Fun Finds: 1969 Spanish TV Cards

Marked on the back "Tele Banco Cancion," these cards showcase TV personalities popular in 1969 Spain. We've seen things like this before at Poseidon's Underworld, to the point where I nearly opted not to share these, but there seemed to be enough uniqueness with many of the photos to offset the familiarity of some others. This is not a whole set, just 41 (and I don't know how many there were to start with!) I also don't know the significance of the "suits" (cup, sun, sword, twig/branch), but perhaps a kindly Spanish reader will enlighten us in the comments section!

First up is Linda Cristal of The High Chaparral (1967-1971), a popular western concerning the inhabitants of a sprawling Arizona ranch.

Blue-eyed Mark Slade portrayed Cristal's stepson on Chaparral.

Cameron Mitchell was Cristal's fiery brother-in-law.

Leif Erickson, Cristal's on-screen husband, was the top-billed star of Chaparral and owner of the ranch.

Tony Franciosa was one of three stars who figured into The Name of the Game (1968-1971), a unique 90-minute drama series set in the world of publishing that allowed each lead actor to be the primary focus of his own episodes while sharing common supporting characters each week. By the way, Franciosa (who was fired early in the final season) did NOT have blue eyes as the tinting on this card (strongly) suggests!

Get Smart (1965-1970), a broadly comic spy series, starred Don Adams as Agent 86. (The show is noted here as "Superagente 86.")

Barbara Feldon was Adams' co-agent and love interest (and eventual wife on the show.)

I'm presenting these cards in numerical order and while many times the series' stars and shows are close together, this time there was interruption for some reason! So back to The Name of the Game with now-brown-eyed Tony Franciosa, Gene Barry and Robert Stack. At no time did all three of these gents appear in an episode together, though sometimes an installment would include a cameo by one of the other costars (though never from Stack.)

Raymond Burr's successful follow-up series to Perry Mason (1957-1966) was Ironside (1967-1975), about the crime-solving done by a wheelchair-bound police detective. Don Galloway was one of his faithful, dependable cohorts.

Don Mitchell began on Ironside as Burr's personal assistant, but through the course of the series became a policeman and ultimately a lawyer!

Back in Name of the Game territory, we find Gene Barry, but this photo is from his earlier series Burke's Law (1963-1966)!

Somewhere along the line, the above error must have been corrected because this card, featuring the same star, suit and number, now has Barry as he looked during Name of the Game.

Dick York, the harried husband of Bewitched, had played the iconic role from 1964, but 1969 would mark the year that health problems, principally with his back, led to the part being recast with Dick Sargent.

What a peculiar choice of photo for Agnes Moorehead of Bewitched (1964-1972.) While on the series, she was noted for a flaming red hairdo, often elaborately styled. So why this earlier, mis-tinted rendition?

We recently had some fun with the all grown-up Darby Hinton, but here he is as a rather enthusiastic tyke in Daniel Boone (1964-1970.)

At this time, Darrin McGavin was starring in a lesser-known show called The Outsider (1968-1969) about a down & out ex-con turned private investigator.

There have been a lot of viewers out there who got into a lather over young Luke Halpin of Flipper (1964-1967), but for me it was always the dad of the show Brian Kelly.

Tommy Norden, the younger of the show's two boys, only had a scant amount of screen credits after the series' demise.

Mike Connors (strangely noted as "Michael" here) scored a considerable hit with the private eye show Mannix (1965-1975.)

Not sure why Henry Darrow of High Chaparral was so out of sequence from his costars who were featured at the of this page. His role on the show was that of Linda Cristal's brother. Did you know that many years later he had a memorable guest role on The Golden Girls (in with gray hair and mustache) as Fidel Santiago, who simultaneously dates both Blanche and Sophia?

This is the cast of Cimarron Strip (1967-1968), a 90-minute western which starred Stuart Whitman as a frontier sheriff and had Percy Herbert, Jill Townsend and Randy Boone as his pals.

There was a time when execs wanted to (and did!) remove strongman Peter Lupus from Mission: Impossible because they thought him expendable, but viewers disagreed and he was soon reinstated full time, winding up working on the series from its debut in 1966 to its finale in 1973. Only Greg Morris appeared in more episodes.

