What is it that made Theodore (Beaver) Cleaver unique ?
It was his uncanny ability to tell a fib.
If there was a way to get out of any trouble he was in, or punishment was imminent he'd find a way with a neat little well timed lie that we'll refer to as a "Beaver Fib".
One of my favorite Beaver Fibs is when Beaver's teacher, Ms. Canfield, gave him a note to take home to his parents.
Ms.Canfield never revealed what was in the note, and the other kids in the class saw her give the note to Beaver.
When the recess bell rang, everyone scurried out to the hallway to ambush Beaver with their thoughts about the note as he was entering the hallway from the classroom.
The kids suggested to poor little Beav that the note spelled certain disaster, shame,expulsion and derision, and oh Lord, a whipping.
The paranoia the Beaver had to endure on that long walk home was terrifying.
Beaver finally made up his mind that he wasn't going to share the note, sealed in an envelope, with Ward and June, his mom and dad.
He never even bothered to open the note to examine the contents. Poor Beav.
Finally, after Beaver discussed the note with his big brother, Wally, his brother penned a bogus note from the Beav's parents for Ms. Canfield.
The note said that Mr. and Mrs. Cleaver were ashamed of the Beav's behavior and that they had "whipped him".
Wally even forged a signature from his parents to the note.
Well, when the school principal, Ms. Rayburn, called the Cleaver home to find out what was going on and to inquire why the Beav had been whipped, after Ms. Canfield had shared the contents of the forged note with the principal, believing that it was actually from Mr. and Mrs. Cleaver, the plot to cover up Beaver's plan to hide the note began to manifest itself.
Finally, after Beaver's dad was finally able to coax Beaver out of tree that he had been hiding in all afternoon after running away from home, in an attempt to avoid the "whipping", we begin to see the moral of the story unfolding in all of it's bravura.
The note was actually a letter from Ms. Canfield asking for Mr.and Ms. Cleaver's permission to allow the Beaver to play 'Smokey the Bear' in the school safety play.
Ms. Canfield kept the Beav after school after all of the details had unfolded to explain to him that she was his friend.
Beav tried to explain that teachers and little boys were essentially not of the same substance, and that little boys had a bit of fear for the authority figures in their lives.
Ms. Canfield told Beaver that "a teacher is a candle that consumes itself with a light to light the way for others".
She wanted Beaver to always know that she was his friend.
Beaver fibs are ok.
We've all told them.
It's when fibs become the intentional fraudulent misrepresentation of a material fact, designed to cripple or injure the needs of another, that we should really start to worry.
Look out for your clients, your family and your friends in these troubled days for our nation and light the way for them.
I LOVE Beaver...I think he is still floating around cable somewhere....my sister says after seeing all the disfunctional families in life we WERE the Cleavers. All too often the whole Ethics oath gets put away with the license...never to be reviewed or revered again. Thank you...great way to start the day.
I have to admit that I never really watched much Leave it to Beaver, an occasional episode on Nick at Night. That was a very well written post I enjoyed the story telling. The Beaver Fib is an interesting analogy to use to examine the day to day practices of a paranoid real estate agent.
Thank you for taking a moment to post, Morgan. Delusions of persecution are abundant in todays world. I'm sure your having a good go at keeping the worms out of the Big Apple :-) Have a great day, my friend.
The memories of good TV viewing with morals taught, no language to be worried about and certainly no adult content. Good lessons to always get into information before getting into concerns or even action. Thanks for the walk down memory lane.
I'm honored to hear from you, Frank. I had lunch with Ken Osmond (Eddie Haskell) and Frank Bank (Lumpy Rutherford) a couple of years ago at a conference in Desoto County. It was a privilege spending the afternoon with them, and I can testify that they were riotous. I'll send some referrals your way in the days ahead. Hope you have a terrific week.
Beaver fibs...I like it. It recognizes our shared humanity and desire to avoid pain. A great lesson for children and the adults who missed it as a child. A lesson learned late is still a lesson learned. Just because everybody 'says' they know what will happen doesn't mean they really know. I think that's the point where faith in what you heart tells you is true becomes the touchstone. If you end up being disappointed by people anyway, it doesn't mean your faith was misplaced. It just means people are constrained by the fact that we are human!
