October 5, 1998: “The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer” Premieres

October 5, 1998: The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer premieres on UPN. It goes down in history as one of the worst and most-hated TV shows of all time.

Kenneth "Chi" McBride played Desmond Pfeiffer -- and that's pronounced "Puh-FIGH-fer," whereas the name usually leaves the P silent -- a black English nobleman in the 1860s. Choosing to flee Britain for America due to gambling debts, he becomes the valet of President Abraham Lincoln, played by Dann Florek.

Christine Estabrook played First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln. In real life, Mary was mentally ill and what we would now call a shopaholic. The show exaggerated those traits. Kelly Connell played General Ulysses S. Grant. Later to become President himself, Grant had issues with alcohol. The show not only played up this trait, but suggested that Mrs. Lincoln was also an alcoholic. Max Baker played Nibblet, Pfeiffer's white assistant.

But the show was set during the American Civil War. People were afraid that it would make jokes about slavery. And people were outraged. The NAACP led a protest outside Paramount Studios in Los Angeles on September 24. Paramount Pictures decided they wouldn't air the pilot, and substituted a different episode for the premiere date of October 5.

The one they chose was titled "A.O.L.: Abe On-Line." Lincoln engaged in not phone sex -- the telephone wasn't invented until 1876 -- but telegraph sex. With a woman he'd never met. In real life, there is no record of Abe ever cheating on Mary, or vice-versa. But this episode was offensive even without counting the racial material.

The October 12 episode was titled "Up, Up and Away." Abe, Desmond and Nibblet got into a hot-air balloon designed for reconnaissance against Confederate troops. It got blown off-course, and they landed behind enemy lines, and in order to escape, they had to dress Abe in drag. Even a guest appearance by Jeffersons star Sherman Hemsley couldn't save this one.

The October 19 episode was meant to show a meeting between Abe and Britain's Queen Victoria. (In real life, there was never a meeting between a U.S. President and a U.K. monarch until 1919, Woodrow Wilson and King George V, although a pre-President John Adams did meet King George III, and a post-Presidency Grant met Victoria.) But Abe got sick, and Mary hired a body double -- and decided the body was too good.

As it turned out, there were no jokes about slavery. The show was a sex farce, designed to dovetail with the then-ongoing scandal between President Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky. But this outraged people, too.

UPN impeached the series on October 24, and aired the last episode on October 26. This left 5 episodes unaired, including the pilot, and an episode where Confederate soldiers kidnapped Mary, so Grant retaliated by kidnapping Mary Lee (Mrs. Robert E.)

UPN President Dan Valentine was fired over the show. McBride rebounded to star on such TV series as Boston Public, House, Killer Instinct, The Nine, Pushing Daises, Human Target, and the rebooted version of Hawaii Five-0. Florek went back to the Law & Order franchise. Estabrook continued acting, including receiving a recurring role on Desperate Housewives. Connell and Baker both kept going as "character actors."

*

October 5, 1998 was a Monday. Baseball was between the end of its regular season and the start of its Playoffs. The NBA and NHL seasons hadn't started yet. The only score on this day was on ABC Monday Night Football: The Minnesota Vikings beat their arch-rivals, the Green Bay Packers, 37-24 at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

September 11, 2000: "Girlfriends" Premieres

Left to right: Jill Marie Jones, Persia White,

Golden Brooks, Tracee Ellis Ross

September 11, 2000: Girlfriends premieres on UPN, later moving to The CW, and running for 8 years. It stars Tracee Ellis Ross, daughter of music legend Diana Ross, as lawyer Joan Clayton; Golden Brooks as her secretary, Maya Wilkes; Jill Marie Jones as real estate agent Toni Childs, Joan's best friend from childhood; Persia White as artist Lynn Searcy, Joan's college roommate; and Reggie Hayes as William Dent, a partner at Joan's law firm, who spends so much time with them he gets called "The Fifth Girlfriend." He briefly ends up as a boyfriend of Lynn, and later Joan.

I'm not saying Girlfriends is a Los Angeles-based ripoff of the New York-based Living Single of the previous decade. I am saying there were a few similarities:

* It was an almost all-black, female-led cast.

