Here's proof that you can find almost anything on the Internet including episodes and clips of classic TV series that were thought to be lost or missing. A good example is "Our Miss Brooks" where, until recently, only a handful of public domain episodes were available online. Last year, I found a collection of over 60 additional episodes from a YouTube user. Today I found 5 more episodes on the Internet Archive --- and they are all in color!!

I'm not exactly sure how they ended up in color unless CBS used it and other series in the 1950s to experiment with color TV broadcasts which didn't become standard viewing until 1965. So what you are going to see is truly a piece of history. Enjoy it and prepare to be amazed!

Our Miss Brooks - Color - 5 episodes (https://archive.org/details/OurMissBrooksS1e31SuzyPrentissscolorizedFullEpisode)

Thank you very much, this was great news and I like to think I'm "hep" to all the scoops on colorization. This is one I haven't heard, fantastic!

From the looks of it it seems to be examples of very early colorizing, probably from the mid to late 1980's. Looks similar to the old early Hal Roach colorizing efforts from the '80's. But though it's not nearly up to today's perfection in colorizing, it's still better than drab b/w.

Me TV showed most of the Our Miss Brooks episodes but they did skip about 3 to 4. Now about 6 months ago I did find a lot of Our Miss Brooks episodes on Youtube but quality of all was far below the Me TV quality. BUT, there was one episode on Youtube which was skipped by ME TV, so that one episode alone was worth watching on utube. If all Miss Brooks episodes are now gone from Utube, they were there once, is all I can tell you.

Now, here's another question for you. About 10 years ago Amazon advertised a Love That Bob DVD that was supposed to have contained about 3 or 4 colorized episodes. Naturally I ordered it, but was thoroughly regusted when I got the DVD and ALL of them were b/w.:mad: Ripoff city. Now maybe you can find out if there were ever any colorized episodes of Love That Bob. Now that would be exciting too.

Another disappointement:( MPI (or was it Shout?) had advertised on a Dobie Gillis disc that the "complete Love That Bob" series was coming "soon". That was several years ago and to date there has been no such miracle. Love That Bob is one series I would love to have complete, it makes me laugh everytime I watch an episode.:lol:

Thank you very much, this was great news and I like to think I'm "hep" to all the scoops on colorization. This is one I haven't heard, fantastic!

From the looks of it it seems to be examples of very early colorizing, probably from the mid to late 1980's. Looks similar to the old early Hal Roach colorizing efforts from the '80's. But though it's not nearly up to today's perfection in colorizing, it's still better than drab b/w.

Me TV showed most of the Our Miss Brooks episodes but they did skip about 3 to 4. Now about 6 months ago I did find a lot of Our Miss Brooks episodes on Youtube but quality of all was far below the Me TV quality. BUT, there was one episode on Youtube which was skipped by ME TV, so that one episode alone was worth watching on utube. If all Miss Brooks episodes are now gone from Utube, they were there once, is all I can tell you.

Now, here's another question for you. About 10 years ago Amazon advertised a Love That Bob DVD that was supposed to have contained about 3 or 4 colorized episodes. Naturally I ordered it, but was thoroughly regusted when I got the DVD and ALL of them were b/w.:mad: Ripoff city. Now maybe you can find out if there were ever any colorized episodes of Love That Bob. Now that would be exciting too.

Another disappointement:( MPI (or was it Shout?) had advertised on a Dobie Gillis disc that the "complete Love That Bob" series was coming "soon". That was several years ago and to date there has been no such miracle. Love That Bob is one series I would love to have complete, it makes me laugh everytime I watch an episode.:lol:

Happy for you as I know you’re a big fan of colorization.

Thank you very much, this was great news and I like to think I'm "hep" to all the scoops on colorization. This is one I haven't heard, fantastic!

From the looks of it it seems to be examples of very early colorizing, probably from the mid to late 1980's. Looks similar to the old early Hal Roach colorizing efforts from the '80's. But though it's not nearly up to today's perfection in colorizing, it's still better than drab b/w.

