LJ Idol X - Week [5] - F Trump
Jan. 11th, 2017 02:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
penpusherAs we are on the verge of a new presidential administration in the United States, many people are concerned, even fearful about what the look, the feel, the tenet of this next chapter of the American story will resemble. To me, a television trivia expert, the answer is very clear. It’s…
"F Troop"
“F Troop” was an American situation comedy which was broadcast on the ABC Television Network from September 14, 1965 to April 6, 1967.
As the US Civil War was concluding, a private named Wilton Parmenter (played by Ken Berry) was sent from the battlefront to accomplish a task suitable to his capabilities: retrieve the laundry of an unnamed Union General (who looked suspiciously like Ulysses S. Grant, but was never specifically identified).
Despite his lowly rank, Parmenter was a part of a very important military family - all officers and all named for gods: his brothers Achilles, Hercules, Jupiter and his father, Thor. How he got saddled with the name Wilton is just one unexplained element of the series.
Because of Parmenter’s spring allergies during his fateful laundry run, he sneezed at an opportune moment, a commanding officer overheard it, assumed the private yelled “Charge!” and got his troops to follow along into what was, we were told, The Battle of Appomattox Court House.
Parmenter, Mid-Sneeze
Having bumbled his way into military success (and likely because of his good surname), he was awarded a command: He would become the Captain of Fort Courage, a military post out west, often assumed to be in or near Kansas, because of their proximity to “Indian Territory,” or what is now known as Oklahoma - Although it was suggested that it might have been three time zones from Parmenter’s native Philadelphia (as they played “Reveille” at ten AM instead of the customary seven AM).
As a commander, Parmenter was a no-nothing, a greenhorn when it came to leading, and additionally was a clumsy oaf, needing to consult his military manual at every opportunity. He oftentimes tripped or fell over every obstacle in his way, sometimes specifically because he was reading that manual!
When Parmenter arrived at his new post, he met his two non-commissioned officers: Sergeant Morgan O’Rourke (Forrest Tucker) and Corporal Randolph Agarn (Larry Storch). These two were the most crooked members of Fort Courage, running a sideline business called “O’Rourke Enterprises” and siphoning off military funding to help support it, all as part of their get rich schemes.
Sgt. O'Rourke and Cpl. Agarn
Also, O’Rourke and Agarn were responsible for fabricating a war with a group of local Indians, the Hekawi tribe, even though the tribe’s chief, Wild Eagle (Frank de Kova) was actually O’Rourke’s business partner! It was another method of guaranteeing a constant flow of money and supplies from Washington DC into the fort. They covered this deception with constant flattery of the Captain’s ego, continually brownnosing Parmenter until he forgot what he intended to criticize or examine.
Chief Wild Eagle
(As an aside, by today’s standards it’s difficult to miss the political incorrectness that the “natives” on the program were all played by white actors… de Kova was Italian American and even long-time comedians Don Rickles and Milton Berle both made guest appearances as Indians on the show.)
Milton Berle as a Native American
Additionally, the soldiers that populated Parmenter’s troop were among the most unprepared and inept of any in the army, making the people he was charged to lead the absolute worst to accomplish any job to which they were assigned. Examples: A Bugler who didn’t know how to play his instrument. A lookout man who was severely myopic. And a translator who could speak with the local tribes fluently in their native tongues, but either spoke no English or spoke it with an unintelligible German accent.
Dobbs: the bugler who couldn't play, even without an arrow in his bell
Finally, there was one of the townsfolk who dealt directly with the fort personnel: Jane Angelica Thrift, (Melody Patterson) informally known as Wrangler Jane, who ran the trading post in town. Wrangler Jane adored Parmenter and felt he could do no wrong. Practically at first sight, she seemed intent on a romance with the Captain, and though he always reacted flirtatiously back, he managed to keep her at arm’s length for the duration of the series. Young, blonde, intelligent and an accomplished businesswoman with a tough as nails attitude, Wrangler Jane seemed far more prepared than the Captain to be a leader.
Wrangler Jane - What a pistol.
Typical plots centered on Parmenter’s ineptitude, providing moments of slapstick and/or wordplay, some high-ranking official coming for an inspection of Fort Courage, causing O’Rourke and Agarn to cover their conflict of interest business dealings, some new scheme O’Rourke hatched up with the Hekawi tribe to make even more money but was likely as illegal as their previous plots, or Wrangler Jane and Wilton dealing with someone or something that disrupted their chaste relationship.
Parmenter, Jane and his always handy handbook
Yes, this parallel of a long-ago TV comedy won't really resemble the incoming governing body. How our reality will progress and where we will be at the end of it, none of us can say with any certainty. That’s why we have to laugh, we have to treat this fear with humor and love. It’s up to us, now. And that’s why “F Troop” does provide us with these final hopeful points:
First, Captain Parmenter was trying to be a good leader. Of course, he wasn’t prepared and he was an excruciatingly slow learner. So, he was taken advantage of by many of the people around him, most especially his sergeant and corporal, who were knowingly breaking the law for their own benefit and constantly did things permitting the deception to continue. Parmenter never took serious notice of his staff’s shortcomings. Instead, he just accepted them, which kept the fort functioning at a high level of incompetence. In other words, the Captain’s own personality traits allowed the worst to occur.
See? Captain Parmenter is paying attention just as much as he can!
But, perhaps the most important observation is that “F Troop” was cancelled after its second season, meaning that the American public tired of this exercise in futility almost as quickly as it began. When the time came, ABC filled its timeslot with a much more believable and much more down to earth show…
Sally Field in “The Flying Nun.”
