This report was initially broadcast September 19, 2021.
That tall, amiable sheriff and his little boy, Opie, heading to a fishing gap on the outskirts of Mayberry, North Carolina, in the beginning of "The Andy Griffith Present," had been truly strolling alongside a lake in Beverly Hills, California.
Ron Howard, the actor who performed Opie, is now one among Hollywood's high administrators. A lot of the different stars – Andy Griffith; Don Knotts, who performed his deputy, Barney Fife; and the actors who performed Aunt Bee and Floyd the Barber – they've all handed on. In spite of everything, it has been 54 years since Andy left the present.
So, it could come as one thing of a shock to study that Mayberry is doing simply positive, although its precise title is Mount Ethereal, and its solely real hyperlink to "The Andy Griffith Present" is that Griffith was born and grew up right here.
"Andy Griffith, God bless him, if he had not been born on this specific little city, we would not be standing right here having that dialog," stated Randy Collins, president and CEO of the Higher Mount Ethereal Chamber of Commerce.
He is recalling when North Carolina's tobacco and textile industries had the stuffing knocked out of them: "After the mills closed, I feel plenty of the city fathers and the enterprise homeowners received collectively and stated, 'Hey, you already know, what about this Mayberry factor? Possibly we will do one thing with it.' And companies had been born, or reinvented."
"It is somewhat weird, is not it?" requested "Sunday Morning" senior contributor Ted Koppel. "It went off the air greater than 50 years in the past."
"Sure, sir."
"It captured a actuality that by no means was."
"True; Mayberry is fictitious," Collins stated. "Most everybody is aware of that! Besides perhaps a number of the rabid followers of the present. They imagine it is actual."
And, let or not it's stated, the city is not doing a complete lot to undermine the phantasm. Cease by at Wally's filling station, and you may get a journey round city in a classic Ford Galaxy squad automotive. Lately there's a complete fleet of them carting vacationers round city.
Collins stated, "We're continuously different ways in which we will promote the neighborhood, 'trigger we all know the Mayberry technology will not be right here perpetually. However now with streaming tv, Andy shall be perpetually with us, and we hope a youthful technology will decide it up."
As if on cue, the Foster household, from Pomeroy, Ohio, confirmed up. It's no exaggeration to say that this re-creation verges, for the Fosters, on being a nationwide monument.
Koppel requested the Fosters, "You watch 'The Andy Griffith Present' 4 hours a day?"
"Greater than that," stated Bobby Foster.
"What do you imply, 'greater than that'?"
"It is on generally early within the morning," Sarah Foster defined.
"Aren't you afraid that after a month or two of watching 4 hours or extra a day, that you simply're gonna flip his little mind to mush?"
"No!" younger Isaiah replied.
"Oh, no!" stated Sarah. "Not on the subject of good, healthful reveals."
"Inform me why you prefer it a lot?"
"Good, clear comedy enjoyable," stated Bobby.
"Yeah, good, clear comedy," Sarah stated. "Has morals, values. You do not see that so much at present in TV."
Down on Important Avenue, the place vacationers peek into Floyd's barber store or seize a chunk on the Snappy Lunch diner ("We drove from Louisiana for the well-known pork chop sandwich!" stated one man), you hear the identical theme.
One man instructed Koppel, "I feel the generations now lengthy for that simplicity of the episodes of Andy being actual together with his son about stealing or doing the correct factor, and as a godless society that we see at present is longing for easy life. Again when neighbors had been neighbors, and so they offered for everyone else.
"What do you see, Mr. Koppel? Let me flip it again on you. I do know you are doing this, however what do you see?"
"What you are saying is true of sure individuals," stated Koppel. "In case you had been Black within the '60s, issues weren't all that good for you."
"That is true. True."
"In case you had been a Vietnam vet coming again, issues weren't all that good for you."
"Spat on and hated, yeah," stated the person.
What truly occurred throughout the years this system first performed – the Cuban missile disaster, the assassination of President Kennedy, the Vietnam Warfare, marches by African Individuals for the correct to vote – these occasions by no means intruded inside Mayberry's imaginary city limits.
Mayberry is the place greater than 30 million Individuals every week went to escape actuality, which is why it is unusual to seek out so many individuals half a century later looking for what made America nice in a replica of a city that by no means was.
And, as Randy Collins of the Chamber of Commerce acknowledges, African Individuals had been all however invisible on "The Andy Griffith Present." "There have been only a few talking components," he stated.
[Actually, only one: Rockne Tarkington played Opie's football coach, Flip Conroy, in one episode.]
Collins stated, "In case you watch carefully within the crowd scenes, I feel Andy and others on the present pushed to verify that there have been individuals of shade within the crowds, however you must look carefully."
Maggie Rosser is in her 90s now. She and her youthful brother and sister had been all born right here in Mount Ethereal, left, and returned.
"I moved again right here, 1973," Rosser stated. "So, we needed a sandwich. And went in our Important Avenue, and so they served us, however we needed to exit and eat."
"They would not allow you to sit?" requested Koppel. "So, even in 1973, or somewhat bit after?"
"Slightly bit after, sure," she stated.