Me TV showed most of the Our Miss Brooks episodes but they did skip about 3 to 4. Now about 6 months ago I did find a lot of Our Miss Brooks episodes on Youtube but quality of all was far below the Me TV quality. BUT, there was one episode on Youtube which was skipped by ME TV, so that one episode alone was worth watching on utube. If all Miss Brooks episodes are now gone from Utube, they were there once, is all I can tell you.

Now, here's another question for you. About 10 years ago Amazon advertised a Love That Bob DVD that was supposed to have contained about 3 or 4 colorized episodes. Naturally I ordered it, but was thoroughly regusted when I got the DVD and ALL of them were b/w.:mad: Ripoff city. Now maybe you can find out if there were ever any colorized episodes of Love That Bob. Now that would be exciting too.

Another disappointement:( MPI (or was it Shout?) had advertised on a Dobie Gillis disc that the "complete Love That Bob" series was coming "soon". That was several years ago and to date there has been no such miracle. Love That Bob is one series I would love to have complete, it makes me laugh everytime I watch an episode.:lol:

The "Our Miss Brooks" videos are still there. There are about 65 episodes in total:

Our Miss Brooks - YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLisuzvJIODKZBnnqRDJeorfoXLbuV_b_v)

(Check out episode #10 "Buddy". I love the opening credits --- and the commercials too!)

Speaking of Bob Cummings, I love "Love That Bob" too but unlike "Our Miss Brooks" I haven't found any additional episodes other than the usual 10-20 that are already in the public domain and all of those are in black and white only. However, while I was looking for them, I did manage to see a color video showing the opening of his next series "My Living Doll". Take a look:

My Living Doll - Opening credits in color (http://pop-colorture.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/LIVINGDOLL-video.mp4)


The video is from a website called Pop-Colorture.com which is run by a classic TV fan who has colorized many TV sitcoms from the past such as "I Love Lucy", "The Munsters", and "The Addams Family" and has produced still photos and short video clips for each show. The site can be found here:

Pop Colorture (http://pop-colorture.com/)

Checked after my post and I see Brooks' on Utube are still there, I don't need them thanks to Me TV, but at least they're still available, even if they aren't the remastered versions ME TV ran. I'll check out Buddy there though, Me TV ran no original commerials.

As for Love That Bob, yep, same story here, I've found about 25 episodes though. But everywhere you go it's always those same 25 or so. That series ran a long time and had 100's of episodes, Shout or some company should get back on the stick and release the complete series, such a funny show.

Yes, I've seen that colorized Living Doll opening (I bought the commercial DVD release of Living Doll too, but they never came out with a volume 2 to complete the season. Love That Bob was a much better series anyway.) I've visited that Pop-Colorture website many times, what an absolute genius he is when it comes to colorizing. He's done the very best jobs that I've ever seen done. Even better than the current I Love Lucy colorizers. I also thought the Bewitched Seasons 1 & 2 DVDs looked fantastic colorized. But Pop-Colorture's work looks like it was all filmed in color originally.

My only problem with him is he only posts tiny little excerpts of his great color jobs, never complete episodes. Maybe he's trying to get someone to hire him to do this job right for a TV series official DVD release by teasing with these tiny excerpts (I wish he'd do My Favorite Martian or Dennis The Menace). More likely mindless copyright police would get after him if he ever posted a complete masterpiece color show.:mad:

So far no great TV series is available from him. What a shame, he could do a perfect job at colorizing great old TV sitcoms like the "Classic 39" of the Honeymooners or season 1 of Hazel. So many great things that could be happening right now but sadly aren't.:( Maybe if I live another 100 years I'll see this dream come true.:)

I remember watching reruns of Cummings' show years ago, it used to be widely syndicated. Very funny show. Some popular sitcoms stars from that era, Ann B. Davis, Rosemary De Camp, and Dwayne Hickman. It's owned by Universal--and certainly out of circulation. Bob was what they called a wolf back then, now he'd probably never get his show on the air.

Checked the colorture site--really like what he does--saw the Addams and Munsters clips and they look great.

Thanks for the heads up on the colour episodes. I love this show, and am glad that one of my favourite episodes 'The Hurricane' is one of the five colourised. Hi from Australia.

