At one time, it was virtually impossible to get through a day without hearing a few of these silly statements: “Sock it to me!” “Here come de judge!” “You bet your sweet bippy!” “Look that up in your Funk and Wagnalls!”—all thanks to the astounding success and widespread influence of “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In.” 

The show premiered as a groundbreaking NBC-TV special in September 1967. It proved to be such a surprise ratings hit that NBC added it to their regular weekly schedule staring in January the following year. 

Creator George Schlatter reflected, “At the time, nobody was doing pure comedy. All variety shows were the same. I wanted something that reflected my own minimal attention span and love of comedy.” 

“Laugh-In” was essentially an hour of modern vaudeville. Viewers were treated to absurd sight gags, irreverent one-liners, off-color sketches, social-issue playlets and satirical newscasts. Performers fell through trap doors, toppled over on tricycles and endured buckets of water and cream pies to the face. Fleeting celebrity cameo appearances featured stars like ukulele maven Tiny Tim, movie icon John Wayne and even straight-arrow politician Richard Nixon (“Sock it to me?”). 

The show moved at a breakneck pace, with one critic aptly describing it as “like an Ed Sullivan Show on an LSD trip.”

“Laugh-In” was hosted by the urbane Dan Rowan with the supposedly dim Dick Martin as his foil. The show portrayed them as hosts often bewildered by the wacky events around them—go-go dancers, a continuous cocktail party and an end-of-the-show joke wall.  

The show spawned a line of products including coffee mugs, T-shirts, jogging outfits, fortune cookies, a comic strip, a magazine and even graffitied wallpaper. Baskin-Robbins even created a new flavor inspired by the show—Here Comes the Fudge. 

The show also launched the careers of numerous celebrities including Arte Johnson, Ruth Buzzi, Henry Gibson, Jo Anne Worley, Flip Wilson, Judy Carne, Alan Sues and Gary Owens. Yet, two women stood out among them.

Goldie Hawn became famous for her portrayal of a bumbling, giggling, bikini-clad blonde babe with silly sayings painted on her skin.

Lily Tomlin’s star soared as Ernestine, a sardonic telephone operator with immortal lines like, “Is this the party to whom I am speaking?” Schlatter even instructed her to use her middle finger when dialing the phone as a gentle jab at the world. 

Although “Laugh-In” continued until 1973, the show had been on life support since the end of the 1960s. However, NBC would soon return to satire with a new show created by a former “Laugh-In” writer, Lorne Michaels, called “Saturday Night Live.”

When asked about the legacy of “Laugh-In,” Schlatter replied, “Break the rules. Once something becomes a rule, it’s made to be broken.”  

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