Ironside Episode: Memory of an Ice Cream Stick

This episode of television crime drama "Ironside" first aired on NBC in January 1968.

Some background: The title of the series, "Ironside," refers to Robert T. Ironside, the Chief of Detectives of the San Francisco Police Department, who was seriously wounded by a sniper attack and left paralyzed from the waist down and, thus, he was confined to a wheelchair. Upon his recovery from the basic wounds, the "Chief" is made a special consultant to the police department, which assigns two young permanent officers to him, these being Detective Sergeant Ed Brown and Officer Eve Whitfield. He also hires, on his own, Mark Sanger, a young delinquent, whom the Chief works to reform. Oh, I almost forgot ... Sanger is black. The Chief hires Mark to be his personal assistant and the driver of a refurbished paddy wagon police vehicle to haul around the Chief and his wheelchair, as well as radio and mobile telephone equipment. (To younger people: no Internet or cellphones like today in those times.) The series was very representative of the second half of the 1960s and early 1970s, with "culture clash" (music styles, clothing and personal appearance styles, drug use, antiwar activism, women's rights, racial fairness), "generation gap" (many of the same issues as 'culture clash,' because of generational differences), and the striving to see racial minorities, especially black Americans, be treated fairly in society. The writers for the series didn't have to really make things up, as all of these things I've mentioned, and likely some I've inadvertently left out, were right there in front of us for all to see. 

Episode Cast:

Raymond Burr ....... Chief Robert T. Ironside, aka simply, "the Chief," or "Chief"
Don Mitchell .......... Mark Sanger
Barbara Anderson ... Officer Eve Whitfield
Don Galloway ......... Sergeant Ed Brown
Mel Scott ................. Sam Noble
Jack Kruschen ......... Willie Busch
Ena Hartman ...........  Millie Roberts
Gene Lyons .............  Police Commissioner Dennis Randall 

A racketeer is found murdered and a recent parolee, Sam Noble, is questioned about the killing, as he was one of the last people to see the man alive. The fear among the San Francisco authorities is that a gang murder could set off a series of retaliatory killings by rival gangs, and bring about a gang war. When Sam Noble is questioned, Mark Sanger recognizes him as a man from his neighborhood when he was a child, and who had given Mark a quarter for an ice cream stick to do errands for him.* Mark introduces himself to Sam, who indeed recalls Mark from a decade earlier and that seems to be the end of it. The Chief, meanwhile, recounts Sam's lengthy criminal record and states that they likely haven't seen the last of Sam Noble. Later, Sam sees Mark in a coffee shop and they talk briefly, but a supermarket robbery has been reported to police and two police officers enter the coffee shop and put both Sam and Mark against the wall and search them. Mark is furious when he tells the Chief what happened, but Ironside tries to calm Mark by explaining that Sam fit a description of the robbery suspect, and that obviously, the officers thought Mark was a possible accomplice, and both men had to be searched for weapons. When the Chief makes a somewhat casual comment that Mark probably won't see Sam Noble again, Mark takes offense and says that no one can tell him whom to befriend. Their voices rise as they have a bit of a clash, and their friendship seems threatened. The Chief's perception of Sam is as a convicted criminal who is probably not reformed, and potentially a bad influence on Mark, and maybe even a danger to him (throughout the series, the Chief is very protective of his staff). On the other hand, Mark associates Sam with "the best times" of his life, his childhood, and even though Mark has lots of "street smarts," he doesn't want to see or hear anything that casts a shadow over Sam's past role as the guy who bought him ice cream. This is the crux of the story: our desire to hold onto our happy memories, and perhaps to try to relive those memories. Maybe others have a different take on it.

Anyway, Chief Ironside has a kind of father like relationship with Mark, a very interesting and daring thing in those times, when racial tensions in the U.S. were often seething. I'm sure some white Americans, especially, but not exclusively, in the South, and probably some black Americans, were furious over such a mix. Both the Chief and Mark are bothered by their argument and later, in a good will gesture, the Chief tells Mark to go to the steakhouse across the street for dinner, and to put it on his account. When Mark leaves the building, Sam Noble is outside waiting to see him. He says he wants to apologize for Mark getting dragged into the mess with the police. Mark is happy for Sam's apology and he sees it as a sign that Sam has reformed, so he invites Sam into the steakhouse with him. During dinner Sam tells Mark he will be starting a new job in a few days, and this goes a long way toward reassuring Mark that Sam has changed his ways and he lets Sam know that the Chief doesn't really trust him. Mark is a bit shocked to hear Sam admit that he can't blame the Chief, and that, "A rap lasts a lot longer than the time you spend inside. Well... it lasts until people trust you again."**

