Duncan Rinaldo (right) and Leo Carillo (left) in The Cisco Kid
I’m trying to kick my memory back into gear. A spotty memory, part of “chemo brain,” is a standard leftover from chemotherapy and radiation. In my own case it’s taking a lot of time to fade away.
Yesterday I was exercising my memory by asking it what TV shows I used to watch with Grandma. I spent a lot of time at her house. I was too young to realize this, but television had only come along later in her life and still seemed a touch miraculous.
When the weather was nice, of course, we were out on the porch–me with my pick-up sticks, Grandma with her Reader’s Digest. When it wasn’t, we resorted to the living room and turned on the TV.
Here are three shows I remember from back them.
*The Cisco Kid (1950-1956). I loved this show! So exotic! Certainly nothing like it in New Jersey. Grandma always tried to please her grandchildren, so we watched The Cisco Kid. I’m not convinced she thought it was so great.
*Arthur Godfrey. Great Caesar’s ghost! Could this guy put you to sleep, or what? Grandma never missed it. He played a big part in early TV history, on air 1949-1959. And it was live TV: sometimes he liked to just throw away the script and wing it.
*Queen for a Day (1956-64). This started out as a radio show in 1949–and who can forget it? Old ladies competed with each other, and whoever could trot out the most abject misery got to be “Queen for a Day.” Really, this was just awful! Grandma lapped it up like chowder.
I want to get my brain back on line. Somewhere out there is Ozias, Prince Enthroned–but where is it? I’ve got the longhand copy, but the finished manuscript is still hiding in the blahsmos.
Come on, memory! No more lolly-gagging!
I remember watching the Cisco Kid. When I was very little, a saw Queen for a Day and thought it was great, but that was just a very small child responding to the kindness on display. What I didnt understand at that age was that it was all for show and it wasn’t so much kindness as it was theater. It could fool me at four years of age, but when I saw a clip of the show years later, I could hardly bear to sit through it.
I wasn’t exposed to much of Arthur Godfrey, but remember him having a very calm and soothing voice. I understand that he was a bit of a character, employing double meanings and subtle humor that flew under the radar of many listeners. In our day, he probably would never have become popular.
My personal standards for entertainment have changed greatly over the years. Most DJs or talk show hosts lose my interest quickly. Somewhere along the line, it occurred to me that everything on radio or TV is scripted and that even the most spontaneous of moments are actually carefully planned. After that realization, my interest dwindled to nearly zero.
I remember one Queen For a Day episode about a poor old lady whose husband kept her locked in the chicken coop. It wasn’t easy to believe–even for me as a little kid.
That does seem far fetched. The victim worship of our time apparently has very deep roots.
My Arthur Godfrey memory is his pushing Geritol to cure tired blood. I always wondered what tired blood was anyway – it was never explained. And my mom never missed “Queen for a Day” which shows you there was not much of a selection during daytime TV back in the 1950’s – mostly games shows.
And soap operas… with dreary organ music.