FRIDAY HALL OF FAMERS 08/16/19 - ANNIE OAKLEY

With this week’s Friday Hall of Famer, we’ve chosen an historical multiversal, but only her portrayals in the greater Toobworld Dynamic, the many dimensions of the TV Universe.

ANNIE OAKLEY

From Wikipedia:
Annie Oakley (born Phoebe Ann Mosey; August 13, 1860 – November 3, 1926) was an American sharpshooter and exhibition shooter. Her talent first came to light when at age 15 she won a shooting match against traveling-show marksman Frank E. Butler, whom she later married.  The couple joined Buffalo Bill's Wild West show a few years later. Oakley became a renowned international star, performing before royalty and heads of state.

Oakley also was variously known as "Miss Annie Oakley", "Little Sure Shot", "Little Miss Sure Shot", "Watanya Cicilla", "Phoebe Anne Oakley", "Mrs. Annie Oakley", "Mrs. Annie Butler", and "Mrs. Frank Butler". Her death certificate gives her name as "Annie Oakley Butler".

For more, click here:

Here are the actresses who played her in various TV dimensions:

• Gail Davis played Oakley in the television series ‘Annie Oakley’ (1954 to 1956).
• Sarah Strange played Oakley in the episode "Mild Mild West" (2009) of the Canadian crime drama television show, ‘Murdoch Mysteries'.

O’Bservation:
She would be the same woman as played by Gail Davis.  But the differences in her appearance can be credited to being seen by us via Detective Murdoch’s perception of her.

These next two portrayals are in other TV dimensions to spread the wealth.

• Jamie Lee Curtis portrayed Oakley in ‘Tall Tales & Legends’ (1985).
• Reba McEntire portrayed Oakley in ‘Buffalo Girls’ (1996), alongside Anjelica Huston, Melanie Griffith, and Tom Wopat.

While seeing Annie Oakley interacting with already established characters like William Murdoch, I'd like to see Annie's televersion as an old woman.  She lived to the year 1926, after all.  This is a picture of her.  (Maybe Frances Sternhagen is still vital enough to assay the role?)

And the show in which she could appear would probably be the 'Murdoch Mysteries' spinoff 'Frankie Drake Mysteries'.  It's set in Toronto as well, but it takes place in the 1920s. 
 
While Ms. Davis’ portrayal is probably the least accurate historically, it also epitomizes the spirit of Buffalo Bill’s embodiment of “the show business.”  As such, she will be the face of Annie Oakley in the 2019 class of the Television Crossover Hall of Fame.

Welcome to the hall, Little Miss Sure Shot….

THEORIES OF RELATEEVEETY - THE BART MAVERICK LINE(S)

In the Facebook page celebrating actor Jack Kelly and the book about him by Linda Alexander, the focus is of course on his role as Bart Maverick in ‘Maverick’.

In December of last year, one of the page administrators, Sharon Viljoen, shared a spate of colorized publicity pictures of Bart Maverick with a handful of his leading ladies from various episodes.  (And many of those loverly ladies proved to be just that – a handful!)

STELLA LEGENDRE
"THE GOOSE DROWNDER"
(FAY SPAIN)

BELLE MORGAN
"BRASADA SPUR"
(JULIE ADAMS)

DAISY HARRIS aka DAISY HASKELL
"THE JEWELED GUN"
(KATHLEEN CROWLEY)

JANET KILMER
"THE THIRTY-NINTH STAR"
(BETHEL LESLIE)

VIRGINIA CORY
"THE NAKED GALLOWS"
(JEANNE COOPER)

LINDA
THE LASS WITH THE POISONOUS AIR"
(JOANNA MOORE)

MODESTY BLAINE
"ONE OF OUR TRAINS IS MISSING"
(KATHLEEN CROWLEY)

MYRA
"YOU CAN'T BEAT THE PERCENTAGE"
(KAREN STEELE)

SYDNEY SUE "FRENCHY" SHIPLEY
"HIGH CARD HANGS"
(LILYAN CHAUVIN)

I’m writing this up back in December of 2018 and for alls I know, Sharon has even more portraits to offer.  But for the sake of this post, I’m going with that original handful of “heroines”.

As many in Team Toobworld are probably aware, I treat what I see on TV as being its own reality.  And as such, I don’t hold to the strictures of either the scripts nor the times in which the series was originally broadcast.  And there are plenty of times in each episode – of any TV show when it comes to that! – when we just don’t see what is going on in a character’s life.  This would include not only the edits that mark a passage of time but also what goes on while the commercials are interrupting.

So who’s to argue that Bart Maverick was better than any other man?  I don’t think he would even try to make that claim.

Therefore, Bart Maverick could be seen as the Amos Burke, Sam Malone, Fonzie, and Martin Tupper of the Old West, giving James T. West a run for his money when it comes to capturing the title of “Playa of the Plains”.

As such, it would certainly provide plenty of fodder for quite a slew of theories of relateeveeties.  And there were plenty of Jack Kelly characters throughout the 1960s and the 1970s who could be considered as descendants of Bart  Maverick.  (The strong genetic imprint of his DNA passed down intact over several generations would be quite the giveaway.)  None of those future Jack Kelly roles would need to share any more of a bloodline than to have Bart as their great-grandfather or grandfather.
 
