Lassie's saga has touched books, film, TV. comics, merchandise
(remember those beloved lunch boxes?), and almost every other pop
culture medium. She is credited with popularizing the rough-coated
Collie and has become an icon representing courage, Loyalty, and an
uncanny ability to "get help,"
1938: Eric Knight publishes his short story "Lassie Come-Home" in
the Saturday Evening Post.
1940: An expanded version of the story appears in book form and
becomes a popular bestseller. Set in Knight's native Yorkshire,
Lassie Come Home tells the story of a loyal Collie who travels
hundreds of miles to return to the boy she loves.
1941: MGM purchases the film rights to Knight's story for $1
0,000. Simultaneously, Robert "Ruddn Weatherwax, a respected Hollywood
dog trainer. acquires "Pal", a rambunctious male Collie who had
frustrated the training efforts of his previous owner.
featuring the
beautiful young Elizabeth TayLor and Pal, is reLeased in theaters and
goes on to become one the top-grossing films of the year.
1940s-1960s. Dell Comics publishes a bimonthly lassie comic that has
America's favorite Collie living with her new family in South America,
which is where these comics are sold, In 1956, however, lassie suddenly
develops an allergy to a certain kind of South American plant. and she
is tearfully shipped to the Miller family in the United States, much to
the relief of the publishers, who felt they could sell more copies if
they tied their story Line into the successful TV series. These comics
are highly collectible today, as is much lassie memorabilia and
merchandise that was manufactured during this time, including action
figures, lunch boxes, dolls, clocks, candy molds-you name it,
1945-1953: Lassie continues to resonate with U.S. and British
audiences as the film gives birth to a Utter of six sequels plus various
other non-sequel films starring lassie which continue to be released
well into the 19805 (many are available on DVD, and the Collie becomes
the mythic embodiment of the kind of faith and determination for which
audiences hungered in postwar years. lassie's talents knew no bounds as
she (Pal and all the succeeding Collies who played lassie have been
male) took on social roles, facilitating romances and rescuing orphans,
in addition to performing daring rescues and part-time jobs as
babysitter, shepherd, messenger, firefighter. and others. At the height
of his career, Pal was earning $4,000 a week.
1947-1950: A lassie drama hits the radio airwaves. The
fifteen-minute weekly anthology had lassie playing a different dog each
week. Aired first on the ABC radio network before being moved to NBC,
the program featured the real Lassie, who provided the barking and
growling, while an actor handled the whining and other dog noises.
195': Whereas up to this point the Lassie stories have taken
place in Great Britain, she becomes a full-fledged American idol as
Lassie the TV series, about a farm family struggling through hard
times, debuts. The show's rural setting and moving rescue stories
touched the hearts of viewers, many of whom could identify with the
hearth-and-home values and themes that Lassie espoused, and the
depiction of an American boyhood helped further shape the coming of age
of baby boomers. Jeff Miller (played by Tommy Retig until 1957) played
the dog's original owner, eventually turning over the leash to the
orphaned Timmy Martin (Jon Provost). Once Timmy outgrew the role in the
midsixties. Lassie became the province of a series of park rangers, and
she spent the rest of her TV career in civic service.
1971: The program's relevance diminishes during a time of intense
social and political change, and the Lassie TV series is
canceled, airing only in syndication for the next three years,
1975: Cartoon rights to the character of Lassie are sold. and
almost two dozen animated features are produced for TV programming.
1981: An attempt to revive the TV series, to be based on Earl
Hamner's made-far-TV
