My First Doctor
Once upon a time, I had never watched Doctor Who. Then, I reached High School and everything changed. I kept hearing about this amazing show that was played on our local PBS station. I encountered mentions of time travel and really long scarves. I even managed to listen to part of the Fourth Doctor Story The Pyramids of Mars on the radio, as you could occasionally pick up the PBS station way at the end of the dial, without quite knowing what I was listening to. One day I went on a field trip to a Shakespeare festival with my school. One of the other folks on that trip was a particularly dedicated Whovian by the name of Mindi Rambo. During the trip she told me all sorts of things about her favorite show. So, as you might imagine, by the time we got back I decided that I had to see what she was talking about.
My very first episode of Doctor Who Tom Baker’s Underworld. Not the best episode to start with to be sure, but my interest was captured. By the Key to Time series I was hooked. So, I dragged every last member of my immediate family into the fandom with me. (Rather like I did more recently with my husband come to think of it.) We read Doctor Who Magazine and collected the novelizations. I even studied a bit of time theory. All the while I kept my eyes open for a stray Police Box, just in case. As is the case with most folks, I will always have a special place in my heart for my first Doctor.
Anybody care for a Jelly Baby?
Now I’m curious to know: How did you first encounter Doctor Who? Who was your first Doctor? How did this new show affect your life? You see, I would like to start a new periodic feature here on Watching Doctor Who called “My First Doctor.” Tell me your story, and I will feature it on a future installment. You can do this by either commenting below, or using the “Contact Me” feature to the right of the page. I hope to see your story soon.
Doctor Who, The Pyramids of Mars, Tom Baker, Underworld, Key to Time, Doctor Who Magazine
June 28th, 2007 at 5:59 am
Many years ago, I lived in San Jose, California. This was in the mid 80s when local PBS station KTEH was one of the great supporters of Dr Who–to the tune of it aired six days a week. One episode an evening at 7:30 p.m. (it moved to 7 p.m. when they got East Enders) and then a complete story in episode format Saturday nights at 11:15 p.m. (Called the Saturday Night Late Night Dr Who feature).
I should preface this by saying I’m also a huge Star Trek fan and this was the time before TNG, so we only had the original 79 that I’d seen–well, a few times. My dad was sitting there with me one hot summer evening and asked me if I’d ever heard of Dr Who. I said I had but it was odd in that it had multiple part stories and I never seemed to see part one.
So, my dad said, “Why don’t we give it a try?” and flipped over to KTEH. The starfield opening swirled into view and lo and behold, it was part one of “Time-Flight.” I sat and watched, fascinating. Having nothing else Who related to compare it to, I thought it was quite good and tuned in the next night…and the next night…and the next night. I soon was figuring out how to program the VCR to record the late night features on Saturday–and they were running Tom Baker. My first T. Baker was “Terror of the Zygons.”
So, my first Doctor was Davison, which is odd since while I like him, he’s not my favorite. My favorite is McCoy, but part of that may be I met him once at the WhoMobile in San Jose and he answered my question about the Daleks. It was after his first season (which we’d not seen yet) and he said he’d go back and tell them the American fans wanted a Dalek story. A few weeks later, I found out the lead story to season 25 was “Remembrance of the Daleks.” Now, I know deep down McCoy didn’t run back to JN-T and say that a young American fan wanted the Daleks back, but I still like to imagine that is exactly what happened.
June 28th, 2007 at 11:29 am
Thank you kindly, Michael!
KTEH does kinda rule, doesn’t it?
June 28th, 2007 at 4:30 pm
Ah, the memories, Where to begin? Let’s see…a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away….ooops, sorry wrong fandom. Anywho.
In the mid 1980s I was in college. One Saturday night I was with a group of friends at someone’s home. We had dinner and our usual D & D game and everyone was talking about the new show that the local PBS station was going to start showing that night. Some sort of British science fiction. Well, we were all sci-fi fantasy geeks so we decided what the hay. Right before 9:00 rolls around we adjourned to the living room and start setting up chairs, snacks, etc.
Strangely, one thing I clearly remember at the time was that someone had the TV on MTV and they were playing the music video for Weird Al Yankovich’s ‘Eat It’. Three puppet mice dancing around like Michael Jackson. And THIS is what I was watching before Dr. Who came on. Don’t know why that has stuck with me…Oh well…
Nine pm rolled around and we were treated to our first Dr. Who story. The incomprable Tom Baker in ‘The Ark in Space’. Now admittedly, all of us had grown up with Star Trek, Star Wars, some of us could quote Trek dialog verbatim. But with that opening story, as campy as the production values were, we were hooked! From then on, every Saturday it became a ritual to hog the TV from Mom and Dad so that we could spend the next 2 1/2 hours watching the Doctor defeat evil across the galaxy.
I will always have a special place in my heart for Tom Baker’s Doctor. I just love the exuberance he brought to the role. My favorite has to be Christopher Eccleston though. He brought such depth and pathos to the role that had not been seen before. I only wish he had stayed with the role longer. Let’s just hope David Tennant sticks around for many years. The Doctor’s running out of regenerations….*bites fingernails*
June 29th, 2007 at 4:49 pm
MKE? You played D&D? I knew that I liked you.
Great First Doctor story!
June 30th, 2007 at 8:51 pm
I also discovered Who on KTEH. When I started watching the episodes they were showing 2nd doctor episodes so technically he is my first.
I really like the 2nd, and 4th Doctors but McCoy’s 7th is my favorite of the Classic series.