Subj: Sky King

NVAA - Sky King (of the 1950s) flies again (website address)

Hello aero fans: Here are 64 - 1/2 hour TV episodes of "Sky King" to watch.

Click on any one of these episodes & be prepared to be transformed back to the early 1950s. Some may be too young to remember these, for the rest of you, it's a time capsule. Get out your Sky King Secret Signalscope and watch!

(They change airplanes at about episode 13, from a Cessna T-50 Bamboo Bomber to a Cessna 320 - "Skynight." Both were named "Songbird".)

http://www.americanflyers.net/entertainment/skyking.asp

The Radio Show -

The radio show, based on a radio story by Roy Winsor, was the brainchild of Robert Morris Burtt and Wilfred Gibbs Moore, who also created Captain Midnight, first aired in 1946. Several actors played the part of Sky, including Earl Nightingale and John Reed King.

Like many radio shows of the day there were many "radio premiums" offered to listeners. On November 2, 1947 in the episode titled "Mountain Detour" the Sky King Secret Signalscope was used. Listeners were advised to get their own for only 15 cents and the inner seal from a jar of Peter Pan Peanut Butter (produced by sponsor Derby Foods). The Signalscope included a glow-in-the-dark signaling device, whistle, magnifying glass and Sky King's private code. With the Signalscope you could also see around corners and trees. [1] The premiums were innovative, such as the Sky King Spy-Detecto Writer, which had a "decoder" (cipher disk), magnifying glass, measuring scale, and printing mechanism in a single package slightly over 2 inches long. Other notable premiums included the Magni-Glo Writing Ring, which had a luminous element, a secret compartment, a magnifier, and a ballpoint pen all in the crownpiece of a "fits any finger" ring. The radio show ran until 1954, being aired simultaneously with the television version.

Television -

The television version starred Kirby Grant as Sky King and Gloria Winters as his teen-aged niece Penny. Other regular characters included his nephew Clipper, played by Ron Hagerthy, and Mitch the sheriff, played by Ewing Mitchell. Unlike many "lawman-acquaintance" characters on other shows, Mitch was competent, intelligent and skilled. He was always coming to Sky for help, due to friendship and recognizing the utility of Sky's flying skills. Other recurring characters included Jim Bell, the ranch foreman, played by Chubby Johnson as well as Sheriff Hollister played by Monte Blue and Bob Carey played by Norman Ollestad.

The television show began airing on Sunday afternoons on NBC between September 16, 1951 and October 26, 1952. These episodes were rebroadcast on ABC's Saturday morning lineup the following year November 8, 1952 until September 21, 1953, when it made its prime-time debut on ABC's Monday night lineup, before it aired twice-a-week in August and September of 1954, before ABC pulled the plug on it. New episodes were produced when the show went into syndication in 1955. The last episode, Mickey's Birthday, aired March 8, 1959. CBS began airing reruns of the show on early Saturdays afternoons (at 12 pm Eastern/Pacific times; late Saturday mornings at 11 am Central/Mountain times) on October 3, 1959 and continued to do so until September 3, 1966.

Thia was a little before my time, but here's a signalscope:


I'll check out the programs one of these evenings!

Later, I'll post a link to an archive of hundreds of old radio programs. I downloaded a bunch of them last year when we drove to the in-laws for Christmas, it was fun to listen to them in the car and kept the kids attention as well.

Very Cool, thanks

We got our first TV when I was 6 yo in 1955. 3 stations came in poorly before the commercial antenna-tower was built a few months later next to the neighbor's Boysensberry patch. Sky King, the Lone Ranger, Howdy Doody, The Honeymooners,Crusader Rabbit, Ozzie and Harriet, Jackie Gleason, Ed Sullivan, Andy's (Devine) Gang, Superman--those were the days!!
Captain Midnight was another character with his own Jet.

"Out of the clear blue of the western sky comes SKY KING"

The bad guys did not have a chance against his fantastic piloting skills in the T50 and later the 310B in sync with the two way radio.

And wasn't that Penny a doll?

So how many of us became pilots because of this show?

Thanks for some very good memories. I used to really look forward to Saturday mornings with the "Songbird".

Bull1