Quite exciting to see “Our Miss Brooks” in living color!
I am quite the “Our Miss Brooks” fan. I like this show much more than “I Love Lucy”
I have really poor quality amateur DVDs of the show, & like to run a marathon of “Our Miss Brooks” on weekends in between the wasteland TV on Saturdays & Sunday’s. A shame & a tragedy that “Our Miss Brooks” hasn’t had a DVD release.

Always nice to see Our Miss Brooks. I recently saw her guest star on a color show but I forgot what show it was. I also enjoy seeing the science teacher in Growing Pains playing the father and of course WKRP also has one of our favorites star as newsman. I am mistaken or is that granny from Beverly Hillbillies on OMB?

Mrs. Davis was not Granny on BHB. She was a Lux radio performer, & played Mrs. Davis for both the radio show & TV as did Eve & Gale, except for the 1st radio broadcast of OMB Miss Brooks is HAZEL! LOL, Shirley Booth.

Thank you, RetroVic! What a show OMB. I gotta say Stretch is my favorite character lol. I crack up when he comes on screen, his delivery and character depiction is one of my all time favorites but there are so many great characters and actors to choose from. Must say definitely like the first edition better before she changed schools and many of my fave characters went away �� What is your favorite episode?

I like so many episodes, some that come to mind: the pawn shop one, the catty photographer one, the stolen antenna one, there really wasn’t a bad episode from the first 40. I also love to listen to “Our Miss Brooks” radio program in bed, with all of the Lustre Creme & Palmolive beauty soap commercials! I liked Stretch especially the way he said “Ms. Bwooks” I also loved little Harriet, Walter Denton, Mrs. Davis, Minerva, & mean Mr. Conkiln! The weakest character is Mr. Boynton. I am waiting to get some feedback on the newly released DVD. $35 is a bit steep, & they are divided into Volumes so $70 for 1 season! If they are edited, that would be a shame.

Love it, thanks. I'm downloading some OMB radio shows to enjoy, never had the privilege until you gave me the idea. Very much looking forward to listening. I'm saving the Christmas tree episode for yule tide lol:happyface

Love it, thanks. I'm downloading some OMB radio shows to enjoy, never had the privilege until you gave me the idea. Very much looking forward to listening. I'm saving the Christmas tree episode for yule tide lol:happyface


If you would like to listen to the entire series on radio for free, you can do so here:


Our Miss Brooks - Radio Series (https://www.oldtimeradiodownloads.com/comedy/our-miss-brooks?display=50)

Thank you very much, this was great news and I like to think I'm "hep" to all the scoops on colorization. This is one I haven't heard, fantastic!

From the looks of it it seems to be examples of very early colorizing, probably from the mid to late 1980's. Looks similar to the old early Hal Roach colorizing efforts from the '80's. But though it's not nearly up to today's perfection in colorizing, it's still better than drab b/w.

Me TV showed most of the Our Miss Brooks episodes but they did skip about 3 to 4. Now about 6 months ago I did find a lot of Our Miss Brooks episodes on Youtube but quality of all was far below the Me TV quality. BUT, there was one episode on Youtube which was skipped by ME TV, so that one episode alone was worth watching on YouTube. If all Miss Brooks episodes are now gone from YouTube, they were there once, is all I can tell you.

Now, here's another question for you. About 10 years ago Amazon advertised a Love That Bob DVD that was supposed to have contained about 3 or 4 colorized episodes. Naturally I ordered it, but was thoroughly disgusted when I got the DVD and ALL of them were b/w.:mad: Ripoff city. Now maybe you can find out if there were ever any colorized episodes of Love That Bob. Now that would be exciting too.

Another disappointment:( MPI (or was it Shout [Factory]?) had advertised on a Dobie Gillis disc that the "complete Love That Bob" series was coming "soon". That was several years ago and to date there has been no such miracle. Love That Bob is one series I would love to have complete, it makes me laugh every time I watch an episode.:lol:



I have been trying to find the three other Christmas episodes of The Bob Cummings Show (syndication title Love That Bob) for a few years now. The Christmas episode of Love That Bob most commonly in circulation is "Grandpa's Christmas Visit, which is Episode 14 from Season 2 (December 22, 1955), which I already have. But I am seeking the following other Christmas episodes--Season 1, Episode 6 - "A Wife for Christmas" (February 6, 1955), Season 2, Episode 13 - "The Christmas Spirit" (December 15, 1955) and Season 4, Episode 13 - "Bob's Christmas Party" (December 24, 1957).

