HossC

We're moving on to 1973 with these pictures. The same website that led me to 'The Invaders' also listed an episode of 'The Waltons' called 'The Townie' as one that was filmed on Warner's backlot. Was Midwest Street used regularly on 'The Waltons'? Let me know if there were other episodes; I haven't watched 'The Waltons' since the late '70s/early '80s when we only had three channels to choose from (I still remember the "Night John-Boy. Night Mary Ellen. Night Jim-Bob" etc. endings). When I found out about this episode I remembered that one of the channels I get shows re-runs of 'The Waltons', so I checked the TV listings. As luck would have it, I only had to wait just over a week for them to show 'The Townie'. Just like the episode of 'The Invaders' in the previous post, this episode also features a guest appearance of a well-known actress fairly early in her acting career; in this case it's Sissy Spacek, who plays Sarah Jane Simmons. Here's her house where she lived with her mother. Although there are differences, it looks to have the same proportions and location as Rosco's house in 'Baa, Baa White Sheep'. I certainly think it could've been re-dressed in the eight years that separated to two shows. I've never been able to exactly pinpoint its location, but I think it was near the Laramie Street set. We're back on more certain territory with this shot. Here's the Waltons' pickup near the bank. Hazzard's drug store is 'Big Al's Grill' that serves "Steaks & Chops". Initially I thought the sign said "Steak & Chips", but that probably only makes sense (and my mouth water) in British English. Here's buildings 8 and 9, looking quite different from the way they did in Dukes.

I'll have a go this time because I think I only have to guess one . Abner Peabody Gary Butler's Law Office Luke's brother Roger, I've been trying to remember which episode Vern Baskins (from your last question) appeared in - can you put me out of my misery please?

Olympics

Luke gets attacked nearly opposite the Boar's Nest. This shot shows the General racing down the valley track to help him. This shot is of the General heading down the hill toward the site of the impound yard (see above). You can see the trees on either side. The truck is just about to pass the spot where the impound yard entrance was located. From this angle we can see right down that arm of the valley. A change of camera angle and we can how the intersection looks from above. The truck is now on the track that leads back to the Boar's Nest.

These pictures are from the next track over (to the west) from the previous ones. They're all from 'Cooter's Confession'. The first is another aerial view, and includes three screengrabs along the bottom. I tried doing another panorama, but the camera doesn't move in a straight line, so it didn't work out. The large trees are all in the same places, but some of the smaller ones have come and gone. If you look at the center screengrab you'll notice that the tracks used to form a triangle, although the left side is hardly visible now (the bottom left corner of the triangle would've been just above the #7). As far as I can see, the track going diagonally up and left from the #7 didn't exist when Dukes was filmed. The white fence would've been nearly behind the tree above the #6. Here's Rosco about to cut off the General at the white fence. And with Enos behind, the General's blocked in. This camera is looking up the right side of the triangle. After a bit of ramming, the General makes its escape. Enos got pushed down by the fence (and his car hit the camera - I'm not sure that was meant to happen!), and Rosco nearly got beached on the verge. If the camera had panned left slightly you would've seen the Boar's Nest above the General's roof.

Aaargh - it's based on the 2003 movie. It would've been so much better (and longer) if they'd based it on the original. If you're not familiar with the original, you can see the best bits of the chase (Warning: contains the movie ending, as if I haven't spoiled that already ) - so "getta bloomin' move on" and watch it.

I couldn't find HNet's 'Art & Culture' section, so I'll post this here . Various artistic projects are taking place around Britain as part of the Cultural Olympiad surrounding the London 2012 Olympics. One of these is a rather unusual installation at the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhil (on the south coast of England). Taking inspiration from the ending of the 'Italian Job', and entitled 'Hang on a minute lads, I've got a great idea…', artist Richard Wilson has created a full-sized replica of the coach and placed it teetering on the edge of the roof. It even rocks back and forth! You can read more here.

I have started it now. I got a few chapters in during a long journey earlier this year, but I never seem to get around to reading at home. I really should make time to finish it because it's an interesting book. Hopefully it won't be too long before I can post a full review.

