Golden Memories: TV Programmes Part Two

A few 1960's TV programmes are hard to forget, because they have rightly achieved cult status, and are now regularly repeated. These include The Avengers and The Prisoner. Some have found longevity through film franchises, such as Mission Impossible and Startrek, while others have been half forgotten, then unexpectedly resurrected (e.g. Bewitched and Get Smart).

Like the bulk of the iceberg, though, most old TV shows float somewhere in our latent subconscious mind. For me, these include Mr. Ed (an American comedy about a talking horse), Green Acres (where a city couple relocate to the country) and Adam Adamant (where a suave hero returns from a deep freeze to right wrongs).

We could do with him now.

Other TV gems are only remembered as untitled fragments. I vaguely recall the menacing 'man with the steel chin' who lurked in the shadows until a terrifying appearance in the final episode, the ominous black cloud that threatened destruction over an isolated village, and the guy who stumbled through the door of a Medieval cottage with about twenty arrows in his back, bristling like a porcupine.

But it wasn't all the stuff of nightmares and subsequent personality problems.

Many will remember an old lady trying to beat up Giant Haystacks with a brolly and handbag.