My previous post got me thinking about how much I love TV history.

When I was a kid growing up in the ’80s, I was really interested in old TV shows. My vision of the 1950s was filled with black-and-white nuclear families; my vision of the 1960s had Technicolor housewives with secret magic powers living in leafy suburbs. And everyone from the Cleavers to Major Nelson and his genie lived in classical American homes. There was no segregation or Cold War or Joe McCarthy, no Vietnam or civil rights marches: just tidy families resolving problems in 30 minutes or less.

One day when I was 11 or 12, I was at a shopping center with my dad. We were in one of those all-purpose stores like Wal-Mart, except we didn’t have Wal-Mart in New Jersey, so maybe it was Caldor? Channel? I was browsing through the book section when I saw an enormous paperback that caught my eye: The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows, 1946-Present by Tim Brooks and Earle Marsh.

I was enthralled. I had no idea such a book existed! It had every show, in alphabetical order, with first and last broadcast dates, regular airtimes, cast lists, and several paragraphs describing the show. For each year it also had the prime-time fall TV schedule, top-rated shows for each year, and Emmy winners in the major categories.

I bought it right then and there. In the internet era, books like this are practically obsolete, but I still have my copy. They’re up to the ninth edition now, but I could never bear to part with my edition, for nostalgic reasons.

And if you want a great summary of TV history, here’s the introduction to the latest edition, including “The Eight Eras
of Prime Time,” and this list of the number of Westerns on TV by year:

Number of Westerns in Prime Time, by Season

1955–1956: 9
1956–1957: 11
1957–1958: 20
1958–1959: 31
1959–1960: 30
1960–1961: 26
1961–1962: 16
1962–1963: 13
1963–1964: 8
1964–1965: 7

My concept of postwar American history has become more complicated since I was a kid, but I still have a soft spot for the ’50s and ’60s and all that Atomic-Age TV stuff, and I still love TV history.

No wonder “Back to the Future” has always been my favorite movie and always will be.