Forgotten TV: Mr. Novak

Teachers once occupied a loftier status than they do today and Mr. Novak (James Franciscus) was one of my favorites on this series that ran from 1963-65. He was an English teacher and Dean Jaffe, the principal. (And later Burgess Meredith)

The show took on pretty heavy topics over its two years.

A schoolteacher would only play as a comedy today. Room 222 was a similarly fine show from that era.

And believe it or not, George C. Scott played a social worker a few years earlier.

Teachers, social workers, firemen, cops, nurses, these are/were our heroes.