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| Erin Moran on Happy Days. |
I was lucky enough to grow up in a nonsmoking family. But we always had ashtrays in our house because, back then, it was still acceptable to smoke indoors in other people's homes. People just lit up all the time back then, wherever they were. My own parents didn't partake, but their relatives, friends, neighbors, and coworkers did. If smokers came over, they needed to some place to flick their ashes. Better in an ashtray than on the carpet.
When I got to high school, some of my friends smoked, but there was no peer pressure to join them like you see in the public service announcements. If you're addicted to nicotine, the last thing you want to do is give your cigarettes away to some dumb newbie. There was a mysterious stretch of land near our school that the kids called "the trail." I never used it because it didn't lead anywhere I needed to go, but I certainly heard stories of "the trail." Legends. Folklore. I pictured it as a place where kids went to smoke, drink, and engage in all kinds of vices.
As a TV show about (and directed toward) young people, Happy Days eventually had to deal with the issue of teen smoking. They got around to it with Season 6's "Smokin' Ain't Cool," which first aired on January 16, 1979. The plot has Joanie (Erin Moran), the youngest of the Cunninghams, taking up smoking because she wants to fit in with a clique called the Magnets. After Richie (Ron Howard) and Howard (Tom Bosley) fail to dissuade her, it's time to call in the big guns -- namely, Arthur Fonzarelli (Henry Winkler).
How does this all turn out? And does it lead to an entertaining episode or just a half hour anti-smoking sermon? Find out when we review "Smokin' Ain't Cool" in the latest installment of These Days Are Ours: A Happy Days Podcast.
P.S. There was no room for this in our podcast, but here is the most memorable anti-smoking PSA of my youth. I cannot tell you how many times I've found myself singing this song.