* There was a boss lady, raised by a single mother after her father walked out: Magazine publisher Khadijah and lawyer Joan.

* There was a secretary to the boss lady: Synclaire and Maya.

* There was a high-strung lady lawyer: Max and Joan.

* There was a weirdo: Synclaire and Lynn.

* There was a freeloader who, or so it would seem, would sleep with pretty much any man: Max and Lynn.

* There was a self-centered career woman who wanted you to forget she was ever poor: East Orange, New Jersey native Regine; and Fresno, California native Toni.

* There was a self-centered career man who wanted you to forget he was descended from country folk: Cleveland-born stockbroker Kyle and Kansas City-born lawyer William.

* One of the big four ended up leaving, resulting in a lackluster last season, again pairing up Regine and Toni.

* And Michael Warren, best known as Officer Bobby Hill on Hill Street Blues, played the fathers of both Khadijah and Joan. Did you think I would overlook that? As Maya would say, "Oh, hell, no!"  

There were, however, some significant differences:

* Living Single was recorded on videotape; Girlfriends, on film.

* On Girlfriends, one of the 4 women started out married with a child -- ironically, Maya, the youngest of them.

* None of the Living Single ladies lied about their ages, not even the very vain Regine. On Girlfriends, Joan used to tell people she was 4 years younger than she really was, while Toni said she was 1 year younger, to the point where even Joan, her childhood best friend, didn't know until she was 31 years old that Toni was 32. (Even a Season 1 fantasy sequence where Joan imagined Toni dead showed her tombstone giving her birth year as 1972, instead of 1971, which turned out to be correct.)

* None of the Living Single ladies was the child of a mixed-race couple, or adopted. On Girlfriends, Lynn was both. (Her birth father was played by Demond Wilson of Sanford and Son.)

* Living Single had Overton Jones, Kyle's best friend from Cleveland and roommate in New York, as the building's handyman, who dated and eventually married Synclaire. Girlfriends had no corresponding character.

Living Single lasted 5 seasons, 118 episodes; Girlfriends, 8 seasons, 172 episodes.

*

September 11, 2000 was a Monday. These Major League Baseball games were played:

* The New York Yankees lost to the Boston Red Sox, 4-0 at Yankee Stadium. Rolando Arrojo (7 2/3rds innings) and Derek Lowe combined on a 5-hit shutout, to outpitch Orlando "El Duque" Hernández. The 5 hits were a double by Jorge Posada, and singles by Derek Jeter, Paul O'Neill and Tino Martinez.

* The New York Mets lost to the Milwaukee Brewers, 8-2 at Shea Stadium.

* A doubleheader was split at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia. The Philadelphia Phillies won the opener, 5-2. The Montreal Expos won the nightcap, 7-6.

* The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Pittsburgh Pirates, 8-4 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. Three Rivers was in its last year: The following April, the Pirates moved into PNC Park; the following September, the Steelers moved into Heinz Field (now Acrisure Stadium). In this game, Mark McGwire hit his 31st home run of the season, and the 553rd of his career.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Chicago Cubs, 7-6 at Cinergy Field, formerly known as Riverfront Stadium, in Cincinnati. Sammy Sosa hit his 49th home run of the season, and the 389th of his career. Mark Grace went 4-for-5. For the Reds, Ken Griffey Jr. went 1-for-3 with a walk.

* The Chicago White Sox beat the Detroit Tigers, 10-3 at the new Comiskey Park (now Rate Field) in Chicago.

* The San Francisco Giants beat the Houston Astros, 8-7 at Enron Field (soon to be renamed Minute Maid Park, now Daikin Park) in Houston. Bill Mueller tripled Ramón Martinez home with the winning run in the top of the 10th inning. Barry Bonds hit his 45th home run of the season, and the 490th of his career. Jeff Kent hit his 32nd home run of the season, and the 204th of his career. J.T. Snow hit his 17th home run of the season, and the 149th of his career. For the Astros, Jeff Bagwell hit his 42nd home run of the season, and the 305th of his career. And Moisés Alou hit his 28th home run of the season, and the 173rd of his career.

