The Dave Astor Show: For Teenagers Only was broadcast on Saturday nights from 1956 to 1971 and featured local teenagers dancing and singing along to the popular music of the day. It first broadcast on WGAN (now WGME) and moved to WCSH by 1963.
The Dave Astor Show: For Teenagers Only began when WGME executives invited Astor, a car salesman, to create a family show of his own design. He said he called the program For Teenagers Only because, “I considered everyone a pre-teenager, a teenager, or a post-teenager because they control what goes on in the house” (via Maine Memory Network).
Remember Jordan’s Meats? Well, the best thing to ever come out of that factory was the Dave Astor Show: the only remaining footage of Maine’s own American Bandstand style television show is the episode they filmed inside the meat factory. Watch excerpts below:
The pic below is from May 1962 – it’s Portland High School student Willy Stewart doing the twist at Kennebunk High School. Yeah, that’s right – this Maine show was racially integrated in 1962.
PORTLAND: I ❤ YOUR HISTORY. Shout-outs to R$ and BMack for their profound knowledge and radness.
shake it like a bowl of soup. 