WXIX and Our First Color TV

WXIX TV, Channel 19, went on the air as Cincinnati's first commercial UHF station in August of 1968 with a plate full of colorful attractions that included Larry Smith and His Puppets, George Reeves as Superman, Hanna-Barbera cartoons, early Anime, and the area's first broadcast of the Marvel Superheroes cartoons from 2 years earlier. Not long afterwards came the Adam West BATMAN, fresh off the network in its first syndicated run! My parents decided that this colorful programming was a good time to get our first ever color set! Note, however, the distinctive black and white ads they used to offer up their early shows.

TV's Shaft

Been binge watching the 1974 TV mystery movie series of SHAFT lately. In contrast to the version we met in the 3 R-rated films just prior to it, this guy doesn't operate out of Harlem at all but rather what appears to be Los Angeles. He's still black but he's decidedly middle class here, with middle class office and middle class clients as well as an upscale taste in suits and ties as opposed to his standard movie leathers. That said, these are quite entertaining mysteries with some fairly big name guest stars, all held together but the amazingly charismatic Ricard Roundtree.

Detective School

It didn't last long but I always enjoyed this 1979 sitcom. Technically it wasn't a spinoff from BARNEY MILLER but it WAS James Gregory's recurring role on that show that got him this one as a similar--if more likable--character. 

Gregory plays a private eye whose business is slow so he opens the title detective school. The motley crew of students accidentally solves a crime and so begins to work on solving more week after week. 

The cast included LaWanda Page from SANFORD AND SON, Melinda Naud from OPERATION: PETTICOAT, Randy Mantooth from EMERGENCY, writer/comedian Pat Proft,  FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH's Taylor Negron (himself later a fan of my high school journal blogs!), and Douglas Fowley, the great old school character actor from SINGIN' IN THE RAIN and TV's PISTOLS AND PETTICOATS. Fowley's character was named "Robert Redford."