Our sky was a really strange color today - from my distant memory I think it's called "blue". Can anyone tell me if this is normal, or should I be worried? There was also a strange yellow object in the sky, sort of circular in shape, and the water had stopped falling .

I could only find an article on CNN's website - no Dukes pictures or video. Then I came across a short video here if anyone wants to watch it. There's a couple of still below that show the posters.

Werner/Wekke's site seems to have disappeared over the past 12 months along with some of the photos of his Californian trip on cglfc. It's a shame because they were a great resource. He hasn't been on HNet since September 2009.

Seeing as I posted a Thomas Dolby track in 'Musical Chairs' recently, I thought I'd post one here. Please don't remind me that the album this is from (The Golden Age of Wireless) came out 30 years ago - I can still remember watching him promote it on Saturday morning TV . Windpower - Thomas Dolby One of the comments on YouTube says "Windpower sounds much different when batteries are dying in a Walkman!". When I read that I thought "wow!" (and flutter ), "I remember that feeling."

Moving south from the Boar's Nest (to the left on the recent aerial view) we get to this intersection. If you go back to the aerial view, it's directly above the word "various" in the key. Both the track along the valley and the track just to the left of the General (that leads off up the hill) were used in many episodes; this one happens to be from 'Close Call for Daisy'. In 'The Ransom of Hazzard County' the General gets taken to the Hazzard Sheriff Impound Yard (at least its third or fourth location!). I didn't have any idea where it was located until I saw this shot of the hapless guard, Clyde, trying to fix Daisy's Jeep. It's the same intersection and track up the hill that were in the picture before last. Here's the General making its escape via the conveniently placed car transporter (although strangely it flies right over the truck without touching it!). Despite the growing shadows, it's still possible to make out the trees on either side of the track up the hill.

The directors were very skilled at using different camera angles to make the ranch look bigger than it was. All the pictures in this post are from very near the Boar's Nest, but none give the game away by showing it. This shot from 'When You Wish Upon a Hogg' shows the track that heads off from the Boar's Nest toward the barn. CD has already posted a shot looking down this track - it's the one looking over the back of Boss's Caddy. Just to the right of the van you can see the telegraph pole from the third picture in the previous post. If you scroll back to that picture you'll see the wooden fence (shown clearly here) is just visible to the right of the General. Here's another shot from 'When You Wish Upon a Hogg'. This time the camera is further back and the vehicles enter from one of the tracks on the right. The orange bush from the last picture is visible again here. Above it is the brown silo structure. The Boar's Nest car park is behind the bush on the left. When "Nervous" Norman Willis heads for Hazzard in 'Close Call for Daisy' he's actually only about 100 yards from the Boar's Nest. This is a close-up of the fencing at the start of the track that's disappeared. Just before the camera pans around to this angle you can see the parallel track through the trees. I apologize for the blurriness of this picture from 'Daisy’s Shotgun Wedding'; I wanted to get it at the last second before they cut to another shot. Now that we're getting familiar with the landmarks, it's easy to recognize the white fence from the previous picture near the left, and the brown silo in the background. In about 150 yards they'd be in the Boar's Nest car park rather than Tennessee!

