Sky King

I can remember watching Sky King as a kid, too. Saturday morning seemed to be filled with shows of this type... Captain Gallant & Tales of Texas Rangers come to mind. I became curious about Sky King because my daughter, now a freshman in college, is pursuing her dream to become a commercial pilot. And of course I remember Penny being Sky's niece; and yes, she must have been pretty; but I remember little else. It seems to me that Penny had her own plane... is this right? And if so, did it have a name as well? It also seems to me that her character would have been considered "ahead of her time". I don't know if shows of this simplicity would "fly well" today.

Though it was a nice play on words the character Sky King did not get his moniker from his reliance on air travel, it was simply short for Schuyler. Nevertheless it's a great handle and suggestive of all kinds of romantic fantasies about air travel.

The last name King was also an interesting choice. One of the largest, if not the largest cattle ranches ever was the King Ranch of Texas. If people thought Sky was one of those Kings, so much the better. And I don't think the King Ranch minded the free publicity.

The title role in this modern western was played by Kirby Grant who also had played him on radio. He was the owner of a considerable spread, but the main thing with Grant was that he was up to date with the times. He had a private plane that he named the Songbird which he used to both oversee his ranch and help deal with bad guys who couldn't ride horses fast enough to get away from Sky King and the Songbird. As you can imagine, the law had need of Sky and his plane and Sky was only too willing to help out a sheriff in need.

Sky lived on the ranch with niece Penny {Gloria Winters} and nephew Clipper {Ron Haggerty}. These two headstrong youths got themselves in jams and half the plots of the shows were Uncle Sky using the Songbird to get them out of a jackpot.

Kirby Grant who broke into film as a singer and not a bad one found his niche on radio playing heroic Sky King. The show transitioned smoothly to television and was a big hit with the kids including this kid.

Ironically enough Kirby Grant's death was a postscript to the Challenger disaster. Long retired and living in Florida he saw the Challenger blow up and then died in a car accident on the way home. Probably the horror of what he saw unnerved as it did everyone else who witnessed it live or on television. So a man whose fame was as a fictional air hero died after witnessing one of the great air disasters of the last century.

Sky King was a nice family show and I'm surprised no one has thought to revive it.

I fondly recall watching this show during my childhood. Although I haven't seen it since I was about 7 or 8 years old, my memories of it are filled with good, warm feelings, possibly because of the simpler times (seemingly) we enjoyed then. I'm sure that seen through the eyes of today this show would appear to be lacking in some respects, but so what? I had completely forgotten about this one until I had a song request recently to perform Jimmy Buffett's "Pencil Thin Moustache" (an old song of his and one of a very few which I DIDN'T learn to play 30 years ago). I was catapulted into my past as I read and learned Jimmy's lyrics:

Oh, I remember bein' buck toothed and skinny Writin' fan letters to Sky's niece Penny Oh, I wish I had a pencil-thin mustache, then I could solve some mysteries too...

The light bulb is back on now. God Bless Gloria Winters and Kirby Grant! Thanks for the memories and a really great show....

My mother told me about this show, and she told me she would watch it religiously every Saturday morning. She was starting to think she dreamed it up, because no one she talked to remembered it. So I did a search, and found some episodes on tape, and gave it to her birthday. She watched two of them that very day, and loved them!

With Kirby Grant as the Sky King, and Gloria Winters Penny, and all the rest, from what I saw, it is a great show! Yes, it is simple, as most shows from the early fifties, but it taught right from wrong, and that's what is missing from most shows today. It might be interesting to see what a remake of this show would look like.

As with many of us "of a certain age" (i.e., aged) "Sky King" was a huge part of childhood. It ignited a lifelong interest in airplanes as well as reinforcing another aspect of personality. No one else has bothered to mention that Penny was gorgeous! I recall not one plot and do remember thinking that, like several others, the early 50s series were overshadowed by the mid- to late-fifties Westerns.