It’s time to celebrate 60 years of the Andy Griffith Show. Come back to Mayberry for simpler times with Andy, Barney, Opie, Floyd, Helen, Gomer, Otis & Aunt Bee. The show has lived on for years and can be seen daily on TVLand, Sundance Channel, MeTV. The entire series is available on Amazon Prime. Looking to binge the series? Here are some of my favorite episodes to get you started. Grab the keys to the jail cell from the wall and lock yourself in.
1- “Malcolm at the Crossroads” - season 6, episode 3 original air date 9.27.1965
“Englishter” Malcolm Merriweather returns to Mayberry announcing he wants to live there permanently. Andy makes him crossing guard, after firing Ernest T Bass. Ernest challenges Malcolm to a fight, which he accepts. We see two of the more popular outlying characters together for the only time, plus we get to see two great character actors in Bernard Fox and Howard Morris working together.
2- “The Pickle Story” - season 2, episode 11 original air date 12.18.1961
Aunt Bee is putting up pickles. Only problem, they taste terrible. Andy & Barney don’t have the heart to tell her, so they switch them out for store bought ones. Bee is so happy to see how much they like them, she decides to enter them into the county fair. That, of course, presents a dilemma , especially since Clara Johnson has won the contest 11 years in row.
3- “The Haunted House” - season 4, episode 2 original air date 10.7.1963
Gomer and Barney retrieve Opie’s baseball from the haunted Rimshaw house. They encounter floating axes, eyes in paintings following them, even strange sounds and a secret chamber. There is of course a good reason for all these goings on and we find out why Otis was so determined to keep the sheriff & deputy out. It’s also thought this episode inspired the Don Knotts movie, “The Ghost & Mr. Chicken”
4- “Deputy Otis” - season 2, episode 31 original air date 5.2.1963
Wanting to impress his visiting brother and sister-in-law, Otis is temporarily sworn in as a deputy. The deception works out well, until we learn that his brother is the town drunk from where they are from. The conclusion is a bit sad, I was happy to see some character development for Otis.
5- “The Merchant of Mayberry” - season 2, episode 22 original air date 3.5.1962
Andy helps struggling salesman Ben Miller stay in town. Store keeper Ben Weaver of course objects to the competition complaining to Andy & Barney. They continue though to help keep Miller in business, but do it just to get under old man Weaver’s skin. Finally Weaver relents and hires Miller to work in his store. This episode guest stars Sterling Holloway as Ben Miller.
6- “Opie’s Charity” - season 1, episode 8 original air date 11.28.1960
When Andy learns that Opie donated only 3 cents to the school charity drive, he gets concerned about how he raised the boy. But when they finally get to talk about it, he learns that Opie is in fact good at charity after all. The other plotline in this is the ‘return from the dead’ of Tom Silby. One of the more poignant but better episodes in the series.
Do you have favorites from the series that weren’t included? Let us know in the comments below.
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