SC, as it's been presented to us, does seem more engaged in print media, and although television was throughly addictive to the general public in the 1950s, there was still a distain for it as a "dumbed down" medium by those like Bertram Cooper who came up in a previous era when magazines and newspapers were the respected mass media.
(A lot of late '50s and early '60s TV series were dumb, and I can say that as a kid who was addicted to it. Although the news was smarter, for a number of reasons.)
And note: it's the early '60s and this prestigious ad agency didn't have Television department until Harry dreamed it up, which should give us a good idea of how high TV was on Bertram's list.
Our BoK quote of the week:
The series is so novelistic in scope, I suppose the best comparison I can come up with would be with the best of the Dickens‘ novels published serially in 19th century magazines.
—Basketcase judybrowni
Love how the first reason the gyno thinks might be Betty's reluctance to have another baby is concern for "her figure."
And I bet dollars to donuts that a doctor dealing with any woman below Betty's white upper class priviledge would not have discussed or admitted there were "alternatives" to pregnancy.
If working class Peggy had gotten a pregnancy test early, her alternatives would have been a home for unwed mothers or parents adopting it, moving to another neighborhood, pretending it was theirs, and calling it her "little brother" or "sister" (the story of Bobby Darin's young life, as an example.)
The high volume D and Cs quietly done in the upper, upper middle class suburban hospitals weren't available in the lower rent districts. Whose inhabitants also didn't have the funds to fly to Puerto Rico.
Some of the above comes from the contrasts I saw personally in pregnancy rites of the 20th century, and the highly informative and fascinating study in the book "When Abortion Was a Crime: Women, Medicine, and Law in the United States, 1867-1973 (Paperback) http://www.amazon.com/When-Abortion-Was-Crime-186…
A lot of late ’50s and early ’60s TV series were dumb, and I can say that as a kid who was addicted to it.
It really was. Aside from a couple of gems (Dick Van Dyke Show, Andy
Griffith) it was the era of the gimmick show. Hicks get rich!/Disparate people on an Island!/Wife's a witch!/Uncle's a Martian!/Girlfriend's a genie!/A creepy family!/A monster family!/Etc.
They got better towards the late sixties early seventies when we start getting shows either dealing with female empowerment (Mary Tyler Moore, That Girl!, etc.) or people like Norm Lear actually dealing with social issues in his shows with other sitcoms copying him because he was gangbusters at the time.
Ha! Great quote.
Don't quite remember the context, but it sure does say a lot about Cooper's disdain for the medium, and therefore S-C's general lack of vision.
I don't know if those things have to go hand in hand–Willy Wonka had lots of disdain for commercialism, but he was a master marketer.
SC, as it's been presented to us, does seem more engaged in print media, and although television was throughly addictive to the general public in the 1950s, there was still a distain for it as a "dumbed down" medium by those like Bertram Cooper who came up in a previous era when magazines and newspapers were the respected mass media.
(A lot of late '50s and early '60s TV series were dumb, and I can say that as a kid who was addicted to it. Although the news was smarter, for a number of reasons.)
And note: it's the early '60s and this prestigious ad agency didn't have Television department until Harry dreamed it up, which should give us a good idea of how high TV was on Bertram's list.
Hey, thanks for the shout out for my quote:
Our BoK quote of the week:
The series is so novelistic in scope, I suppose the best comparison I can come up with would be with the best of the Dickens‘ novels published serially in 19th century magazines.
—Basketcase judybrowni
Love how the first reason the gyno thinks might be Betty's reluctance to have another baby is concern for "her figure."
And I bet dollars to donuts that a doctor dealing with any woman below Betty's white upper class priviledge would not have discussed or admitted there were "alternatives" to pregnancy.
If working class Peggy had gotten a pregnancy test early, her alternatives would have been a home for unwed mothers or parents adopting it, moving to another neighborhood, pretending it was theirs, and calling it her "little brother" or "sister" (the story of Bobby Darin's young life, as an example.)
The high volume D and Cs quietly done in the upper, upper middle class suburban hospitals weren't available in the lower rent districts. Whose inhabitants also didn't have the funds to fly to Puerto Rico.
Some of the above comes from the contrasts I saw personally in pregnancy rites of the 20th century, and the highly informative and fascinating study in the book "When Abortion Was a Crime: Women, Medicine, and Law in the United States, 1867-1973 (Paperback)
http://www.amazon.com/When-Abortion-Was-Crime-186…
"There's a doctor in Albany, and of course in Puerto Rico they do it in a hospital." – Waspy beauty parlor talk.
A lot of late ’50s and early ’60s TV series were dumb, and I can say that as a kid who was addicted to it.
It really was. Aside from a couple of gems (Dick Van Dyke Show, Andy
Griffith) it was the era of the gimmick show. Hicks get rich!/Disparate people on an Island!/Wife's a witch!/Uncle's a Martian!/Girlfriend's a genie!/A creepy family!/A monster family!/Etc.
They got better towards the late sixties early seventies when we start getting shows either dealing with female empowerment (Mary Tyler Moore, That Girl!, etc.) or people like Norm Lear actually dealing with social issues in his shows with other sitcoms copying him because he was gangbusters at the time.
All due respect to Roald Dahl, MM is better-written.
The context, FYI, was the meeting between Harry & Cooper in which Harry kept staring at the Rothko.