If anyone reading this has any of those Christmas episodes of The Bob Cummings Show/Love That Bob, I am open to a trade for some titles from my own video collection of films and TV episodes.

I am also trying to locate a second Christmas episode of Topper. The Christmas episode I already have of that series is Episode 12 from the first season, titled "A Christmas Carol" (December 25, 1953). I am seeking Season 2, Episode 24 - "Topper's Quiet Christmas" (December 24, 1954). Likewise, if anyone reading this has that second season Christmas episode of Topper, I am open to a trade for a title from my own video collection of films and TV episodes.

And while I have the lone Christmas episode of Bachelor Father, "Deck the Halls," which is the fourth episode of the series' fifth and final season, the file of it I have is very small, only of mobile quality (320 x 240), if even that. And also, unfortunately, after I tried to convert the file to make the image larger, it merely increased the already-thick black border surrounding the video image, leaving the resolution of the video image still too tiny to watch with much enjoyment. The other problem is that my copy of that episode is very bleached-out, the whiteness too bright and not enough contrast with the black.

If anyone reading this has a better copy of the "Deck the Halls" episode of Bachelor Father, I am open to a trade for something else from my vast video collection of films and TV episodes.

Really, it is a shame that none of these three TV series' (two of them very popular in their original prime time network runs) have ever been officially remastered and released on home video and/or for on demand streaming. And also, sadly, I really fear that with most of the Baby Boomers now facing mortality, the chances to see any more vintage TV series' released for home-viewing is next to nil from here on out.

Here's proof that you can find almost anything on the Internet including episodes and clips of classic TV series that were thought to be lost or missing. A good example is "Our Miss Brooks" where, until recently, only a handful of public domain episodes were available online. Last year, I found a collection of over 60 additional episodes from a YouTube user. Today I found 5 more episodes on the Internet Archive --- and they are all in color!!

I'm not exactly sure how they ended up in color unless CBS used it and other series in the 1950s to experiment with color TV broadcasts which didn't become standard viewing until 1965. So what you are going to see is truly a piece of history. Enjoy it and prepare to be amazed!

Our Miss Brooks - Color - 5 episodes (https://archive.org/details/OurMissBrooksS1e31SuzyPrentissscolorizedFullEpisode)




Unfortunately, I think most of these so-called colorizations of vintage television series' you found on the Internet Archive (and many more of which are also available on YouTube) are probably from the same source, and certainly not from CBS-Paramount nor up to the better standards of modern day colorization, such as are produced by CBS-Paramount when airing special episodes of I Love Lucy, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Andy Griffith Show, etc., during the A.E. Nielsen Company's so-called "sweeps" periods, especially at Christmastime.

These colorized renderings of vintage TV sitcoms on YouTube and Internet Archive may remind one more of the early colorizations of films done by cable TV maven and Cable News Network (CNN) and TBS/Superstation founder Ted Turner shortly after he purchased the old M-G-M film library in the early 1980s, before his company was merged with AOL-Time-Warner. But, thankfully, professional colorization technology has come at least a little way since then. There has even been an improvement between the colorizations of the I Love Lucy Christmas episode (Season Six, Episode 11), first done in 1990 with only the framing sequences, and another one done later (in 2013) of the entire episode, referencing actual photographs from the Desilu sets.

Besides CBS' Our Miss Brooks, I have also found some bleached-out, pastel "colorizations' of some other CBS sitcoms, among them December Bride and its spin-off, Pete and Gladys, as well as The Bob Cummings Show (a.k.a. Love That Bob), Private Secretary and The Tim Conway Show (even though, originally airing in 1970, it was filmed in color), all on YouTube. And after watching some of these faux colorizations, I think I almost prefer the poor quality, public domain black and white originals, which at least don't exacerbate the poor contrast any more so.

