What's new

Andy Griffith

Nannymouse

Well-known member
Okay, here's a 'returned seviceman' story. (a friend's family). So, he returns from the war disabled, addicted to morphine, alcolholic and with severe ptsd. Mostly, he stays in his bedroom. But one day, he figures that he's had enough of life and ties a string between the bedroom door handle and his shotgun. One of his five little kids goes to open the door to see daddy and the rig worked as intended. So one of the kids kills the dad. With little to nothing, the mom is left to raise the kids. As adults the boys end up alcoholics, one commits suicide. Two of the girls end up with lasting mental-emotional problems that puts one of them in the hospital getting shock treatments and the other gal had such a jumpy nature and had speech problems. Okay, some of the kids' problems maybe was because of the DDT that was used to rid the house of bedbugs.

I remember the first chain-link fence that i ever saw. Now, back in the day, VERY few people had a fence, at all, kids and dogs just roamed through town pretty much unhindered. So why in the world did this old couple have a fence like that? Because they had 'abducted' their eldest grandchild from a horribly abusive situation. and were afraid that their kids would come for her/them The 'situation' got so bad that one of the other kids (they had a herd of kids, the pill hadn't been invented or wasn't in use yet) died. The cops went in and found another kid that had been locked in a closet for lord knows how long, starving, listless. Other kids had broken bones, electric burner circles on butts, etc. The dad pleaded that he had no idea what was going on, even though he lived there, and got off scott free. The mom did time or was sent off to the state hospital.

Oh, yes, state hospitals. They were where the rich folks sent their rebellious daughter after the brothers castrated a boyfriend and left him for dead in the city park. None of the brothers did any time.

Girls couldn't take shop of vocational agriculture, because it was a 'boys' class. Besides, they talked about sexual reproduction in the ag classes...we all know that females don't need to know anything about that.

The cops all knew who was cheating on who, as they patrolled the little Mayberry's.

It was automatically assumed that a raped woman asked for it. Ask the old gay guys what they think about those days.

But the Mayberry 'illusion' was upheld by tv media. Don't for a minute believe that times were better then. I certainly don't want to go back to that.
 

Canglish

Member
Ask the old gay guys what they think about those days. But the Mayberry 'illusion' was upheld by tv media. Don't for a minute believe that times were better then. I certainly don't want to go back to that.

Oof. Hearing ya. I know that cute small town thing, scratch the surface and there's some weird shit goin on, it's no different in the UK in that regard. Huh. So what do you think? Better now or worse than then?
 

Nannymouse

Well-known member
Life is a struggle. We've made some gains, in some areas. None of it matters much, if we've killed our planet and have nowhere else to go.
 

hamstring

Well-known member
Veteran
I will just tell you how I remember it from the natural world. As far as the society aspect I agree with Nannymouse on a lot of the stuff.

I was born in 1965. My brother and I had cane poles and would use a piece of styrofoam as a bobber and a nut from my fathers tool box as weight . The neighbor lived by the creek and we would dig worms next to her house. We would catch crappie and blue gill all day. In the summer my brother , a friend of ours and I spent all day ,everyday, along the crick ( not creek) . Seeing muskrats, snakes, turtles, hard shell, soft shell and red ears. I remember that we sat in front of the TV on Sundays to watch Virgil Ward's fishing show and talking about how cool it was the next day. Virgil was one of our heros back then.

That same creek , even 20yrs ago, didnt have a single game fish in it. There are no water snakes left because the fish are gone. Soft shell turtles are endangered now.

Honestly listening to my father and his friend talk back then I was still born 20 - 30 years too late to really enjoy the natural world. I have to listen to fools tell me everyday the planet hasn't changed and talking about being green is looked at like your a communist to people my age.
 

armedoldhippy

Well-known member
Veteran
hadn't stumbled over this thread yet. made me think. it was set in NC, a state with an enormous rural Black population. i watched that show for YEARS and don't recall any Black actors in any episodes. did i miss something? look out Google, here i come...
 

RobFromTX

Well-known member
Well then i think the best thing to do is remake the show with an all black cast. How else do you go about this righteously. I vote kevin heart as andi and cedric the "entertainer" as Otis. Eddie griffin as the town judge so we can have a proper amount of humor when a white guy parks in a fire zone
 

armedoldhippy

Well-known member
Veteran
Still don’t get how shooting turtles can be considered a proper pastime:wtf:What kind of sport is that ?it’s not like they can really run away now is it…
lots of folks eat them, at least in the rural south. a bullet in the head is probably preferred to a hook in the jaw and protracted struggle before meeting fate via a hatchet strike.
 

armedoldhippy

Well-known member
Veteran
i'd like to do a low budget thread some day, and get feedback from others,
when/if i do one, i'll be Mr. Cheap. i get everything at Wal-Mart or Home DePot. DWC buckets were free ex-kitty litter containers. if you beat me to it, i'll follow along...i'd love to do an outdoors DWC just to satisfy my curiosity.
 

armedoldhippy

Well-known member
Veteran
That would work better with the duke boys. Change it from shine to bud, and change nothing else, straight seen by seen remake.
and film it in Jamaica, with Rastas for actors. probably not gonna have as many car chase scenes...:smoke:
 
  • Love
Reactions: Gry
Top