Back in the olden days when most of us were lucky if we had one tv in the house, the adults ruled the dial. What did your parents watch that you didn’t like. Especially Saturday night, which is what made me think of this.

Off the top of my head,
Lawrence Welk
Red Skelton
Danny Thomas

 

[seadoug]

There was nothing that they watched that I didn't like. I controlled the knob that changed the channels. I watched Dark Shadows on my own every afternoon after school and after dinner we watched Laugh In, the Carol Burnett Show, The Jeffersons and Sandford and Son.

I'm happy I grew up with parents who only watched TV when I did.

 

[January]

my parents watched some adult programs after we had gone to bed - but whether we liked them or not was irelevant since we weren't allowed to watch them.

 

[Bella]

Back in the olden days, the family was usually gathered at my grandma's for dinner on Sunday. After dinner my parents, aunts, and uncles would play cards. My cousins and I would retire to the living room with Grandma to watch Lawrence Welk, which was on right after Mitch Miller. I suffered through both of those shows because when they were over, she'd let us watch Jonny Quest.

My father liked Red Skelton, but his favorites were the Wile E. Coyote/Roadrunner cartoons and The Three Stooges. He thought they were hilarious and would bust a gut laughing. I'd look at him like he was an escaped mental patient, lol. What about me? I hated both shows. I couldn't stand The Three Stooges' hair pulling, slapping, head conks, eye pokes, and other antics—nope, not funny. My father would laugh like he was deranged. I'd often just leave the room because I didn't think that type of “humor” was funny.

Thank Sweet Baby Jesus that I was fortunate to have another television to watch in the upstairs TV room. I liked to watch The Jetsons, The Flintstones, Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color, The Addams Family, The Beverly Hillbillies, Get Smart, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., My Favorite Martian, and The Monkees. That's the short list.

Just kill me now...

 

[Fritz]

Back in the olden days when most of us were lucky if we had one tv in the house, the adults ruled the dial. What did your parents watch that you didn’t like. Especially Saturday night, which is what made me think of this.

Off the top of my head,
Lawrence Welk
Red Skelton
Danny Thomas

i actually liked lawrence welk. i was just little but i always thought the dancing was so lovely. and the music.

 

[Beezer]

Hee Haw

Entertainment for retarded hillbillies.

 

[Naturally]

There were 5 of us in the family, with one TV. It was a black and white set.
I don't recall any disagreements about what to watch.
There were only 3 channels after all. Seldom was there a conflict regarding best channel to watch.
Those who weren't interested with anything on TV, found something else to do. No problem.

In the 70's my parents finally got a color TV. Us kids were no longer living at home.
When we each would visit, we watched whatever they had on. Again, no problem.

 

[fuzzybuddy]

Surprisingly, my taste in TV was what my parents liked. At 11, I used to watch Perry Mason with them. I always laid on the floor, but I couldn't get to close to the TV, or I'd ruin my eyes.

 

[IrishEyes]

There was distinct programming times back then, Pretty G-rated all day and evening then after usually 9pm racier stuff for adults.
I am glad I can watch a movie now when and what hour I wish but I really cringe that young children can do the same.

I didn't like Lawrence Welk either. I think it was him I didn't care for, he seemed so stiff and mechanical or something. I would
have watched Red Skelton anytime as long as Fury, Flicka, Tonka or Black Beauty wasn't playing at the same time.

 

[Tommy]

We didn't watch a lot of evening television when I was young. My father would usually watch the evening news and I recall that he did like Perry Mason. I usually had other things that filled my evenings. Homework, hobbies, &c. I did enjoy the show Sea Hunt.

 

[hearlady]

My mother loved Lawrence Welk.

 

[Pam]

Television didn't play a part of my young life really. I was about 7/8 when my dad bought one for my grandparents (we lived with them) but not long after that we moved to the Middle East and we didn't have a tv there. So most of my childhood and all of my teenage years were without tv... apart from when we came back to England on our annual leave and I'd watch Wagon Train with my grandmother. She loved Ward Bond while I loved Robert Horton.

 

[Aunt Bea]

I grew up with appointment TV where we warmed up the set for specific programs and turned it off as soon as they were finished. Today my TV is on most of the time for background noise.

I suffered through the variety shows like Ed Sullivan.

I always looked forward to Walt Disney’s The Wonderful World of Color, Bonanza, Marlin Perkins Wild Kingdom.

 

[Aunt Bea]

Surprisingly, my taste in TV was what my parents liked. At 11, I used to watch Perry Mason with them. I always laid on the floor, but I couldn't get to close to the TV, or I'd ruin my eyes.

It seems like there must have been a severe furniture shortage in the 50s and 60s, most of us spent our young lives on the floor.

 

[Della]

Back in the olden days when most of us were lucky if we had one tv in the house, the adults ruled the dial. What did your parents watch that you didn’t like. Especially Saturday night, which is what made me think of this.

Off the top of my head,
Lawrence Welk
Red Skelton
Danny Thomas

I grew up with appointment TV where we warmed up the set for specific programs and turned it off as soon as they were finished. Today my TV is on most of the time for background noise.