Respectively, they finished their careers with 762*, 377, 189, 449 and 332.

* The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Arizona Diamondbacks, 6-3 at Bank One Ballpark (now Chase Field) in Phoenix.

* The San Diego Padres beat the Colorado Rockies, 7-2 at Qualcomm Stadium (formerly San Diego Stadium and Jack Murphy Stadium). Tony Gwynn did not play.

* The Baltimore Orioles beat the Anaheim Angels, 3-1 at Edison International Field of Anaheim (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim). Cal Ripken went 1-for-4.

* The Oakland Athletics beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 5-1 at the Oakland Athletics.

* And the Kansas City Royals beat the Seattle Mariners, 6-3 at Safeco Field (now T-Mobile Park) in Seattle. Rickey Henderson, running out the string with the M's, went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* And the Cleveland Indians, the Minnesota Twins, the Texas Rangers, the Toronto Blue Jays, the Atlanta Braves and the Florida Marlins were not scheduled.

And on ABC Monday Night Football, the New York Jets beat their arch-rivals, the New England Patriots, 20-19 at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands. As the new 21st Century wore on, Jet wins over the Pats would become rare.

January 16, 1995: UPN Is Launched

January 16, 1995: UPN, the United Paramount Network, is launched by Paramount Pictures, just 5 days after the launch of The WB. Its New York station was WWOR-Channel 9. Its first show: Star Trek: Voyager.

The 3 previous live-action Star Trek shows -- Star Trek (often now called "The Original Series"), Star Trek: The Next Generation, and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine -- aired on independent stations that, by this point, were part of The WB. UPN were smart enough to not further confuse things by running Voyager on the same night as the still-running Deep Space Nine.

The show was the 1st Trek show with a female lead, with Captain Kathryn Janeway forced to join forces with a rebel cell in order to bring the crew of the starship USS Voyager back from the Delta Quadrant: At top speed, it would take them 70 years to get home.

French-Canadian actress Geneviève Bujold was originally cast, but, though accomplished in film, she was not used to the shooting schedule of a TV series, she left after 2 days of filming. She was replaced by Kate Mulgrew.

A few days before the premiere, I saw an ad for Voyager on a billboard at the New Brunswick train station, and someone had scrawled "TUVOK RULES!" on it, a reference to Tim Russ' Lieutenant (later Lieutenant Commander) Tuvok, the Voyager's Vulcan Chief of Security and the closest confidant of Captain Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew, playing the 1st female lead of a Star Trek series). So I wrote next to it, "An emotional outburst? Highly illogical."

But Voyager wasn't like most UPN shows. For one thing, like The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine, it lasted 7 seasons. But, for the most part, the network specifically targeted the African-American audience. Sitcoms like Moesha and its spinoff The Parkers, Malcom & Eddie and In the House, became popular. So did later sitcoms like Girlfriends, The Hughleys, One on One, All of Us, Half & Half, Eve, and Everybody Hates Chris.

But 2 black-themed sitcoms became albatrosses around the network's neck. Homeboys in Outer Space centered around 2 astronauts, Tyberius "Ty" Walker (Flex Alexander) and Morris Clay (Darryl Bell), who flew around the universe in a winged car in the 23rd Century. The car, nicknamed the Space Hoopty, was a cross between a lowrider and an 18-wheeler, and was piloted by a talking female computer named Loquatia. The show was grounded after 21 episodes.

Then, in 1998, came The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer. Lampooning Abraham Lincoln is one thing. Lampooning the American Civil War is another. But this sitcom lampooned slavery. It went too far, and only 9 episodes were filmed, with only 4 being aired before it was canceled.

On September 18, 2006, both admitting failure, the WB and UPN merged to form The CW.

*

January 16, 1995 was a Monday. Jonathan Allen, the Pro Bowl defensive tackle for the Washington Commanders, was born.

Baseball was out of season. The NFL's Conference Championship Games had been played the day before, won by the San Francisco 49ers and the San Diego Chargers. And the NHL team owners' lockout of the players meant that the season wouldn't start for another 4 days.

