In great-grandmother's diaries, we see that she often talks about watching wildlife on television. We are not surprised to see this reference to Mutual of Omaha's famous Animal Wildlife program. After all, we remember that at Grandma and Grandpa Calkins' house this very televisions programs was highly approved and they would likely sit down and enjoy watching that themselves. In fact, back in olden times a National Geographical special on television some night would be occasion to draw everyone around the television set for a treat watching Jacques Cousteau's latest voyage of discovery or something like that. Grandpa Calkins also was a lifetime member of the San Diego Zoo which explains the presence of zoo magazines all over the house and Grandpa's free ticket to the zoo plus he would get us all special discounts. So, like, what is so unusual about that? Nowadays there are entire TV channels dedicated to animal documentaries that are highly popular so obviously we were normal people.
However, TV programs of which Grandpa Calkins would not approve included Bob Hope movies. I remember his disapproval when we were found to be watching that. It was not so much that the funniness but the off-color nature of the humor of which Grandpa Calkins disapproved. Yes, Hope really does grate on one's nerves if one pays too much attention to that. Grandpa Calkins was probably right on that point.