When Mark returns home, the Chief tells him that Sam has long had ties to racketeers, and that there's a good chance he had gone to see the murdered racketeer to collect on a payoff. This all brings the Chief and Mark to argue about Mark's association with Sam again, but this argument escalates beyond the earlier disagreement. Mark talks with Eve Whitfield about what he should do, because now he feels he should not have argued with the Chief, and that he can't explain why he defends Sam Noble against the Chief's suspicions. Mark wants to apologize to the Chief, but the hustle and bustle of the ongoing case leaves no time alone for the two. One of the top racketeers tells the chief the name of the man who is taking over for the murdered racketeer leader. Sam arranges to see Mark and he tells Mark this same name, which only confirms to Mark that Sam is trying to go straight. When Mark finally has some time alone with the Chief, they try talking again, but the Chief restates the possibility of Sam still being outside of the law. This begins to make Mark angry again, but the Chief recounts the bad times in Mark's life, and how Mark had to love when he was a child and Sam Noble bought him ice cream and candy, and the Chief says he knows he seems to be taking this one part of Mark's life with so many fond memories and ruining it, but that he doesn't mean to do so. Mark tells him not to do it then.

The new racketeer leader is found dead and his wall safe emptied. When the Chief goes to investigate, he lets Mark go out on his own for awhile. Mark goes to Sam's hotel room, only to find Sam packing. Mark is curious that Sam would be leaving town when he is scheduled to start his new job. When Mark looks into Sam's suitcase, there is a large amount of money inside. Sam draws a gun and intends to use Mark as a hostage to get out of town. It was Sam who killed and robbed the new racketeer leader. Mark now sees Sam as he really is, and when Sam tells him to cooperate and he might buy him an ice cream stick, Mark answers, "I'm not a kid anymore." Life has its brutal moments of reality.

Sam has Mark call the Chief to get him to end the hunt for Sam. With Mark's life hanging in the balance, the Chief carefully works things to drag out the process to see if they can get a fix on where the call is coming from. They only get a generalized area of the call, so numerous police units go to the area. When Sam has Mark call back, this time the call is completely traced by the police to the phone booth of Sam and Mark's location. When Sam tries to escape, he is grabbed by police officers and handcuffed. Mark is safe.

Back at home, Mark starts to apologize to the Chief, but in a very touching moment, the Chief says, "Mark... Sam Noble bought you ice cream when you were a kid. It was a good time of life. There's not a man in the world who wouldn't fight as hard as he can to hold onto the best time of his life." Mark realizes he has found a new "best time of life," in his life with, and taking care of, the Chief, which includes games of darts, and Mark challenges the Chief to a game, and the Chief tells him, "You sir are about to be taught a lesson in humility."       

* Actor Don Mitchell and his character Mark Sanger were in their 20s in the "Ironside" series, so his childhood years were in the1950s. To a child, a quarter's value in those times made them "rich," and believe me, I know ... ahh, I mean, I've heard that.

** For those unaware of this slang usage of "rap," it means, "a charge or accusation against a person, usually by indictment," and a "rap sheet" is "a written record of a person's arrests and the charges against them." "To beat the rap" means, "not pay a penalty for a charge against one."

Photo is of the Shout! Factory Season 1 DVD Box Set

WORD HISTORY:
Snipe (Sniper)-This word's origin is highly uncertain, but it "seems" possibly related to "snout," a word from the Germanic roots of English, with any further lineage unknown. The idea here is that "snipe" is the name for a bird with a long pointed beak (snout), which has been a game bird found near water going well back in history. There are numerous forms in the Germanic languages, but no one has actually settled upon an Old Germanic form, or whether the bird name was borrowed into Germanic. Old English (Anglo-Saxon) had "snite," but whether this is an altered form of the word (likely, in my opinion), or an entirely different word, is unknown. Many have assumed that what is now "snipe" in English, was borrowed as "snippe/snipe" (ending 'e' pronounced eh/ah) from Old Norse circa 1300, but that related Germanic language used "myrisnipa," literally "moor snipe." Perhaps the Old Norse word influenced the existing English word in pronunciation and spelling? Modern German has "Schnepfe," which was once spelled "snepha/snepfa/snepho;" Low German has "Snipp," Dutch has "snip," Swedish has "snipa," which means a long, narrow pointed boat (get it?), and also, "snäppa," for a "sandpiper," a bird found near water and similar to a snipe, Norwegian has "snipe." The verb developed from the noun in the 1700s from the idea of hiding in bushes to hunt snipes. This then developed into the noun "sniper" in the first half of the 1800s ("sniper"="typically a skilled marksman who fires upon enemy personnel from bushes or some other type of cover"). The verb later (about 1900?) also took the figurative meaning, "to make negative remarks about someone in a round about way or from a distance."