Other colorizations include ABC's Date with the Angels and The Farmer's Daughter, CBS' Hennesey and Topper, NBC's Karen (spun off earlier that same season from the sitcom trilogy 90 Bristol Court that included Harris Against the World starring Jack Klugman and Tom, Dick and Mary with Steve Franken of The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis fame and The Tab Hunter Show, and even the first-run syndicated The Great Gildersleeve starring Willard Waterman (the second radio "Gildy" after original Harold Peary) and the pilot for The Dick Van Dyke Show titled Head of the Family, starring creator and writer Carl Reiner, among several other colorized sitcom episodes.

You may view a playlist of these colorizations of older TV sitcoms here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIm4J1RCJV0hFup6VuDUJ2s8osi-6PHxs

And if you go to this other link you may see a fuller menu of more colorizations, of films and more TV episodes, including some TV dramatic series': https://www.youtube.com/user/danilbruce/playlists

All that said, I have read that CBS had experimented with actually filming some color episodes (different from colorizing, which is merely computer-coloring after the fact of filming) in the 1954-55 season, to see how at least some of their series' would appear if broadcast in color. Three CBS series' which definitely filmed color episodes were Lassie, two pilot episodes filmed--"Inheritance" (Season 1, Episode #1) and "The Well" (Season 1, Ep. #24), although only one, "The Well," filmed in color (at least so far as we know at this point), The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show and The Jack Benny Program. The color episodes' descriptions, with original airdates, are as follows (from IMDB.com and TV.com)--

Lassie - Season 1, Episodes 24 "The Well" (Original CBS airdate February 20, 1955): A snoopy inspector from the water department insists on seeing the Miller well. Leave it to Beaver, which also made its debut the first of its six seasons on CBS.

The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show - Season 5, Episode 1 "George Invites Critics to Watch First Show of Season" (Original CBS airdate October 4, 1954): George invites two newspaper reporters, while Gracie secretly invites two dozen strangers over to the house to view their opening night show.

The Jack Benny Program - Season 5, Episode 4 "Jack Takes Beavers to the Fair" (Original CBS airdate March 6, 1955): In this color episode, Jack takes a group of boys called the Beverly Hills Beavers (one of them is young Harry Shearer) to the fair. Things get off to a bad start; he has to be shot down when he holds too many helium balloons, he falls off the merry-go-round, and he succeeds in ringing the bell at the top of the strength meter only after one of the Beavers sticks a pin in his backside. Several times they run into Mr. Kitzel, who's a "utility player" working wherever he's needed. At one point, Jack steps into a lion cage, thinking the animal is Mr. Kitzel in a costume; it isn't. As Benny and the boys leave, they pass a hula girl show — and the girl is Mr. Kitzel!

I had previously read in the book TV on Video, by the late Sam Frank, that no master copy of this Benny program could be located, though. I also know of no finding yet, in color, for the first ("Inheritance") of the two Lassie episodes which served as pilots for that long-running (17 years on CBS, two years in first-run syndication) family adventure series. But I have "The Well" episode in color, from its inclusion in a special three episodes' DVD set of Lassie titled Lassie: A Mother's Love, released by Classic Media in 2006, which you may view or download from the following link, the color episode (and some comparison scenes of the monochrome and color versions) the very last episode of this three episodes' upload--https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiA3eL0ctG0

And The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show color episode is uploaded to YouTube in two versions, one shorter in running time (even with a commercial), but appearing more vivid, while the other appears colorized or at least not as vivid, but brighter. You may draw your own conclusions by viewing both versions of that Burns & Allen color episode from the following links--https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90EHgPZiP90&t=1053s