These tykes, Marc Copage (misspelled "Mark" here) and Michael Link, were regular cast members on Julia (1968-1971), which was a groundbreaking series in that its lead character, a black female, was a professional, independent lady and not a domestic or other subservient type as was then the norm.

Breaking the chain of continuity again is Daniel Boone's Patricia Blair. The eye-popping redhead played Boone's wife Rebecca for the entire run of the series, though the first couple of seasons were in black & white.

Now back to Julia! If Marc Coppage was in any way let down by having his name misspelled you can just imagine how Miss Diahann Carroll would have felt had she ever seen this card (which is unlikely -- unless you're out there Miss C?! Drop in and say hi!) The fondly-remembered series about a widowed nurse with a young son was cancelled when Carroll finally had had her fill of the show's being criticized for not accurately reflecting black lives in their actual state. (A situation Bill Cosby overcame with ease about a dozen years later with The Cosby Show, 1984-1992.)

Suddenly, we're back to Mission: Impossible again, this time with Martin Landau. Landau played master of disguises Rollin Hand for the first three seasons, but departed (with this wife Barbara Bain) in a contract dispute

This little-known sitcom (1968-1970) The Good Guys starred a post-Gilligan's Island (1964-1967) Bob Denver along with Herb Edelman, who Golden Girls fans will know as Dorothy's ex-husband Stan.

This is really Desi Arnaz Jr, during his time on his mother's series Here's Lucy (1968-1972.) For all intents and purposes, Arnaz retired from screen acting in the mid-1980s and eventually segued into behind-the-scenes theatrical endeavors.

Although arguably best known for Dynasty (1981-1989), John Forsythe had previously enjoyed success on Bachelor Father (1957-1962) and to a lesser degree with To Rome with Love (1969-1971) about an American teacher and widowed father of three girls working in Italy's famed city.

Now we find Lucie Arnaz (misspelled Luci) of Here's Lucy (1968-1974.) Unlike her brother, she continued to work on television and in the occasional movie.

Sadly, we don't get close-ups of Martin Milner and especially square-jawed Kent McCord of Adam-12 (1968-1975.) The card amusingly refers to the show as "Area -12!"

Linda Thorson is a Canadian actress who burst onto the scene as Diana Rigg's replacement on The Avengers (1968-1969), though that gig turned out to be short-lived. The show was cancelled that year. However, she went on to an active career that continues to the present.

When it comes to Ron Ely of Tarzan (1966-1968), we prefer him practically naked in his loincloth as opposed to wearing a sportcoat and slacks, but this is an amusing picture of him at an NBC event with "Cheeta" on his lap.

Without the caption, we'd have been hard-pressed to recognize Susan St. James from her role on the aforementioned The Name of the Game (1968-1971)! As the (blonde!) stalwart secretary at the show's publishing house, she appeared in various episodes of the show no matter which of the star trio of actors was being featured that week.

Whoever trimmed this photo of Michael Landon of Bonanza (1959-1973) did a shitty job along the right side (his left)!

Though it's true that by 1969 Robert Young was starring in Marcus Welby, M.D. (1969-1976), this photo is from his earlier series Father Knows Best (1954-1960.)

Bonanza's proud papa Lorne Greene remained with the series while one son (Pernell Roberts) left and another (Dan Blocker) died, with various surrogate guys filling in here and there along the way.

Whoever made the decision to put Chad Everett of Medical Center (1969-1976) on a card with "wood" was a smart cookie!  LOL

Typically, the actor made famous by playing Dr. McCoy on Star Trek (1966-1969) has his first name together like this: DeForest Kelley. Interesting that the show's name is "La Conquista del Espacio" ("Conquest of Space" - ? - which infers a tad different meaning than merely trekking through it and exploring...)

Here's a cast photo from The Courtship of Eddie's Father (1969-1972), based upon the 1963 movie of the same name which had starred Glenn Ford and Ron Howard.

And, lastly, we're back to Medical Center with James Daly, who was the father of Tyne and Tim, successful actors in their own right. Have a great weekend and we'll be back with more from the depths of The Underworld soon!