Joe's TV List Unpacks Its Adjectives

#24: Schoolhouse Rock
(ABC, 1973-1986, 1993-1996)

It’s an oft-repeated legend that countless Gen-X schoolkids, when asked to write the preamble of the U.S. Constitution from memory, sang softly to themselves as they scribbled. Of course, they all got points docked for jumping right from “We the people” to “in order to form a more perfect union” because Schoolhouse Rock didn’t bother to include “of the United States.” Oh, well. These three-minute shorts – 52 in all – got most everything else right, whether it was Interplanet Janet touring the solar system, Lolly spouting off about adverbs (not as memorably as Tom Lehrer did on The Electric Company, but close), or Jack Sheldon giving immortal voice to a downtrodden bill longing for his chance to become a law (today, he’d be a crumpled judicial nomination stuffed behind Nancy Pelosi’s filing cabinet). Schoolhouse Rock was a misnomer – the music tended more toward jazz and pop than rock – but the educational value was immense, ranging from grammar and math to science and American history. Still, history is an ever-changing beast, and when the Dems control everything next year, it would be nice if the show returned to document our cheerful descent into socialism, with winning numbers like “You’d Just Spend It on Your Family” and “Siphon This.” The latter would tell the witty story of how the environmental lobby and Democratic lawmakers spent decades restricting America’s ability to drill and refine its own oil, leading to overdependence on unstable foreign markets, all the while extorting billions in revenues from oil companies, yet somehow Republicans got blamed when prices hit $4 per gallon. It would be hilarious. Someone call Jack Sheldon.