AND

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9U5oGqT0Ps


And even though NBC ultimately prevailed over rival TV network CBS in their competition for which analog color broadcasting system would be adopted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the National Television System Committee (NTSC) and become the standard used in North America until conversion to mostly digital broadcasting in 2012, at first it had been the CBS color system which was adopted. CBS had developed a field-sequential color system, a mechanically-based system that consisted of a rotating color wheel of red, blue, and green filters in front of a monochrome (black and white) camera, feeding a monochrome Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) receiver viewed through a second rotating color wheel. The two wheels were kept in phase synchronization, such that successive television fields were viewed using identical color primary filters to the one at the camera. To overcome flicker, the field rate was increased from 60 to 144 fields per second, resulting in 24 complete color frames per second. To compensate for the increased field rate within the standard 6-MHz channel, the lines per frame were reduced from 525 to 405. A 29,160-Hz line rate resulted. But this led to a basic incompatibility of the CBS color system, such that no standard monochrome receiver could display "an intelligible picture during color telecasts." In other words, viewers watching on black and white TV sets saw no picture or, if at all, a picture with distorted images.

Eventually, the CBS color TV plan was scrapped, ostensibly because of a federal government order that its development would require use of scarce resources then needed for the Korean conflict (Korean War), which rivals such as Alfred P. DuMont (of the then-fourth TV network, DuMont) claim was a face-saving plot by CBS, in any case resulting in the adoption by the FCC and NTSC of NBC's "compatible color system," an electronic-based color system which could be utilized without affecting the majority of viewers who would continue (for almost another two decades) to view TV on monochrome sets. But even though the NBC-RCA color system had been adopted in 1954, "The Peacock Network" still didn't film most of its episodic series' (Bonanza first in 1959 being the exception) in color until the early 1960s (Hazel, another one beginning in 1962-63), for the simple fact most viewers in the United States still didn't own color TV sets until the late 1960s and even into the early 1970s.

I hope at least some will find the above helpful and interesting. I tried to expand upon the original thread's theme of the colorized episode of Our Miss Brooks, utilizing what I already had in my head (and in my private video collection) along with more background from IMDB.com, TV.com and Wikipedia, plus some other sources, including the late Sam Frank's book (fraught as it was with more factual errors and typos than I'd ever seen in any reference book before or since), TV on Video. And doing the research for this forum contribution also actually provided me with additional sources of even more colorized TV episodes than those about which I had known previously.

Have fun reading and watching!

Unfortunately, I think most of these so-called colorizations of vintage television series' you found on the Internet Archive (and many more of which are also available on YouTube) are probably from the same source, and certainly not from CBS-Paramount nor up to the better standards of modern day colorization, such as are produced by CBS-Paramount when airing special episodes of I Love Lucy, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Andy Griffith Show, etc., during the A.E. Nielsen Company's so-called "sweeps" periods, especially at Christmastime.

These colorized renderings of vintage TV sitcoms on YouTube and Internet Archive may remind one more of the early colorizations of films done by cable TV maven and Cable News Network (CNN) and TBS/Superstation founder Ted Turner shortly after he purchased the old M-G-M film library in the early 1980s, before his company was merged with AOL-Time-Warner. But, thankfully, professional colorization technology has come at least a little way since then. There has even been an improvement between the colorizations of the I Love Lucy Christmas episode (Season Six, Episode 11), first done in 1990 with only the framing sequences, and another one done later (in 2013) of the entire episode, referencing actual photographs from the Desilu sets.

Besides CBS' Our Miss Brooks, I have also found some bleached-out, pastel "colorizations' of some other CBS sitcoms, among them December Bride and its spin-off, Pete and Gladys, as well as The Bob Cummings Show (a.k.a. Love That Bob), Private Secretary and The Tim Conway Show (even though, originally airing in 1970, it was filmed in color), all on YouTube. And after watching some of these faux colorizations, I think I almost prefer the poor quality, public domain black and white originals, which at least don't exacerbate the poor contrast any more so.

Other colorizations include ABC's Date with the Angels and The Farmer's Daughter, CBS' Hennesey and Topper, NBC's Karen (spun off earlier that same season from the sitcom trilogy 90 Bristol Court that included Harris Against the World starring Jack Klugman and Tom, Dick and Mary with Steve Franken of The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis fame and The Tab Hunter Show, and even the first-run syndicated The Great Gildersleeve starring Willard Waterman (the second radio "Gildy" after original Harold Peary) and the pilot for The Dick Van Dyke Show titled Head of the Family, starring creator and writer Carl Reiner, among several other colorized sitcom episodes.

