The M*A*S*H Historian 3rd Anniversary

It is hard to believe that another year has gone by, and I am starting my fourth year of The M*A*S*H Historian. It feels like I just finished the second Anniversary post. The last year has been steady and productive as I have worked on some projects behind the scenes, and I engaged with the M*A*S*H community through the posts on the site, on social media, and by email. This site is a labor of love, and it is the interaction with fellow M*A*S*H fans that has kept me engaged over the past three years. I don’t profit from it. It isn’t my day job. The M*A*S*H Historian is my way to connect and communicate with the M*A*S*H community. As I begin my fourth year writing The M*A*S*H Historian, let’s look back on what was my third year.

In the last year (since November 1, 2023), there have been some important developments and sad losses within the M*A*S*H community. We lost M*A*S*H writers Hank Bradford and Dan Wilcox. Bradford wrote “Tell it to the Marines” (09×08) and Wilcox is credited with writing 36 episodes of M*A*S*H from 1979 to 1983. Several guest stars passed away in the last year including Kevin Brophy, James Sikking, Whitney Rydbeck, and John Ashton. One of the toughest losses for me this year was Donald Sutherland who portrayed Hawkeye in Robert Altman’s movie M*A*S*H in addition to his other memorable roles. We remember all of their work as it lives on in M*A*S*H and other projects. The M*A*S*H community has always been good at coming together when we suffer a loss. And the community remains as strong as ever across social media and podcasts. In addition to M*A*S*H Matters, there are a number of fan rewatch podcasts that I recommend checking out (see a list on the Links page). Of course, Alan Alda continues the Clear & Vivid podcast, and several members of the cast (Loretta Swit, Jamie Farr, and Jeff Maxwell) continue to appear together at fan conventions. Finally, Jamie Farr turned 90 in July! There have been reasons to celebrate this past year as well.

As for the website, I have tried to maintain the weekly publishing schedule as I worked on other projects. I often discover new connections as I spotlight objects from the M*A*S*H collection. I also continue to find new objects to add to the collection that add to the story. That is what I enjoy most. Telling stories from behind the scenes of M*A*S*H and shining a spotlight on members of the crew that weren’t always credited for the jobs they did. When I started the site, I knew I wanted to post weekly, but I wanted there to be structure. So I developed five types of posts:

• Script Spotlight – The script posts are my favorites because I get to rewatch M*A*S*H and follow along in the script. It is fun to see the words on paper come to life. In the twelve posts that I wrote this year, I featured a few fan favorite episodes including “Hot Lips and Empty Arms” (02×14), “Dear Sigmund” (05×07), and “The General Flipped at Dawn” (03×01).
• Press Pass – Press releases and photos are really interesting to me because they are the most ephemeral objects in my collection. Most of them were likely thrown away shortly after the information was published, so preserving Fox and CBS’s communications with the press is very important to me. This year, there were a few unique press materials that were a highlight including a CBS Press Information Guide for 1974 – 1975, photos from several “M*A*S*H BASH” celebrations held for the show’s finale, and a press release for Loretta Swit’s role in the original Cagney & Lacey tv movie that led to her almost leaving M*A*S*H.
• From the M*A*S*H Library – I have nearly 200 books related to M*A*S*H and MASH units in the Korean War, so there is no shortage of material for these posts. I did feature a documentary for the first time this year (M*A*S*H: When Television Changed Forever), but my primary focus was reading the memoirs of the M*A*S*H cast and crew. Since I began the site, I have reviewed 13 memoirs for the cast and crew, and the majority were in the last year. See the full list, and links to each post, at the bottom of this post.
• MishM*A*S*H – My second favorite posts to write are the MishM*A*S*H posts because they are a wildcard. I write about any miscellaneous item from the collection. I believe this past year’s posts were some of the best with a cast gift record from 1978, syndication kits from 1984 and 1990, and blueprints for the Swamp set from 20th Century Fox. I also began posting about some M*A*S*H licensed products that were released during the show’s original run, and that theme will continue into 2025.
• M*A*S*Hish – In the last year, there have only been four of these posts since they only appear in months with five Mondays. These posts are about M*A*S*H-adjacent objects, and this year the four posts included: a documentary for the 30th anniversary of the movie M*A*S*H, a script from the M*A*S*H spin-off series AfterMASH, Jamie Farr bobbleheads from the Toledo Mud Hens, and programs from the play You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown starring Gary Burghoff.

I will continue to write these types of posts for as long as I am able. There might come a time when I run out of material for a certain post type, then I will begin to improvise. For example, my collection of press materials is smaller than the script collection, so I may eventually replace the “Press Pass” posts with an additional “Script Spotlight.” This will allow me to think differently about the posts as I can try to find two scripts that relate to each other and post about them in the same month. So, while I may run of certain materials, I will continue to develop fresh ideas about how to present M*A*S*H to current and future fans.

That brings me to the goals for the fourth year of the site. I looked back at last year’s anniversary post, and I set three goals for myself: 1. photograph everything in the collection for an inventory, 2. update the site’s episode guide, and 3. explore venturing into video content. Sadly, of the three goals I set for myself, I only accomplished one, but it was the biggest one. The entire collection has been photographed and entered into a collection inventory software system. The process to do this took nearly half of the year, and I am glad I did because now I know exactly what I have and what I don’t. It also allowed me to reorganize the collection, so I am proud to the say that my M*A*S*H collection is in the best condition (organization and proper storage) ever! So what happened to the other two goals? They are still on the list! I still want to replace the episode guide with the episode details and descriptions from one of the Twentieth Century Fox Television syndication kits. And I still need to do something about that empty YouTube channel. Perhaps this will be the year!

I will wrap up this year’s anniversary post with a big THANK YOU for reading the site, for contacting me, and for reacting to posts on social media. The M*A*S*H community is the best, and the last three years of sharing the collection through the site has proven that. I look forward to writing new posts and interacting with the community, and being a part of the M*A*S*H community has meant so much to me over the past 18+ years that I have been collecting.

M*A*S*H Cast and Crew Memoirs

• Alan Alda – The Last Days of M*A*S*H (1983)
• Alan Alda – Never Have Your Dog Stuffed and Other Things I’ve Learned (2005)
• Alan Alda – Things I Overheard while Talking to Myself (2007)
• Alan Alda – If I Understood You, Would I Have This Look on My Face?: My Adventures in the Art and Science of Relating and Communicating (2017)
• Gary Burghoff – Gary Burghoff: To M*A*S*H and Back: My Life in Poems and Songs (That Nobody ever Wanted to Publish) (2009)
• William Christopher – Mixed Blessings (1989)
• Jackie Cooper – Please Don’t Shoot my Dog: The Autobiography of Jackie Cooper (1981)
• Jamie Farr – Just Farr Fun (1994)
• Mike Farrell – Just Call Me Mike: A Journey to Actor and Activist (2007)
• Larry Gelbart – Laughing Matters: On Writing M*A*S*H, Tootsie, Oh, God!, and a few Other Things (1998)
• Jeff Maxwell – Secrets of the M*A*S*H Mess: The Lost Recipes of Private Igor: 50th Anniversary Edition (2023)
• Wayne Rogers – Make Your Own Rules: A Renegade Guide to Unconventional Success (2011)
• Loretta Swit – Switheart: The Watercolour Artistry & Animal Activism of Loretta Swit