I say a few more Beaver reruns and a lot fewer 'Whats-his-name and Kate plus 8' shows!
Glad you liked it, Ann. One of favorite shows of all time. I spent some time with Jerry Mathers a few years ago and had lunch with Ken Osmond (Eddie Haskell) and Frank Bank (Lumpy) a couple of summers ago here in the Memphis area. Nice to hear from you.
No program in history ever portrayed the importance of family values and the substance and innocence of being a child any more than 'Leave It to Beaver'. Every program had a moral, a sense of timelessness in it's approach to every subject matter, and it's smartness, or alacrity, if you will, created glowing standards by which to live for generations to follow. The show will live forever because of the redemptive good it has given society. Glad to hear from you, Tom.
I enjoyed the Beaver! When these were new, I always wondered were city kids different? My friends and I were never that young. Although my parents were allot like the Cleavers.
WoW! I not only remember Beaver but pre-Beaver TV. We had the 1st TV on the block. Big caninet with lots of TUBES that took a long time to warm so the small screen could produce a B&W picture. Only 3 channels and when the president was on everyone groaned (just like today) as he was on every channel. The cartoons were great and very different from today. Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, & others. Real game shows and no reality TV. No nasty words... progress is not always good in every way.
I loved the Beaver! I loved the Andy Griffith show. I loved Little House on The Prairie. All of these shows were little "morality plays", guaranteed to "teach" a lesson. Usually they were very successful in achieving their goals.
Hi David ~ I loved Beaver. It was on five mornings a week in reruns when I was a kid and we watched it before school. Funny - just the other day I was reading something somewhere about real estate offices needing to recruit younger agents. The author characterized older agents as Leave It to Beaver watchers. Oh well.
Congrats on being the "featured post" on the broken Professional category. You've been post at the top of the page since you posted this. I got pulled away yesterday before I had time to write a comment but lo and behold you're still there this morning!
Thanks for your good thoughts, Bill. Tragically, freedom of speech means the right to use four letterwords to lots of kids today, and adults, too. My favorite four letter words are 'love' and 'hope'.
Great to hear from you, Liz. I remember very well how important those tv shows were to us as a kid, and the tv trays full of sandwiches that my mother would plop down in front of us when we got home. After all that food we ususally fell asleep before we could finish our homework. Mom had the answer to a quiet evening at home....lots of sandwiches and glazed donuts.
Btw...I spent the summer in Cambridge in 1972. I was dating the niece of John Kenneth Galbraith (Professor of Economics at Harvard and President Kennedy's ambassador to India) and was a guest in his home. She was a student at Tuft's and I was visiting Harvard. We loved a little restaurant in Harvard Square called "The Pewter Pot". I was a lousy student. All I wanted to do was play chess and listen to rock and roll.
Hi David ~ You were in the right place if chess and rock and roll was all you cared about. Galbraith's house was wonderful wasn't it? One of my best friends lived with the family (up in the servants' quarters on the third floor) for a while in the 90s. I loved Galbraith - another great one gone.
By the way - a really fabulous book about Harvard Square was just published - Harvard Square: An Illustrated History Since 1950. It's packed with great images from the 70s - and before and after. You would get a real charge out of it. I did a post about it on my own blog the othe day after buying two copies - one for myself and one for my parents. Each of us has our own favorite era in Harvard Square.
I love that episode. Especially Wally's letter, "I have whipped him, his mother has whipped him, we've all whipped him." Even as I was reading your post I was laughing hard at that scene. Too, too funny. That show really captured the mentality of an 8 year old. After Beaver got older the show lost a lot of it's humor. It was hard to believe a Junior High/High School kid could be that naive. Thanks for the laugh and best of luck to you.
Nice to hear from you, Jerry. The script writers had parallels in the real world. It was a simpler time and a simpler life. You could smell the roses back then, not the acid rain.
"Owning a home should never have to be "just a dream" for anyone.
The responsibility of every
real estate agent is to make home ownership a right & reality, in
conformance with fairness,
the principles of sound ethical judgement, justice & the laws of
our nation".
David Saks - Broker The Real Estate Mart of
Tennessee
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