You may view a playlist of these colorizations of older TV sitcoms here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIm4J1RCJV0hFup6VuDUJ2s8osi-6PHxs

And if you go to this other link you may see a fuller menu of more colorizations, of films and more TV episodes, including some TV dramatic series': https://www.youtube.com/user/danilbruce/playlists

All that said, I have read that CBS had experimented with actually filming some color episodes (different from colorizing, which is merely computer-coloring after the fact of filming) in the 1954-55 season, to see how at least some of their series' would appear if broadcast in color. Three CBS series' which definitely filmed color episodes were Lassie, two pilot episodes filmed--"Inheritance" (Season 1, Episode #1) and "The Well" (Season 1, Ep. #24), although only one, "The Well," filmed in color (at least so far as we know at this point), The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show and The Jack Benny Program. The color episodes' descriptions, with original airdates, are as follows (from IMDB.com and TV.com)--

Lassie - Season 1, Episodes 24 "The Well" (Original CBS airdate February 20, 1955): A snoopy inspector from the water department insists on seeing the Miller well. Leave it to Beaver, which also made its debut the first of its six seasons on CBS.

The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show - Season 5, Episode 1 "George Invites Critics to Watch First Show of Season" (Original CBS airdate October 4, 1954): George invites two newspaper reporters, while Gracie secretly invites two dozen strangers over to the house to view their opening night show.

The Jack Benny Program - Season 5, Episode 4 "Jack Takes Beavers to the Fair" (Original CBS airdate March 6, 1955): In this color episode, Jack takes a group of boys called the Beverly Hills Beavers (one of them is young Harry Shearer) to the fair. Things get off to a bad start; he has to be shot down when he holds too many helium balloons, he falls off the merry-go-round, and he succeeds in ringing the bell at the top of the strength meter only after one of the Beavers sticks a pin in his backside. Several times they run into Mr. Kitzel, who's a "utility player" working wherever he's needed. At one point, Jack steps into a lion cage, thinking the animal is Mr. Kitzel in a costume; it isn't. As Benny and the boys leave, they pass a hula girl show — and the girl is Mr. Kitzel!

I had previously read in the book TV on Video, by the late Sam Frank, that no master copy of this Benny program could be located, though. I also know of no finding yet, in color, for the first ("Inheritance") of the two Lassie episodes which served as pilots for that long-running (17 years on CBS, two years in first-run syndication) family adventure series. But I have "The Well" episode in color, from its inclusion in a special three episodes' DVD set of Lassie titled Lassie: A Mother's Love, released by Classic Media in 2006, which you may view or download from the following link, the color episode (and some comparison scenes of the monochrome and color versions) the very last episode of this three episodes' upload--https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiA3eL0ctG0

And The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show color episode is uploaded to YouTube in two versions, one shorter in running time (even with a commercial), but appearing more vivid, while the other appears colorized or at least not as vivid, but brighter. You may draw your own conclusions by viewing both versions of that Burns & Allen color episode from the following links--https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90EHgPZiP90&t=1053s

AND

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9U5oGqT0Ps


And even though NBC ultimately prevailed over rival TV network CBS in their competition for which analog color broadcasting system would be adopted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the National Television System Committee (NTSC) and become the standard used in North America until conversion to mostly digital broadcasting in 2012, at first it had been the CBS color system which was adopted. CBS had developed a field-sequential color system, a mechanically-based system that consisted of a rotating color wheel of red, blue, and green filters in front of a monochrome (black and white) camera, feeding a monochrome Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) receiver viewed through a second rotating color wheel. The two wheels were kept in phase synchronization, such that successive television fields were viewed using identical color primary filters to the one at the camera. To overcome flicker, the field rate was increased from 60 to 144 fields per second, resulting in 24 complete color frames per second. To compensate for the increased field rate within the standard 6-MHz channel, the lines per frame were reduced from 525 to 405. A 29,160-Hz line rate resulted. But this led to a basic incompatibility of the CBS color system, such that no standard monochrome receiver could display "an intelligible picture during color telecasts." In other words, viewers watching on black and white TV sets saw no picture or, if at all, a picture with distorted images.

