Gee, Wally, who are you?

The Reddess and I are watching TV last night. I am engaging in the hunter-male's search for game, channel surfacing. She is there to tell me to knock it off and actually find something to watch.

Suddenly we are in a parallel universe. It's Leave It to Beaver but Ward is not Ward and Wally is not Wally. Mr. Rutherford was there but he was not Mr. Rutherford. He was some guy named Baxter who worked for a milk company. For a moment, we were uncertain whether our senses were betraying us or the laws of nature had been suspended. I mean, Ward sounded like Ward, offering slightly sardonic but essentially good natured commentary from behind the paper. Wally was still all integrity with a dirty face. Jerry Mathers was the Beaver. But who took Hugh Beaumont and Tony Dow? If Richard Deacon was not Lumpy's father, who was? (I guess, in the end, they decided it was the milkman. Deep.)


At the commercial break, we learned it was the rarely seen pilot episode. Order had returned to God's creation. A bit later I saw a glimpse of a world that might have been when Bizarro Ward (Max Schowalter who was then known as Casey Adams and who was about ten years younger that Hugh Beaumont)confronted the man who should have been Fred Rutherford. There he was - Ward Cleaver - jabbing a cigarette at the fellow and blowing smoke through his nose like Jimmy Cagney. I am glad they dumped him. I would not have wanted to grow up in that world.