There were 8 games played in the NBA:

* The New York Knicks beat the New Jersey Nets, 107-90 at Madison Square Garden. Patrick Ewing scored 35 points. Remember: The Nets, now in Brooklyn, consider the Knicks their arch-rivals, but the feeling is not mutual.

* The Detroit Pistons beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 116-110 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia. Joe Dumars scored 35 points.

* The Washington Bullets beat the Chicago Bulls, 109-101 at the USAir Arena (formerly the Capital Centre) in the Washington suburb of Landover, Maryland.

* The Atlanta Hawks beat the Miami Heat, 99-95 at The Omni in Atlanta.

* The Utah Jazz beat the Indiana Pacers, 99-98 at the Market Square Arena in Indianapolis. Karl Malone led all scorers on the day with 42 points.

* The Minnesota Timberwolves beat the Houston Rockets, 94-75 at the Target Center in Minneapolis.

* The Golden State Warriors beat the Denver Nuggets, 77-73 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena.

* And the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Los Angeles Clippers, 96-88 at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California. Remember: The Clippers consider the Lakers their arch-rivals, but the feeling is not mutual.

January 11, 1995: Warner Brothers Launches the WB Television Network

January 11, 1995: Warner Brothers launches the WB Television Network. It aired on many of the former Tribune Broadcasting stations, including WPIX-Channel 11 in New York and WGN-Channel 9 in Chicago.

In Philadelphia, it aired on WPHL-Channel 17; in Baltimore, WNUV-Channel 54; in Washington, WBCD-Channel 50 (now WDCW); in Boston, WLVI-Channel 56; in Los Angeles, KTLA-Channel 5; and in San Francisco, KBCW-Channel 44.

The 1st shows are The Wayans Brothers (not Damon and Keenen, but the next-youngest brothers, Shawn and Marlon), The Parent 'Hood (also with a mostly-black cast), Unhappily Ever After (an even trashier version of Fox's Married... With Children, if you can believe that), and Muscle (in which Adam West doesn't play Batman, and dies 3 minutes into the show).

Paramount Pictures launched UPN a few days later. Both Warners and Paramount thought that a 5th major non-cable network could thrive. But their timing was awful: Not only did they both try at essentially the same time, but the growth of cable TV meant that ratings that would have been considered pathetic in the 1970s were accepted as great in the 1990s.

In 2006, both gave up the ghost, and merged, forming The CW. The more successful stations became CW stations, while the less successful ones became part of a CW subsidiary, "MyNetwork TV." In New York, for example, WPIX-Channel 11 went from WB to CW, while WWOR-Channel 9 went from "UPN9" to "My9."

*

January 11, 1995 was a Tuesday. Baseball was out of season. The NFL was in the middle of its Playoffs. And the NHL had just settled a labor dispute with the players, ending the lockout, and the preseason was underway, with the regular season getting started on January 20.

There were 10 games in the NBA:

* The Boston Celtics beat the Indiana Pacers, 100-97 at the Boston Garden.

* The Chicago Bulls beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 115-77 at The Spectrum in Philadelphia.

* The Charlotte Hornets beat the Minnesota Timberwolves, 100-91 at the Charlotte Coliseum.

* The Orlando Magic beat the Detroit Pistons, 124-107 at the Orlando Arena. Shaquille O'Neal led all scorers on the night with 37 points.

* The Dallas Mavericks beat the Los Angeles Clippers, 98-93 at the Reunion Arena in Dallas.

* The Houston Rockets beat the Miami Heat, 108-97 at The Summit in Houston. (It's now the Central Campus of televangelist Joel Osteen's Lakewood Church.)

* The Milwaukee Bucks beat the Sacramento Kings, 97-88 at the Bradley Center in Milwaukee.

* The Utah Jazz beat their arch-rivals, the Denver Nuggets, 114-88 at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City, Utah.

* The Phoenix Suns beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 118-108 at The Forum outside Los Angeles in Inglewood, California.

* And the Portland Trail Blazers beat the Golden State Warriors, 104-92 at the Portland Memorial Coliseum.