Eventually, the CBS color TV plan was scrapped, ostensibly because of a federal government order that its development would require use of scarce resources then needed for the Korean conflict (Korean War), which rivals such as Alfred P. DuMont (of the then-fourth TV network, DuMont) claim was a face-saving plot by CBS, in any case resulting in the adoption by the FCC and NTSC of NBC's "compatible color system," an electronic-based color system which could be utilized without affecting the majority of viewers who would continue (for almost another two decades) to view TV on monochrome sets. But even though the NBC-RCA color system had been adopted in 1954, "The Peacock Network" still didn't film most of its episodic series' (Bonanza first in 1959 being the exception) in color until the early 1960s (Hazel, another one beginning in 1962-63), for the simple fact most viewers in the United States still didn't own color TV sets until the late 1960s and even into the early 1970s.

I hope at least some will find the above helpful and interesting. I tried to expand upon the original thread's theme of the colorized episode of Our Miss Brooks, utilizing what I already had in my head (and in my private video collection) along with more background from IMDB.com, TV.com and Wikipedia, plus some other sources, including the late Sam Frank's book (fraught as it was with more factual errors and typos than I'd ever seen in any reference book before or since), TV on Video. And doing the research for this forum contribution also actually provided me with additional sources of even more colorized TV episodes than those about which I had known previously.

Have fun reading and watching!



This is great information and was very well said. I agree with you that most of the colorized work that was done by companies like CBS for their "I Love Lucy" specials and Columbia for the first seasons of "Bewitched" and "I Dream Of Jeannie" and, worst of all, Ted Turner colorizing old movies for TBS, are not well done and look like they were drawn by a child. But if you have the time and patience and the right technology to do this the right way, the results can be very good and pleasing to the eye, which I have seen in this website that I talked about on a previous page which is called "Pop Colorture". If you missed it before, it's worth another look:


Pop Colorture (http://pop-colorture.com/)

I have been trying to find the three other Christmas episodes of The Bob Cummings Show (syndication title Love That Bob) for a few years now. The Christmas episode of Love That Bob most commonly in circulation is "Grandpa's Christmas Visit, which is Episode 14 from Season 2 (December 22, 1955), which I already have. But I am seeking the following other Christmas episodes--Season 1, Episode 6 - "A Wife for Christmas" (February 6, 1955), Season 2, Episode 13 - "The Christmas Spirit" (December 15, 1955) and Season 4, Episode 13 - "Bob's Christmas Party" (December 24, 1957).

If anyone reading this has any of those Christmas episodes of The Bob Cummings Show/Love That Bob, I am open to a trade for some titles from my own video collection of films and TV episodes.

I am also trying to locate a second Christmas episode of Topper. The Christmas episode I already have of that series is Episode 12 from the first season, titled "A Christmas Carol" (December 25, 1953). I am seeking Season 2, Episode 24 - "Topper's Quiet Christmas" (December 24, 1954). Likewise, if anyone reading this has that second season Christmas episode of Topper, I am open to a trade for a title from my own video collection of films and TV episodes.

And while I have the lone Christmas episode of Bachelor Father, "Deck the Halls," which is the fourth episode of the series' fifth and final season, the file of it I have is very small, only of mobile quality (320 x 240), if even that. And also, unfortunately, after I tried to convert the file to make the image larger, it merely increased the already-thick black border surrounding the video image, leaving the resolution of the video image still too tiny to watch with much enjoyment. The other problem is that my copy of that episode is very bleached-out, the whiteness too bright and not enough contrast with the black.

If anyone reading this has a better copy of the "Deck the Halls" episode of Bachelor Father, I am open to a trade for something else from my vast video collection of films and TV episodes.

Really, it is a shame that none of these three TV series' (two of them very popular in their original prime time network runs) have ever been officially remastered and released on home video and/or for on demand streaming. And also, sadly, I really fear that with most of the Baby Boomers now facing mortality, the chances to see any more vintage TV series' released for home-viewing is next to nil from here on out.



I have two of the three LOVE THAT BOB episodes you want. PM with your list and hopefully we can work out a trade!