Planet of the Apes TV show premiere (Updated)

(Click on images to enlarge.)

Above, the TV Guide Fall '74 spotlight section highlighted the new shows, and POTA and Night Stalker were both of great interest to me, and are the ones I clipped out and saved.

September 13, 1974 was a red letter date, as it was the premiere of the most anticipated (by me) show just about ever. I was a tender skinny lad of 15, and the Apes movies had fascinated me, even though up to that point I had only recently managed to catch the first on TV in Florida while babysitting a neighboorhood kid (a situation that enabled me to catch many good movies on Saturday nights and even get paid for it). But, the POTA magazine by Marvel had just come out, and it was my main connection to the simian phenomenon. I made sure I got each issue no matter what. I'll be posting cover art, stories and comics from it quite often on this blog in the future.

Below, an ad from the same issue of TV Guide about the show. Since it was so difficult for me to see the movies, the TV show made it a whole lot easier to visit the Ape planet, and whenever I spent the weekend at Grandma's house, which was a lot that year, I was able to catch it, which elated me beyond words.

Next, a local television guide supplement in the Macon Telegraph (GA) supplied me with an ad...

...as well as an article, which I quickly clipped and put in between the pages of Apes section of my scrapbook. That section grew quite rapidly that year, for sure. Also pictured in the same page scan are some other snippets and articles from the same time period.

As with Star Trek, I was always on the alert for Apes article in any kind of magazine, tabloid or newspaper. My keen eye spotted a teen "Flip" magazine, which the cover had a text blurb that there there was an Apes article inside!!! And the article had exclamation marks after every sentence, sometimes in multiples!!! OMG!!! Embarrassed, but undeterred, I bought the mag, apologetically telling the clerk (who could care less!) that I was picking it up for my (non-existent!) sister!!! Once home, the article and photo was very quickly cut out and in my scrapbook, while the offensive teen mag was relegated to the bottom of the outside trashcan... lest it be found by my stepdad, who would have raised a real ruckus over it had he found it!!! Then, there would have been a lot of exclamation marks as he yelled!!! (Whew.)

Besides the trading cards, which I'll post images of often in the future, one of the bigger and more exciting items associated with the show was the novelizations that came out. Below is the front and back covers of the first one, which adapted two of the episodes.

It was with true joy that I snatched up the POTA series DVD set a couple of years back, and sometimes I will devote an evening to "the 70's" and watch an episode of "Apes," Kung Fu," and "Kolchack" back to back and lift my glass of blue creme soda to the memory of Grandma, who allowed me to have the freedom a kid deserves, to pursue and enjoy the things that interested me the most.

Here's a neat POTA TV show fan site that you'll enjoy visiting.