The Waltons: Down-Home Rural Drama Of That Un-'70s Show

By | December 18, 2020


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Mary Elizabeth McDonough and Will Geer appear in a scene from an episode of the television family drama series 'The Waltons.' (Photo by CBS Photo Archive/Getty Images)

The Waltons, a TV drama about a family in rural Virginia during the Great Depression, was remarkably out of step with the '70s -- so why was it so popular? At the time America was deep in the throes of the counter culture, and this sincere, hokey series ran against the grain from the tune in, turn on, drop out generation. But somehow it became one of the most beloved shows of the era, spawning six made for TV movie sequels, and even making its way into a speech by President Bush in 1992. What was it about The Waltons that America loved?

On December 19, 1971, CBS aired The Homecoming: A Christmas Story, a slice of life drama about The Waltons. This made for TV Christmas movie became an immediate classic, and was so popular that it was developed into The Waltons, a series that ran for nine seasons.

A Homespun Look At The Great Depression

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source: Warner Bros.

Set in Jefferson County, Virginia, between 1933 and 1946, the Walton family lives on Walton Mountain, a placed based on community called Schuyler in Nelson County, Virginia. Setting the series during the Great Depression might be the least '70s thing that a show could do.

It's not just that the series took place in the '30s, but it gave an accurate account of the way in which people across the country were financially floundering. During the Depression, Virginians of all stripes were hit hard, and like the Waltons, they supplemented their meager incomes from farming or lumber work with hunting and odd jobs.

The series didn't shy away from showing just how poor the Walton family was, and how they had to struggle to make ends meet on a day to day basis.