I Married Joan made it into the top 30 rated programs for the 1953-1954 television season, ranking in at #25. This was a peak for the show, as all other seasons fell short of the top 30.



1953 - 1954

1. I Love Lucy CBS 15,288,000
2. Dragnet NBC 13,832,000
3. Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts CBS 11,336,000
4. You Bet Your Life NBC 11,336,000
5. The Milton Berle Show NBC 10,452,000
6. Arthur Godfrey and His Friends CBS 10,114,000
7. Ford Theatre NBC 10,088,000
8. The Jackie Gleason Show CBS 9,906,000
9. Fireside Theatre NBC 9,464,000
10. The Colgate Comedy Hour NBC 9,412,000
11. This Is Your Life NBC 9,412,000
12. The Red Buttons Show CBS 9,178,000
13. The Life of Riley NBC 9,100,000
14. Our Miss Brooks CBS 8,892,000
15. Treasury Men in Action NBC 8,814,000
16. The Jack Benny Show CBS 8,658,000
17. The Toast of the Town CBS 8,580,000
18. Gilette Cavalcade of Sports NBC 8,502,000
19. Philco TV Playhouse NBC 8,450,000
20. The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show CBS 8,424,000
21. Kraft Television Theatre NBC 8,138,000
22. Goodyear TV Playhouse NBC 8,060,000
23. Pabst Blue Ribbon Bouts CBS 8,034,000
24. Private Secretary CBS 7,878,000
25. I Married Joan NBC 7,852,000
26. Mama CBS 7,852,000
27. General Electric Theatre NBC 7,774,000
28. What's My Line CBS 7,696,000
29. The Big Story NBC 7,670,000
30. Your Hit Parade NBC 7,670,000

I can't believe IMJ never made it any higher than that in the ratings. I don't know why Joan never caught on, I mean, it's a good quality show & Joan's funny as hell. It's not like she was a b*tch or anything lol

I can't believe IMJ never made it any higher than that in the ratings. I don't know why Joan never caught on, I mean, it's a good quality show & Joan's funny as hell. It's not like she was a b*tch or anything lol

I thought Joan was very funny. I would tape her show everyday on CBN and watch it when I came home from school. My mother really liked this show too. When CBN showed it in the 80's, it was the first time since the 50's she had seen it.

...."ARTHUR GODFREY AND HIS FRIENDS" was one of CBS' highest rated shows on its Wednesday night schedule in the early '50s [8-9pm(et)]. NBC had tried Kate Smith as their "drawing card" opposite Godfrey in the 1951-'52season {she also had a highly rated daytime variety series, as he did}, but to no avail. Reasoning was back then, NBC scheduling "I MARRIED JOAN" directly opposite the Godfrey hour in the fall of 1952 was either a big mistake or a crafty maneuver to get the kids to watch Joan Davis. Well, after Godfrey's fallout with Julius LaRosa in October 1953 [on his daytime RADIO program], his radio AND TV ratings started to take a nosedive...and Joan's started to climb significantly. Then, "DISNEYLAND" premiered on ABC in the fall of 1954 [at 7:30pm], and both Joan and Arthur lost a chunk of their audience...and Joan fell ill, and abandoned her show in early '55.

Looking at that Top 30 list from 1953-54 again, I noticed something that really surprised me - Ed Sullivan is missing from the Top 30 :eek: and his show was on at the time. I thought Sullivan was at least always in the Top 20 during it's 23 years on the air.

..."THE COLGATE COMEDY HOUR" on NBC, in the 1953-'54 season, was getting the higher ratings on Sundays at 8pm(et) opposite Ed Sullivan's "TOAST OF THE TOWN" {as HIS show was titled until the fall of 1955; see #17}....primarily because their rotating hosts included Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis, Bob Hope [for General Motors' Frigidaire division; he wasn't under contract to Colgate-Palmolive-Peet, so his shows were officially titled "THE COMEDY HOUR"], Abbott & Costello, Eddie Cantor, Jimmy Durante and Donald O'Connor, along with "special" hosts. It wasn't until the "COLGATE" show began to falter in the 1954-'55 season that Sullivan's audience started to grow dramatically...and Ed became the #1 show in his time period by the time "THE COLGATE VARIETY HOUR" ended in late 1955.