If I were stranded on a deserted island…

Today’s Daily Post topic is: If I were stranded on a deserted island…

Well one thing is for certain, if I were stranded on a deserted island the LAST thing I would do is break out my; What Would Gilligan Do? survival guide.

I would love to travel in style like the Howells did on the show. I mean, really, do you think they had enough stuff? I think they packed enough outfits, cash, fine linens and jewels to last a lifetime.

Hey, maybe it was a conspiracy conjured up by Mr Howell to escape from a Ponzi scheme that he was partaking in. Bernie Madoff are your listening??

If I were stranded I would hope I would have a friend named Wilson, even if he was a volleyball.

Lets put kidding aside, shall we? I mean, are there ANY more deserted islands left? With todays proliferation of WiFi and the Internet and satellite phones and GPS’s how in the world would there be a deserted island?

But one thing is certain, I would make dang sure I became the Mayor of the deserted island on Foursquare in no less than three days!

Here is some quick trivia about our favorite show Gilligan’s Island:

Jerry Van Dyke turned down the role of Gilligan.

Raquel Welch auditioned for the role of Mary Anne. Man, would that have changed things…

The first season had the cast using cups that were made from real coconuts. However, they found that the cups were porous and soaked through like they were sweating. Thus in the later seasons, the coconut cups were ceramic replicas.

In the very first shot of the opening credits, the American flag over the harbor can be seen flying at half-mast. Reason: the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, shortly before the shot was filmed.

The character of the Professor was supposedly a graduate from SMU, TCU and UCLA, Thurston Howell III went to Harvard. Howell would call an inferior a “Yale Man”

The lagoon set was located at the CBS lot in Studio City, CA. If sequences there were filmed too early or too late in the day, microphones would record rush hour traffic noise from a nearby freeway.

Creator Sherwood Schwartz said that he dreamed up the idea of the show because he wanted the castaways to represent a microcosm of society and he wanted to show how they worked together to help each other when in trouble.

Gilligan saved the Skipper’s life once when they were in the Navy. A depth charge had broken loose from it’s mount and was rolling across the deck. Gilligan pushed Skipper out of the way. Skipper would later say that Gilligan didn’t save his life, he only prolonged it.

The ship’s name, S. S. Minnow, was not named for the fish but rather for Newton Minow, head of the FCC in 1961. Minow was the one who called television “America’s vast wasteland”. Sherwood Schwartz did not care for Minow so he named the soon-to-be shipwrecked ship after him.

Sherwood Schwartz said he had a first name for Gilligan if the need to use it ever arose: Willie.

The lagoon set was the same one used to make Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954).

In the backstory, The Professor had taken the three-hour tour to relax before he began writing a book, “Fun with Ferns”.

“The radio” seen in virtually every episode was a Packard-Bell AM Radio, Model AR-851. The small silver handle and telescoping antenna were added by the prop department (despite the fact that AM radios do not use telescoping antennas). The antenna was likely added to lend credence to the castaways’ ability to pick up radio signals so far from civilization.

Robert Forto | Team Ineka | Alaska Dog Works | Mushing Radio | Dog Works Radio | Denver Dog Works | Daily Post

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Dr. Robert Forto is a musher training for his first Iditarod under the Team Ineka banner and the host of the popular radio shows, Mush! You Huskies and Dog Works Radio Shows