With the passing of former sit-com, television actor David Nelson, 74, on January 12, 2011 from colon Cancer, I recalled my exclusive, memorable exchange of letters with his father, former television star-director, Ozzie Nelson, in 1971.

I chose to write about Nelson, his wife Harriet and their two sons, David and Rick (see photo below, right), who are all deceased, in their on-camera roles on "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet," a family situation comedy that appeared on the ABC TV Network for a record-setting 14 seasons (1952-66).

Tom Harmon, U-M's all-Mr. Everything former football player, was the father-in-law of Rick Nelson in 1971 because he had married Harmon's daughter, Kris. Harmon's forward pass of my series of questions for Ozzie Nelson was completed and scored a touchdown without interruption.

Ozzie Nelson made these insightful observations about the show: ~ The show remained popular for 14 seasons because most family viewers "could identify with us rather easily"; ~ Nelson pointed to the challenge of producing a weekly show, "There was a conscietious effort to keep our standards of performance and production at high a level as possible, considering...the limited time and budget of a weekly television show."; ~ The Nelsons wanted to produce the best product since their name was on it, "Since we owned the show as a family project, each one of us had a deep-seated interest and was proud of the show;" ~ The chief disadvantage of a family show he said was that "it was difficult for any four people, with strong individual opinions and identities, to have a normal family relationship when they are spending so much time together under the pressures and tensions of filming a weekly television show;" and ~ Ozzie justified using a canned laugh track in the show. (Apparently, some television critics panned him.) for using it.) "The hard fact is take the most hilarious movie ever filmed 'Mr. Heulot's Holiday' and run it on television it is deadly...the laugh track is here to stay. The best you can do is what we did - employ it sparingly and judiciously." Nelson's biggest production revelation was only one camera was used to film the program. They would shoot a master shot and then a few close-ups to punctuate certain lines or reactions.

Many of the actual friends of David and Rick appeared as themselves in the series (and most of them used their real first names.) In my exclusive, Ozzie Nelson shared his four favorite episodes of the show: "Ozzie A-Go-Go," a title indicative of the dance era . The others were: "The Kappa Sig Party," "The Blue Moose" and an early show, "The Man Across the Street." My favorite character actor on the Nelson show was Skip Young, a recruit from the Knott's Berry Farm theater. Young, who passed away on St. Patrick's Day, 1993, played the plump, happy-go-lucky pal of the Nelson brothers, Wally Plumsted. I still chuckle about his insatiable appetite for desserts. "Wally, would you like a piece of chocolate cake?", Mrs. Nelson asked in one of the episodes. "Oh, no, thank you, Mrs. Nelson," he exclaimed, "I'm on a diet." He continued, "But I wouldn't mind some of those potato chips over there!" Ozzie Nelson passed away in 1975; Rick perished in a New Year's Eve plane cash in 1985; and in 1994, Harriet, the matriarch, passed away.

The Nelson archive includes the show episodes and scripts and is located is at the University of Wyoming. "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet" re-runs in syndication surface periodically on major cable TV channels and are available on-line or as DVDs.

One footnote: Ozzie Nelson unknowingly may have invented the music video with some travel film footage he placed in the background with Rick Nelson singing I am a "Traveling Man" in one of the series' episodes.

Writer Dale Leslie has watched hundreds of "The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriett" episodes and favors the later years when Dave worked in a law firm and Rick was a member of a college fraternity with Wally Plumsted.