This Week's Classic Game Show TV Milestones

[AaronHandy3]

JULY 4, 1988

America celebrated Her 212th birthday.

Also, CBS dusted off the old Goodson-Todman favorite, Family Feud, and returned it to the air with a vengeance--and with a new set and a new host, Ray Combs. On this first new episode of Family Feud in 3 years, Combs wished America a "Happy Birthday!," and added that "I'm real excited about bein' on CBS and hostin' this show. Uh, I have been studying all of the great CBS shows, I think I'm prepared, so, if you're ready, let's have the first item up for bids!" In this first game, The Drozdowski Family (Norm, Beth, Jennifer, Frank and Tom) took on The Holtrust Family (Steve, Pam [she is such a babe!], Ed, Julie and Mark) The first question on this new Feud was "Who is the most macho man in movies today?", for which the most popular answer was "Sylvester Stallone" (Frank Drozdowski got it). The Holtrusts won this first game with $444, and capped an extra $5000 in the Fast Money round.

Not a bad day's work on the first show!

A new syndicated primetime edition was premiered an immediate 2 months after the CBS Daytime debut. In its 5-year sojourn on CBS, Family Feud would be expanded to 60 minutes with the addition of The Bullseye Round to it and renamed The Family Feud Challenge on June 29, 1992 (The Bullseye Round was added to the syndie version that fall, when it was renamed The New Family Feud), then it went into reruns on March 29, 1993 and was canned on September 10, 1993 when it was decided that CBS give back the hour to their local affiliates. The syndie edition kicked around for a year after that; after which, Combs was replaced by original Family Feud host Richard Dawson! (It was almost like the 10th season of the original Family Feud with Dick Dawson that never happened.)


JULY 6, 1973

The Dating Game, a Chuck Barris Enterprises game show revolving around three young men who vied for a date with a young woman who was hidden from their view, hosted by San Francisco radio personality Jim Lange, went to its reward on ABC Daytime, after 8 years and 2,035 shows.

The Dating Game was the first foray into game shows for producer Chuck Barris, a former songwriter (he composed "Palisades Park," a Top 10 hit for Freddy Cannon in 1962). His production firm churned out such memorable favorites as The Newlywed Game (which first appeared on ABC 7 months after Dating's debut), The Family Game, and the ever-irrepressible Gong Show! ABC gave The Dating Game a primetime edition, seen between October 6, 1966 and January 17, 1970 every Saturday night (sometimes leading in for nighttime versions of other popular ABC Daytime mainstays Let's Make A Deal and The Newlywed Game). Its popularity in the 1960s was big enough to inspire an ice-cream flavor (pink ice cream with diced dates [get it?!] and butter toasted pecans) by Baskin-Robbins!

A daily syndicated edition, launched in the fall as The New Dating Game, carried the show for an extra season. It has seen several resurgences on TV—all syndicated—in 1978, 1986, and 1997.