Summary[]
Opie prints some unsavory gossip in his newspaper.
Plot[]
Opie and a classmate start to produce their own news sheet, the Mayberry Sun, but sales are pretty slow. Yes, Mayberry indeed had its share of gossip-mongers. One of the columns of the local newspaper was called “Mayberry After Midnight” (a favorite of Aunt Bee’s), that listed all of the local gossip with each edition. You can imagine the fodder this provided Aunt Bee and her friends like Clara Edwards and Emma Watson!
Andy’s son Opie and Opie’s friend Howie decided to make their own newspaper, The Mayberry Sun. They printed it in Howie’s garage on a print machine Howie got for his birthday. The first edition of the Sun didn’t sell as well as Opie and Howie had hoped. Well-meaning Barney told Opie they needed to write some “hot copy” — that’s “newspaper talk for stories” — that would sell. Opie and Howie then turned to “Mayberry After Midnight” for their inspiration.
They covertly eavesdropped on Andy, Barney and Aunt Bee, then wrote the second edition of The Mayberry Sun and decided to give it away for free to try to increase future sales. When the unsuspecting trio of influence read the latest copy of the newspaper, they quickly sat up in surprise. Andy’s casual comment about the preacher sometimes being “dry as dust” was there. Barney’s offhanded observation that a jealous man’s wife was a “blonde right out of a bottle” was there. And Aunt Bee’s admission that Mrs. Foster’s chicken a la king “tasted like wallpaper paste” was there. These comments had been made carelessly and thoughtlessly, yet here they were in black and white print for all of Mayberry to see.
Andy and company had no other alternative; they had to go out and try to retrieve each copy of The Mayberry Sun that had been dropped on every front porch on Willow Avenue, Elm, and Maple. Along the way, Aunt Bee ran into Mrs. Foster, who promptly invited the Taylor family for a supper of leftover chicken a la king. Barney encountered the blonde’s husband, who angrily ran Barney off his property. Andy came upon the preacher who, after reading Opie’s paper, told Andy he figures he had Andy “hog-tied into teaching Sunday School for a whole month of Sundays.” When they realize what has happened, Andy, Barney and Aunt Bee scour the town to try and retrieve all of the copies the boys have distributed.
Notes/Trivia[]
- In Opie and Howie's print shop, an empty box of Frosted Flakes and Cheerios can be seen in the background. These were some of the sponsors of the Show.
- Burt Mustin is listed in the cast credits as Sam Benson, even though his character's name is never mentioned in the episode.
- William Keene returns as the preacher, unnamed in the episode even though the cast credits list him Reverend Martin. In other episodes, Mr. Keene's character's name was Reverend Tucker.
- The preacher's home is the same house used for the Rimshaw House and Mrs. Wiley's. It is located beside the Taylor's home.
- It is revealed that Barney had a one-time column in the High School paper called "Pickups and Splashes from floor and pool by Barney Fife".
- Andy had the squad car and Barney had Goober’s car to get to the dump. How did Aunt Bee get there?
Goofs[]
- Andy mentions the name of one of Opie's friends as Troy Bowden. In previous episodes, young Mr. Bowden's name was Trey.
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