Bobby Scales, additionally born and raised in Mount Ethereal, has a transparent reminiscence of race relations within the '60s: "Blacks knew the place they belonged, and Whites knew the place you belonged, too!" he laughed. "And the whole lot was segregated."
Evelyn Scales Thompson (Bobby's twin) stated, "Black individuals did not exist. In making these applications, it was for mainly the White inhabitants."
She believes she understands the continuing recognition of this system: "It is interesting to people who find themselves not conversant in small cities. And what Andy has projected is a quiet, peaceable city with everyone joyful. Everyone's searching for peace."
"So, Mayberry, Mount Ethereal, good place to dwell?" requested Koppel.
"It is a good place," Thompson replied. "If it weren't residence, I'd not be right here."
"Unwrap that for me! I imply, your property is the place you make it."
"Sure, however not the place you had been born and your reminiscences and household."
"But when your reminiscences are principally reminiscences of being handled because the lesser, why would you wanna keep?"
"Effectively, I wasn't handled as a lesser in my household," Thompson replied. "I've household historical past. Our property is there, and reminiscences of childhood remains to be very sturdy. I am very glad being retired within the place the place I grew up."
"By some means," Koppel stated, "Mount Ethereal turns into extra complicated with every dialog."
"I wager! I wager! Sure, certainly," Thompson stated.
Mount Ethereal is a spot the place fantasy and actuality intersect.
Koppel requested Collins, "If I wave the political thermometer throughout the brow of Mount Ethereal, do individuals right here imagine that Joe Biden is the authentic president?"
"That is a very good query," he replied. "Our former president had plenty of assist right here. In case you took a ballot, that will most likely not lean in our present president's favor."
As for the guests? For twenty bucks a pop, they get to journey on a trolley automotive tour of Mount Ethereal. Typically a fella in a deputy's uniform (who does look somewhat like Barney Fife) rides alongside. The Elvis impersonator was an unexplained bonus – as was your entire crew from "CBS Sunday Morning."
Koppel requested the trolley's riders, "I do know you got here right here to have a very good time and to not discuss politics. However let me simply ask you, as a matter of curiosity, what number of of you assume we had a good election?"
"No approach!" stated one man carrying an American flag T-shirt with the phrase "Patriotism."
"I noticed two palms go up," Koppel stated. "So, is it honest to say the remainder of you assume that it was not a good election?"
"No, no. No, it wasn't. I do not assume it was in any respect," stated the person.
One other man stated, "I feel there was plenty of voter fraud. It is by no means been confirmed. There's been folks that's voted that is been lifeless 15 years. I feel it is extra the mail-in poll stuff. You do not know how a lot of those who had been duplicated, triplicated. The entire bit."
A 3rd man stated, "Look what number of lifeless individuals voted for Biden."
Koppel requested, "One query, it is a critical query and I do know you all will take it critically: Inform me what you assume occurred on January 6 at Congress?"
The primary man stated, "They confirmed truckloads of folks that they had been bringing in for this. It was all staged. And that is how that began. They even confirmed photos of it on the information, about these automobiles coming in with all these BLM individuals."
One other man, who believed the election was honest, known as the January 6 assault, "A shame on our nation."
"Whose fault was it?" Koppel requested. The person smiled.
One rider did blame Donald Trump, however he was in a definite minority. A girl stated, "I feel it was staged. We have been to plenty of the Trump rallies, and I do not perceive why they're focusing a lot on that one subject when there's so many cities which are being burned down daily by protesters. It is imagined to be peaceable. However it's all centered on holding these two individuals."
"Homicide and kill everyone there – grasp 'em, put 'em in jail," stated the primary man.
One other girl stated, "We do not even watch information on TV anymore. We do not really feel like we're being instructed the reality. And we discover our fact in different methods. And I will not say what these different methods are, however I really feel like we're not being instructed the reality, as a result of we're attempting to be swayed in a route that we all know is just not the correct route."
"I will not be offended," Koppel stated. "I have been a journalist all my life. When President Trump talked in regards to the press being the enemy of the individuals …"
"They're!" the girl replied. "And I really like President Trump. And I really like that man. I do."
A 3rd girl stated, "I simply hope when this airs, it will not present Southerners as a bunch of dumb idiots. Like so many components of the nation do, you already know? We now have plenty of love in our hearts. We love our nation. We love our fellow man. And if the remainder of the nation felt like that, it might be a greater place."
A fourth man requested, "Mr. Koppel, can I say one thing? This dialog about politics and division is what individuals come right here to get away from. We do not care what shade you might be. We do not even care what your politics are. We simply need to be good neighbors and deal with everyone alike. And that is why they're coming right here."
The Barney Fife impersonator added, "That is what America must be."
And, when the script was written in Hollywood, that is the way in which it was.
For more information:
- visitmayberry.com (Mount Ethereal Guests Middle)
- Andy Griffith Museum, Mt. Ethereal, N.C.
- The Snappy Lunch
- Wally's Service Station
- Mount Ethereal Squad Automobile Excursions
- Good Time Trolley
- Higher Mount Ethereal Chamber of Commerce
- Watch "The Andy Griffith Present" on Me TV and Amazon Prime
Story produced by Dustin Stephens. Editor: Ed Givnish.