Since history began, horses have fired the human imagination. From the cave paintings at Lascaux and the mythological centaur, to Alexander the Great’s Bucephalus and Don Quixote’s “Rosinante,” horses have held a special place in the human heart since antiquity. In our own day, memorable movies like Black Stallion and National Velvet movie stars like Trigger and Silver, and real-life thoroughbreds like Seattle Slew and Whirlaway, testify to the enduring affection for noble steeds. Then there are the steeds who aren’t so noble. Like Mister Ed, for example.
Mister Ed, which ran from 1961 through 1966, is ridiculed by critics as an example of American popular culture at its silliest. Those critics are absolutely correct. Of course it’s silly. It’s a sitcom. If you want high art, go see Equus. Besides, whatever one may think of sitcoms as a whole, “Ed” was undeniably a groundbreaking show for the genre. Seriously. It was. Mister Ed won the 1963 Golden Globe for best TV show and established the template for dozens of sitcoms to come.
The set-up was simple: Wilbur Post (Alan Young), an architect in LA, and his requisite lovely wife Carol (Connie Hines) move into a new home. Wilbur soon discovers a talking horse in the barn. Good news. Yet, there’s a catch. (Isn’t there always?) The horse will only speak to Wilbur, so his existence has to be kept under wraps. Throw in another standard of the genre, the nosy neighbor– in this case a tightwad named Roger Addison — then watch the wackiness ensue.
This essential premise has been repeated continually through four decades of American television: In a normal-looking setting, a specially-gifted being must be kept a secret from the rest of the world. (What the popularity of this motif says about the American psyche is hard to say exactly. I’m sure it has something to do with Freud.)
For Ed, that special being is a horse who talks and, for that matter, surfs. For shows that followed immediately there-after, like Bewitched and I Dream of Genie, the premise was hot babes with magic powers that had to be hidden from nosy neighbors; Gladys Kravitz and Dr. Bellows, respectively. Network television then embarked on a spree of plots with an extraterrestrial premise, stretching from Mork & Mindy in the 70’s to Alf in the 80’s to Third Rock from the Sun in the 90’s. Did I mention the throwback occult series Sabrina the Teenage Witch? Well, you get the idea.
And it all started with a talking horse? Of course. Of course. Ed was created by Arthur Lubin, a Hollywood stalwart who directed projects as diverse as Abbot and Costello Join the Navy and the Claude Rains version of Phantom of the Opera. Also in Lubins’s oeuvre was a series of films about a talking mule named Francis. There were seven in all, most starring Donald O’Conner. The series’ success helped Lubin convince CBS that a similarly wacky premise would work on TV.
Ed was played by a palomino named “Bamboo Harvester.” Foaled in 1949 in El Monte, California, Bamboo started his days as a parade horse, but the intelligent equine was destined for greater things. He became a multi-trick pony, taught by trainer Les Hilton to untie knots and open doors on command. Soon, Bamboo Harvester found himself with a new name and a starring role.
Unfortunately, gifted though the horse was, he couldn’t actually talk. The job of voicing Ed was left to former B-Western star Allan “Rocky” Lane. Lane, fearing ridicule, first refused to let his name appear on the screen, so the show’s credits read: “Mister Ed played by himself.” Rocky changed his mind once the show became a huge hit and told producers he’d like a credit after all. They said no. By now, half of America’s kids believed Ed could really talk and the network had no intention of dashing their illusions.
How, exactly, trainer Hilton got Ed to move his mouth so effectively remains a mystery, but the well-known rumor that they fed him peanut butter remains the most popular explanation. However they did it, they did it for 143 episodes.
When the show finally ended, the president of California’s Palomino Society bought Ed and put him to pasture in a style befitting his star status. In 1970, by the time Ed reached the fine old age of nineteen, he was suffering from a variety of health problems and had to be put down. But, though gone, memories of the wonderful Mister Ed remain.
Whether he was catching Russian spies, getting thrown in a Mexican jail or just chatting with Wilbur about music, Ed holds a special place in our hearts. And, maybe more importantly, in our reruns.
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