Despite my work on the Hazzard Square thread, I was unfamiliar with the Valencia Oaks Ranch until CDoherty started this thread. That was quite an omission on my part because it is used extensively in later seasons. As I became more familiar with the locations I started collecting some screengrabs, because I'm a great believer in the old adage that "a picture is worth a thousand words". I checked with CD that I wasn't stepping on his toes by posting the pictures I'd collected. To paraphrase the reply, and borrow a term from NASCAR, I was told to "have at it", so here goes. It was brave of CD to start this topic because the ranches are harder to research than public roads; they tend to have less visual clues to locations other than background hills, and you don't get the benefit of Streetview either. The Valencia Oaks location has also suffered a fire since Dukes was filmed, which has changed the way parts of it look. Here's a current aerial view of the middle of the ranch. I have used CD's original numbering system for consistency, but have rotated the view by 90 degrees for better clarity (as you can see by the arrow in the top left). Most of the tracks are fairly similar to the way they appeared in Dukes; the only exception I've spotted so far is that there used to be another track to the left of the one that runs between locations 4 and 5. When Dukes was filmed it emerged from the trees near the Boar's Nest; I think CD has already mentioned it and I will cover it later. This is the view looking west from the Boar's Nest as it appeared in 'The Boar's Nest Bears'. These wider, panorama-style pictures are stitched together from three or four separate screengrabs, which hopefully explains why the moving elements (in this case Bo, Luke and Rod) appear more than once. The trees at the left are near the #6 on the aerial view and the ones in the middle are between 5 and 8. Moving backwards, but looking in the same direction is this picture from 'When You Wish Upon a Hogg'. I think the hill in the background is the one just to the left of the Boar's Nest entrance in the previous picture. If you look at the pole and fence on the right and then back to the picture of the bad guy up a pole that CD used in post #14 you'll see they are the same. This shot shows how close it was to the Boar's Nest. Here's a couple more panoramas, this time looking east. The first is from 'Welcome Back, Bo 'n' Luke', and clearly shows that the telgraph poles reach at least as far as the Boar's Nest. In the background you can see a barn and a cylindrical structure, probably a silo or water tower. These are good reference points for other screengrabs, including the one in CD's last post. Just above the yellow Mustang you can see the white fencing that marks one end of the track that has disappeared over the years. The second panorama is from 'The Fortune Tellers', and shows a few more of the surrounding hills. It also shows the start of the track that runs almost perpendicular to the Boar's Nest and goes up the valley.

Any chance you could send the sun over here? We've hardly seen it for the past two or three weeks, and it must be our turn by now . What we have had is heavy rain on virtually a daily basis. They've had it worse in the UK with extensive flooding in some areas and sporting events and summer festivals have suffered disruption as a result. In southern Russia they had five months of rain in a few hours over the weekend, causing flash floods and killing over 170 people.

Jesse also got a concussion and temporarily lost his sight in 'Witness: Jesse Duke'.

Wrong ex-president I'm afraid, it was at the Reagan National Airport. JFK is in NYC and Dulles is DC's international airport. You can read the full story here.

Thanks for clearing that up. I've never paid much attention to which car was being used even though I do notice some of the differences and continuity mistakes. That link has a load of pictures identifying the early cars, although I nearly missed the link to the LEE 2 pictures under the Boss/Rosco picture in the top left because it's yellow on white.

Sorry, I would've replied earlier, but I was halfway through getting screengrabs from a disc from season six. Also I misunderstood which car I was looking at. Initially I thought you meant that LEE 2 had been redressed (like when LEE 1 became the Richard Petty car in 'Repo Men') and was the car that got knocked off the pile. After digging out the DVD and realizing that you couldn't mistake a 1955 Chevy Bel Air for a 1969 Dosge Charger I decided that you were talking about the General itself. As you can see from the pictures below, the damge changes back and forth throughout the scene. I can't see a scratch on it when it enters the junkyard. Then the bumper, nudge bar and front fender get bent during the first shunt. The first picture below shows a dent about halfway along the front fender (sorry, it was really difficult to grab this one), although we never see how it got this damage. Next time we see the General, all the damage has disappeared. After the next shunt the damage caused by the original shunt is back again. In the last picture the General has considerable damage down the left side caused by scraping along the white 1963 Chevy Bel Air in the bottom right. Of course the General is spotless again before it leaves the junkyard . I don't know which car they used - now the screengrabs are up I'll let y'all decide. The other cars in the top picture are a 1967/68 Mustang coupe and a 1967 Ford Fairlane. I think the car under the Mustang is a 1970-72 Chevelle. There are several old muscle/pony cars in the yard - I spotted a couple of Mustangs and a 1970 Coronet Super Bee for starters.

