All in the Family

When All In The Family first came on the air in 1971, you could say that tv was in it's infancy. I mean, when Lucille Ball became pregnant with Desi on her tv show they couldn't even say that word on the air. On the Dick Van Dyke show, they always showed Rob and Laura in seperate beds. All In The Family exploded like a bomb on this innocent world of tv. It showed subjects that were previously taboo like menopause, breast cancer, vasectomies, impotence, rape and even Archie taking a dump and flushing the toilet! Carroll O'Connor, Jean Stapleton, Rob Reiner and Sally Struthers all were an amazing team that made tv history. People don't realize that Norman Lear actually based the character of Archie Bunker on his father Herman. His father was basically a good man, but he was very prejudiced like Archie was. He would tell his wife to "stifle herself" and there was a special chair in his house that he alone would sit in. He would tell his son that he "was the laziest white kid he ever knew". Norman grew up hating his father's prejudices while he still loved his father. Paul Harvey had that on one of his "Rest Of The Stories". Carroll O' Connor had started off his acting career in drama and playing Archie gave him the chance to be dramatic on many occasions. The one episode that I remember was one that came on while the Vietnam war was still being fought it was where Mike brought home a friend for Thanksgiving who was a draft dodger and that same night a friend of Archies came over who had lost a son in the war. Archie exploded in rage at Mike (usually on the show when he gets mad its funny because he is just making a fool of himself, but in this episode it is chilling!). There was another episode where Archie had a problem with drugs and delivered a tearful monologue to Edith and Gloria and Mike when they confronted him with his problem. All In The Family spawned the realistic tv shows that we see today and also led to the spin offs Maude and The Jeffersons. Norman Lear created such a wonderful television legacy for all time and it all started with Archie Bunker, America's favorite bigot and All In The Family. His original aim was to create a show that would allow us to look into our own hearts and souls and see our own fears and prejudices and be able to laugh at them. I guess that in a sense you could say that there is a little bit of Archie Bunker in all of us and that is why he remains so endearing and so popular. It is like we are looking into a mirror.