This thinkpost was written for LJ Idol X using the prompt: Fear is the heart of love
"F Troop"
“F Troop” was an American situation comedy which was broadcast on the ABC Television Network from September 14, 1965 to April 6, 1967.
As the US Civil War was concluding, a private named Wilton Parmenter (played by Ken Berry) was sent from the battlefront to accomplish a task suitable to his capabilities: retrieve the laundry of an unnamed Union General (who looked suspiciously like Ulysses S. Grant, but was never specifically identified).
Despite his lowly rank, Parmenter was a part of a very important military family - all officers and all named for gods: his brothers Achilles, Hercules, Jupiter and his father, Thor. How he got saddled with the name Wilton is just one unexplained element of the series.
Because of Parmenter’s spring allergies during his fateful laundry run, he sneezed at an opportune moment, a commanding officer overheard it, assumed the private yelled “Charge!” and got his troops to follow along into what was, we were told, The Battle of Appomattox Court House.
Parmenter, Mid-Sneeze
Having bumbled his way into military success (and likely because of his good surname), he was awarded a command: He would become the Captain of Fort Courage, a military post out west, often assumed to be in or near Kansas, because of their proximity to “Indian Territory,” or what is now known as Oklahoma - Although it was suggested that it might have been three time zones from Parmenter’s native Philadelphia (as they played “Reveille” at ten AM instead of the customary seven AM).
As a commander, Parmenter was a no-nothing, a greenhorn when it came to leading, and additionally was a clumsy oaf, needing to consult his military manual at every opportunity. He oftentimes tripped or fell over every obstacle in his way, sometimes specifically because he was reading that manual!
When Parmenter arrived at his new post, he met his two non-commissioned officers: Sergeant Morgan O’Rourke (Forrest Tucker) and Corporal Randolph Agarn (Larry Storch). These two were the most crooked members of Fort Courage, running a sideline business called “O’Rourke Enterprises” and siphoning off military funding to help support it, all as part of their get rich schemes.
Sgt. O'Rourke and Cpl. Agarn
Also, O’Rourke and Agarn were responsible for fabricating a war with a group of local Indians, the Hekawi tribe, even though the tribe’s chief, Wild Eagle (Frank de Kova) was actually O’Rourke’s business partner! It was another method of guaranteeing a constant flow of money and supplies from Washington DC into the fort. They covered this deception with constant flattery of the Captain’s ego, continually brownnosing Parmenter until he forgot what he intended to criticize or examine.
Chief Wild Eagle
(As an aside, by today’s standards it’s difficult to miss the political incorrectness that the “natives” on the program were all played by white actors… de Kova was Italian American and even long-time comedians Don Rickles and Milton Berle both made guest appearances as Indians on the show.)
Milton Berle as a Native American
Additionally, the soldiers that populated Parmenter’s troop were among the most unprepared and inept of any in the army, making the people he was charged to lead the absolute worst to accomplish any job to which they were assigned. Examples: A Bugler who didn’t know how to play his instrument. A lookout man who was severely myopic. And a translator who could speak with the local tribes fluently in their native tongues, but either spoke no English or spoke it with an unintelligible German accent.
Dobbs: the bugler who couldn't play, even without an arrow in his bell
Finally, there was one of the townsfolk who dealt directly with the fort personnel: Jane Angelica Thrift, (Melody Patterson) informally known as Wrangler Jane, who ran the trading post in town. Wrangler Jane adored Parmenter and felt he could do no wrong. Practically at first sight, she seemed intent on a romance with the Captain, and though he always reacted flirtatiously back, he managed to keep her at arm’s length for the duration of the series. Young, blonde, intelligent and an accomplished businesswoman with a tough as nails attitude, Wrangler Jane seemed far more prepared than the Captain to be a leader.
Wrangler Jane - What a pistol.
Typical plots centered on Parmenter’s ineptitude, providing moments of slapstick and/or wordplay, some high-ranking official coming for an inspection of Fort Courage, causing O’Rourke and Agarn to cover their conflict of interest business dealings, some new scheme O’Rourke hatched up with the Hekawi tribe to make even more money but was likely as illegal as their previous plots, or Wrangler Jane and Wilton dealing with someone or something that disrupted their chaste relationship.
Parmenter, Jane and his always handy handbook
Yes, this parallel of a long-ago TV comedy won't really resemble the incoming governing body. How our reality will progress and where we will be at the end of it, none of us can say with any certainty. That’s why we have to laugh, we have to treat this fear with humor and love. It’s up to us, now. And that’s why “F Troop” does provide us with these final hopeful points:
First, Captain Parmenter was trying to be a good leader. Of course, he wasn’t prepared and he was an excruciatingly slow learner. So, he was taken advantage of by many of the people around him, most especially his sergeant and corporal, who were knowingly breaking the law for their own benefit and constantly did things permitting the deception to continue. Parmenter never took serious notice of his staff’s shortcomings. Instead, he just accepted them, which kept the fort functioning at a high level of incompetence. In other words, the Captain’s own personality traits allowed the worst to occur.
See? Captain Parmenter is paying attention just as much as he can!
But, perhaps the most important observation is that “F Troop” was cancelled after its second season, meaning that the American public tired of this exercise in futility almost as quickly as it began. When the time came, ABC filled its timeslot with a much more believable and much more down to earth show…
Sally Field in “The Flying Nun.”
This thinkpost was written for LJ Idol X using the prompt: Fear is the heart of love
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Date: 2017-01-11 09:42 pm (UTC)