On Christmas night, 1948, The Judy Canova Show and its 16.6 rating signed on live coast-to-coast for NBC from Hollywood at 9:30PM eastern time. Then in its sixth season on the air, the show had settled into a solid Saturday audience get.

Born in November of 1913, Judy Canova was from Jacksonville, Florida. Early in her career she was typed as a hayseed. Publicity for her show in the fall of 1943 depicted her with shotgun and wolf traps. It created a pigtails-and-calico fad on college campuses everywhere.

Canova told tall tales about her pig, Loverboy, or about Cousin Ureenus, who loved chopped-liver ice cream. Mel Blanc and Ruby Dandridge were large parts of the cast.

On Christmas night, Judy was convinced that her publicity agent was getting her the wrong kind of publicity.