I suffered through the variety shows like Ed Sullivan.

I always looked forward to Walt Disney’s The Wonderful World of Color, Bonanza, Marlin Perkins Wild Kingdom.

Unlike that spoiled @seadoug our father ruled the TV and he was super critical. For example we couldn't watch "Seahunt" because Lloyd Bridges' eyes were too close together.

Like Aunt Bea we watched what we kids called "Worlt Disney" early on Sunday evenings, always hoping for cartoons. After that we kids usually went upstairs, leaving our parents to watch TV in what was supposed to be the basement "Recreation Room," for the teenagers.

I'm not sure what they watched then, but it wasn't Lawrence Welk (my father had played in a local band in the 1930's and thought Welk was "square.") They thought Red Skelton's humor was unsophisticated and preferred Sid Ceasar, and they never watched the Danny Thomas Show because "that little girl smiled constantly." Marlo Thomas once said she was terribly jealous of her, if she had only known my dad she might have felt better.

Yes, that was what it was like at our house.

 

[JustDave]

It seems like there must have been a severe furniture shortage in the 50s and 60s, most of us spent our young lives on the floor.

They are intently watching a TV that isn't even turned on. Talk about addicted! Or did the photographer think we wouldn't notice?

 

[Rae]

My mother liked the Lawrence Welk show. My father didn't like the Danny Thomas show because he said it made the father look stupid. We (the children) watched what my parents watched. I can't remember all of them. We liked Roy Rogers and Gene Autrey during the daytime TV.

 

[Lewkat]

At least the programs we watched in the late 40s and 50s were not geared toward stirring up all the angst, and anti-social rebellion which is so prevalent today. Yes, some were mindless and downright stupid, but still entertaining after listening to a radio fraught with war news just prior to these new t.v. programs.

Not too many had t.v.s yet, but those who did, shared with entire neighborhoods to watch. When baseball started being televised, my dad and I were in our glory. While we were close enough to several major league stadiums and had a box at Yankee Stadium, sometimes it was a pleasure to just kick back in our family room and watch it on that little screen.

 

[Jules]

Just kill me now...

Oh, Mitch. That may have been worse than Lawrence.

but I couldn't get to close to the TV, or I'd ruin my eyes.

Hmm, maybe it did.

I did like Perry Mason. As I recall it was Saturday night. Maybe Lawrence was Sunday.

 

[Imogene]

I enjoyed nearly everything my parents watched.

Dad really liked the old spy series. I led three lives.
Dad also couldn’t go to bed without watching the 6 o’clock news led by that old female journalist, Dorothy Fuldheim in Cleveland, Ohio. That woman was a genius and well ahead of her time in women’s rights. Dad made me sit and watch the news so I would learn something worthwhile lol lol.

Mom & I really liked our Miss Brooks.
Then there was the Ed Sullivan show on Sunday night. It is a sacrilege to not have liked that show.

Our television was a huge floor model Raytheon with a huge round screen. I’m sure dad paid for that for a very long time on our meager income from the dairy farm.

 

[Jules]

Mom & I really liked our Miss Brooks.
Then there was the Ed Sullivan show on Sunday night. It is a sacrilege to not have liked that show.

I loved Miss Brooks. Wonder what I’d think now.
Ed had some guests that I really, really wanted to see. That meant enduring some I didn’t.

 

[HoneyNut]

Off the top of my head,
Lawrence Welk
Red Skelton
Danny Thomas

I don't have an actual memory of watching Lawrence Welk but since my gut reaction is 'Ugh!' I'm guessing my parents watched it. I do remember that my dad like Red Skelton, and I have very vague memories of that guy being a comedian?

Danny Thomas sounds familiar, but again, no actual memory seems to exist.

I don't know if they ever watched Ed Sullivan, but I'm sure they didn't watch it the night the Beatles were on, because everyone in elementary school was talking about the Beatles the next day and I was disappointed that I hadn't seen it and had no idea what they were.

 

[Della]

Dad really liked the old spy series. I led three lives.

We had to watch that because my father was a dead ringer for Richard Carlson and the following day everyone he knew in town would be saying, "Saw you on TV last night!"

 

[hollydolly]

Whn I was a kid we had no option but to watch what my parents were watching, specifically my father. We kids were never allowed to see children tv shows...or turn the tv on unless father wanted it on.

If my father was home he'd be watching American Cowboy shows, The Virginiaan, High Chaperal.. Casey Jones.. etc..... and sports...mainly wrestling or snooker...

My mother never watched Brtish soaps, thought they were all terrible rubbish... but she was glued to shows like Dr Kildare, BenCasey, Peyton Place....

This of course in the days when we only ever watched TV in the evenings or on Saturday afternoons...

 

[Paladin1950]

Anything with country music. I still think that Hee Haw, was the dumbest and worst show in TV history. I hated watching those brain dead hillbillies like Junior Samples. Who the hell thought of this disaster of a program?