Old-Time Stars Reminisce at Hunt Valley Nostalgia Convention

The faces were a little unfamiliar, and some of the memories, too, as the three-day opened Thursday at the

That bearded fellow in the baseball cap – was that really Billy Gray, who played Bud Anderson on “Father Knows Best”? Sure was.

The grey-haired lady thanking a line of fans for “taking me down memory lane” – was that Patty Duke, half a century since she played Helen Keller in “The Miracle Worker”? Yup, that’s her.

Then there was that white-haired fellow named Tony Dow.

“You were in ‘Father Knows Best,’ right?” said a paunchy man approaching him a little tentatively.

“No,” said Dow, pointing one table down, toward Billy Gray, “that was him. I played Wally in ‘Leave It to Beaver.’”

Right, right.

Well, it’s half a century or more since some of these folks first arrived on everybody’s TV screens, so it’s understandable if some of the names, and some of the shows, have gotten a little jumbled.

Promoters say they expect more than 7,000 people through the weekend at this memory-laced convention, to spend a little time with such folks as Lauren Chapin (Kathy Anderson on “Father Knows Best”), Davy Jones of The Monkees, Ed Nelson (Dr. Ed Rossi on TV’s “Peyton Place”) and Michael Constantine (school principal Seymour Kaufman on “Room 22” and the Windex-toting dad in the movie “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”), among others.

“There’s something about that era,” said Constantine, taking a moment between signing autographs. “The ‘50s, the early ‘60s. I don’t know what it is. Partly, I guess, it’s what we remember as the innocence of the time.”

Nelson touched the same issue: innocence.

He recalled his agent approaching him to star in television’s “Peyton Place,” based on the book whose sexual scenes rocked mid-20^th century America and sent clergy to their pulpits to denounce it.

“I said, ‘I can’t do that show,’” Nelson laughed. “’I’m Catholic, I can’t even read the book.’”

It’s easier to laugh from a distance of half a century.

“America has been through so much in the last 50 years,” said Lauren Chapin, “that we think back to those days and remember a sense of safety.”

She was the idealized little sister in “Father Knows Best,” whose family – led by Robert Young and Jane Wyatt – seemed unofficial role models for millions of post-war American families. They were intact. They had dinner together every night. The kids were respectful.

In one episode, when Young sends Chapin off to bed and reminds her to say her prayers, she replies, “I’ll say ‘em twice.”

“Why twice?”

“Forgot to say ‘em last night,” she replies.

Many wish to remember that kind of a safe and orderly America.

But Billy Gray, Chapin’s older brother in “Father Knows Best,” has a different take.

“We were role models for an awful lot of people,” he acknowledged, “but we were unrealistic ones. People would look at their own families, and look at ours, and say, ‘Why can’t we be like those nice people on TV?’

“There was a naivete back then. TV was new. They looked at us and imagined a mirror of reality. But it’s not fair to compare real people with fictional ones. Whose life is gonna measure up to a script written by professionals?”

Reality-based or not, they’re expecting pretty good crowds through the weekend at the Nostalgia Convention. Vendors are all over the place, selling videos of old TV shows and movies, old posters and photos.

“These conventions are recession-proof,” said Art Harvey, a vendor from New Jersey selling old movie and TV memorabilia. “Even with today’s economy, when it comes to the old stuff, people spend. It’s a way to hold onto an easier time of their lives.”

“Absolutely,” said Ron Roundy, who described himself as “just an old film buff.” He was checking the prices on tables laden with memorabilia.

“I’m gonna see how long I can go,” he said, “before I have to raid the ATM.”