Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

Between his stints as Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone, Fess Parker found time to do a short lived television series based on the Frank Capra classic film, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington. Ever the homespun one, the American public would not accept Parker in modern dress.

In fact as I remember it, the thing about the film Mr. Smith Goes To Washington was Jimmy Stewart as the idealistic Boy Ranger swimming with the Washington, DC sharks and besting them with a little help from a couple of friends. Stewart if you remember was an appointment to a seat because of a vacancy, the kind that were caused by death or resignation. In my home state of New York, we have such a Senator right now in Kirsten Gillebrandt, appointed to succeed Hillary Clinton because of her resignation.

Fess Parker is not a naive young man, instead he's an uncommonly shrewd and honest man who's got a couple of terms under his belt. He's the kind of commonsense fellow that used to abound in Washington, DC, Alben Barkley is the best example I could give. We have too few of them now.

I think the series should have succeeded in those idealistic days of the New Frontier. Sadly it didn't though for the reasons I listed above. Still it wasn't a bad show, judging by the couple of episodes I saw.