Hairspray/Buddy Dean/American Bandstand

Something I just learned:
The highest rated local TV show in the 60’s, Buddy Dean Show was taken off the air because it refused to integrate their teen dancers!

In preparation for my next two posts, I am going to re-post part of something I wrote before, about the “American Bandstand” and “Buddy Dean Show”, two dance shows on TV in the 60's.

“As a pre-teen and a teen, I was an avid watcher of "American Bandstand" every day after school. First, I watched “The Buddy Dean” show, which was the same type of show, but it came out of Baltimore, MD, then I would switch the station over to Bandstand. It’s funny how both shows were so different, though they played the same great music. The Maryland based show, the teens dressed up, looked very sharp and dressed conservatively. The Philadelphia bandstand show, the teens dressed much more, what our generation at that time referred to as “wild”. The girls, we from southeastern, rural PA, felt that the city girls dressed like sluts (which is what wild meant). I guess it’s just that they were “city” girls, and we were “country girls”. It was a big difference. With the media now a days, there probably isn’t that difference between the city girls and the country girls anymore. In fact, some would say the majority of the girls now dress like“city” girls, no matter where they live!”

One of the differences that I didn’t realize until this week, between the two shows was pointed out in the recent movie "Hairspray". Bandstand was integrated, Buddy Dean was not. That is something that I didn’t realize. I did some searching on the internet about the Buddy Dean show this week. “Rock around the Clock” was the first real rock and roll recording, and Bill Haley and the Comets made their premiere TV performance on his show, doing the recording.
I found out that it was the highest rated local TV program in the nation for most of it’s 7 years on air. Buddy Dean was named the number one DJ in the nation in 1962. Although it was highly rated, the show was taken off the air because the WZJ-TV Studio refused to integrate black dancers with the white dancers. They were pressured to do so, but refused.