By Eric Kohanik, ReMind Magazine
The great space race of the 1950s and ’60s sparked a widespread, extraterrestrial infatuation in pop culture. And it wasn’t long before space-themed elements infiltrated the realm of fashion, architectural design, toys, movies, television and even food.
The great space race of the 1950s and ’60s sparked a widespread, extraterrestrial infatuation in pop culture. And it wasn’t long before space-themed elements infiltrated the realm of fashion, architectural design, toys, movies, television and even food.
Whether it was the imaginations of such fashion icons as André Courrèges or the structural ponderings of such architects as Buckminster Fuller, there was a futuristic, space-age feel that crept into many creations ranging from classic miniskirts and go-go boots to the various geodesic domes that would pop up around the world.
When it came down to the grassroots level, though, there were certain things that jumped on the space-race bandwagon and penetrated middle-class America in various forms.
Things like Tang, for instance. Developed by chemist William A. Mitchell, the fruit-flavored, powdered drink mix made its debut in 1957. Although it didn’t catch on at first, that all changed in 1962, when NASA made Tang part of the food/eating experiments conducted by astronaut John Glenn during his Mercury space flight on Friendship 7. After that, Tang simply took off.
It wasn’t the only food element that blasted off with the space race, though. Food Sticks surfaced in the 1960s and ’70s, thanks to the Pillsbury Company and its head food scientist, Dr. Howard Bauman. Working in conjunction with NASA to provide a form of solid food for astronauts, Food Sticks were an out-of-this-world snack whose nutritional elements made them a popular precursor of modern-day energy bars.
When it came to the space race’s influence on pop culture, the most visible and widespread evidence came in the world of movies and TV. Director Stanley Kubrick’s epic tale 2001: A Space Odyssey made its debut in 1968, giving audiences perhaps the most influential glimpse of what bizarre things the future might have in store for mankind and space travel.
On television, there were many other standouts. Although shows like Star Trek built their entire premise around space as the final frontier, other TV series like Land of the Giants (1968-70) or even the kooky I Dream of Jeannie (1965-70) relied on spacecraft and astronauts as only secondary elements in their plotlines. A trio of other shows stood out in different ways, though, because the space race seemed to have a bigger influence.
My Favorite Martian (1963-66) spun its comical story elements around a Martian (Ray Walston) whose spaceship crash-lands on Earth. He moves in with a Los Angeles reporter named Tim O’Hara (Bill Bixby), who witnessed the crash, and ends up taking the name Martin O’Hara, pretending to be Tim’s uncle, much to the confusion of Tim’s landlady, Mrs. Brown (Pamela Britton), and various others around them.
Meanwhile, Lost in Space (1965-68) wove its dramatic tales around a clan known as the Space Family Robinson, whose assignment of colonizing a planet in the Alpha Centauri star system goes awry due to a stowaway. The show featured a stellar cast, including Guy Williams, June Lockhart, Marta Kristen, Bill Mumy, Angela Cartwright, Mark Goddard and Jonathan Harris. Oh, yeah, and there was also a robot.
There is perhaps one other show to come out of the space race that continues to be the most endearing — and enduring. The Jetsons lasted only one season in primetime (1962-63), but the famed Hanna-Barbera cartoon has lingered on in syndication for years, spinning the comical futuristic adventures of George, Jane, Judy and Elroy Jetson (voiced by George O’Hanlon, Penny Singleton, Janet Waldo and Daws Butler) and giving us all a little bit of a glance at what middle-class family life could well be like in the space age of the future.
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