Among those characters would be Arthur Ryan of ‘Get Christie Love!’, Jack O’Shea in a couple of ‘Batman’ episodes, and Harry Hammond of the Hardy Boys half of ‘The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries’.
Happy trails to you!

O'BSERVATION:
I'll have more about two of these actresses and their characters on 'Maverick' in other posts this month.

WIKI TIKI WEDNESDAY - GOVERNOR JOHN P. ST. JOHN

Bret Maverick:
Why, the Clem Diefendorfer I’m looking for is an historian. 
Clem Diefendorfer:
Well that’s me!
Bret:
Who is the governor of Kansas?
Clem:
John P. St. John. 
Bret:
How much is his salary?
Clem:
$3000 a year.'MAVERICK'
(From the classic parody episode "Gun Shy".)

From Wikipedia:
John Pierce St. John (February 25, 1833 – August 31, 1916) was the eighth Governor of Kansas and a candidate for President of the United States in 1884.

St. John was born in Brookville, Indiana. He served as lieutenant colonel of the 143rd Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War. From 1873 he sat in the Kansas Senate, and was the Republican Governor of Kansas from 1879 to 1883. Active in the temperance movement, he successfully promoted a prohibition amendment to that state's constitution. St. John also helped create the Kansas Freedmen's Relief Association during the Great Exodus of African-Americans to Kansas in 1879.

He was the Prohibition Party candidate for President of the United States in the 1884 election. On October 2, 1884 he was nearly shot, with the bullet hitting the window next to him. He received 147,482 votes (about 1.5%) on a ticket with William Daniel. The election was won by Grover Cleveland of the Democratic Party. St. John was also surpassed by two other unsuccessful candidates:

James Gillespie Blaine of the Republican Party.
Benjamin Franklin Butler of the United States Greenback Party.

St. John died after suffering heat exhaustion on August 31, 1916 in Olathe, Kansas.

The city of St. John, Kansas, is named after him.

Once upon a time, the IMDb offered a search function for characters and the actors who played them.  It was an invaluable resource for a televisiologist such as Yours Viewly, allowing me to find out if certain historical figures had been dramatized and it provided a list of all the actors who had played those roles.   But in their infinite wisdom, they dropped that feature.  (I think they had run out of server space and didn’t want to purchase more.)

So I don’t know if John St. John was ever seen in Earth Prime-Time as far as in the form of an actor whom we might have known.  But we do know he did exist in the main Toobworld, thanks to this Q&A between Bret Maverick and Clem Diefendorfer.  We even found out his middle name and his annual salary.

That’s more than can be said for a lot of the televersions for the real-life governors depicted in TV shows over the years.
Happy Trails!

MISSING LINKS - THE BAR ARCHITECT

So outside the box, this is just a case of two shows using the same studio set.  But within the reality of Toobworld?

The 'Gunsmoke' saloon is probably the Long Branch Saloon in Dodge City, Kansas.  As the caption says, the saloon for Paladin is in Nevada.  So there's no chance of a geographic crossover. 

But we could make an assumption based on the evidence - i.e. the doors, the wall sconces. 

Both of these saloons were designed by the same architect who probably also oversaw the construction of each.  The rest of the bar area probably looked the same and even the off-camera areas - specifically the rooms upstairs where the saloon girls go to make the real money and occasionally begin a new Toobworld family tree.....

Someday I'll find a wild wild West architect whom I can claim to be the man who designed both saloons.

Happy trails!

SPECIAL GUEST APPEARANCE - ACROSS THE HUGHNIVERSE

Extending my weekend just a bit by having a special guest appearance by one of the first “crossoverists” I ever met online – Hugh Davis: 

"The Infernal Machine," an episode of BONANZA, features Willard Waterman as Cyrus K. Throckmorton. This is likely an ancestor of Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve, Waterman's character on THE GREAT GILDERSLEEVE (and the TV followup to the radio series of the same name). Waterman plays the two very similarly.
-Hugh Davis

From the ‘Bonanza’ wiki:
Daniel Pettibone is trying to find financing for his new invention, a horseless carriage. Hoss tries to help with scaring up money, no one's interested until a smooth-talking stranger, Throckmorton, wants to invest. The locals then start to pony up their cash--and Throckmorton promptly skips town with their cash.  

Hugh knows as I did that family surnames on the maternal side often live on for generations as the given name.  I have friends who named their son “Jordan” which is the mother’s maiden name… in a way.
So Cyrus K. Throckmorton could be the grandfather or great-grandfather of Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve, with Gildy’s mother bearing “Throckmorton” as her maiden name.  And of course, the telegenetics are quite strong in the connection between the two.
This theory of relateeveety is a great find, Hugh!  And timely too, as this is the month in which we celebrate the TV Western…..

A HAT SQUAD ANNIVERSARY

Mindy McConnell:

You know if you learned to say no, 

you probably would have a lot more time to yourself.

Robin Williams:

Whew... 

Maybe that's the last thing I want....

'Mork And Mindy'

"Mork Meets Robin Williams"

Toobworld Central remembers Robin Williams on the fifth anniversary of his death. 

Nanu nanu......