The other episode of 'The Invaders' filmed on Warner's backlot was 'The Miracle'. It was set in rural New Mexico, and all the town scenes were filmed in the old street behind the church. Only the lower half of this street ever appeared in Dukes, and the buildings disappeared years ago, but I've mentioned it a couple of times so I thought I'd include a few pictures. I posted an aerial view from 1980 at the end of this post if you want to see how this location relates to the square. The first picture is from the northern end of the street, and surprisingly there's a few Hazzard buildings hidden in there. The circular opening at the top left is on the back of the church, the building behind the "Harry's Bar & Grill" sign is building #13 (the front was remodeled before Dukes was filmed), and the one to its left, that appears to be "Roger's Drug Store", is building #12. Building #15 was built where the furniture store is in this view. This picture shows the other side of the northern end. I don't know if the store with the Stars and Stripes became building #16, or if it was knocked down and replaced. This picture is about midway down the eastern side of the street. The final picture, from near the end of the episode, shows the hotel at the southern end of the street. This was probably one of the dilapidated buildings seen in the background at the end of 'The Hack of Hazzard'. The girl in the doorway is Barbara Hershey near the beginning of her acting career.

We never get to see Cooter's garage, but here's the entrance to building #33 (Hazzard Police Station). I won’t spoil the story by explaining the glowing man in the foreground. A small tremor causes a fountain of water outside building #19. The house on the right is building #21, most familiar to us as one of Hazzard's boarding houses. This was taken between Boss's house and the doctor's house. It shows that there used to be a door (just visible in the center) through to the set behind. I'll finish with this post-tremor shot looking along the front of buildings 8 to 13. I can't see any signs of building #15 existing at this time. Building #16 may have been there, but would've been just off to the right. The buildings that are visible in the background are explained in the next post.

In this picture the police car is just passing building #3, aka. Hazzard Bank. It finally arrives outside what we know as the County Building. Another angle shows buildings 3 to 8. I love this Mustang; it must've been nearly brand new at the time. A closer look at buildings 10 to 13 shows covered sections projecting over the sidewalk, similar to those seen in the pictures from 'The Shootist'. At this time the town cinema was located in building #12, although, as you can see, it's "Closed Until Further Notice".

It seems to be the way of things now that I go looking for one location and come across another. In this case CDoherty was researching one of his interests when he suggested a possible location for the school in 'Along Came a Duke' (fourth picture in this post). We decided it wasn't the right place and both went on looking. My search led me to a site that mentioned that a couple of episodes of the TV show 'The Invaders' were filmed on Warner's backlot. Both were in the second season, so date from about 1968. The first, 'Valley of the Shadows', was filmed in Midwest Street, this time playing the part of the small town of Carterville, Wyoming. Just like the earlier pictures from 'The Shootist', the square is instantly recognizable, but oddly different at the same time. After the credits a police car drives slowly around the square. The house that would become Boss Hogg's house is above the blue car on the left. The house behind the title in the center was occupied by the town doctor, Maria McKinley MD. By a strange coincidence it would become Doc. Petticord's house in 'Duke vs. Duke'. The police car takes the long way around the square (I guess it looks better that way) and passes the church. In the road to the right of the church you can see some boards being put up, probably to hide the set behind the church that existed at the time (see later post about the other episode of ‘The Invaders’). The gazebo is present in the square, but it’s on the ground rather than on its usual platform. Buildings 10 to 13 are visible in the background. The centerpiece of the square is this statue.

Here's a pair of 1973 Ford Torinos from 'Carnival of Thrills'. I've only done side views because a) there's not much to see in other views, and they're so much quicker . The top one is the 'Leap for Life' car. This was the first car to have an unfortunate accident when it was being driven by Bob Dexter. The bottom one is one of the standard 'Carnival of Thrills' stunt cars. Various cars were used for the stunts, but seeing as one of them was a Torino, that's the one I decided to do. This screengrab shows the small part of the flame graphics that make it onto the hood of the 'Leap for Life' car. There's another 'Leap for Life' Torino just visible on the far right of the picture. I find it strange that these cars still have all their glass and trim considering they're going to be jumped.