That link and the account in Wiki indicates it does.
“Spearchucker” was certainly an offensive term for blacks in the 1960s. The explanation that it was because of Jones’ ability with the javelin would have been something of a joke.
I understand your point.
But the other stuff is sporadic. I have to look at that hair every damn time he is onscreen.
mmm
That’s a terrible Wikipedia summary, by the way, at least in regards to the book. In the book, Hawkeye asks Duke if he’ll have any problem living with Jones in the swamp, and Jones answers basically that his reputation is already ruined living with a bunch of yankees, so at this point, it doesn’t make a difference.
Then, Duke asks Jones if he’ll have a problem living with him, being a southerer, and Jones explains that his father was from Duke’so hometown, and when he had to get out if town after killing a man, Duke’s father paid him a fair price for his farm, when he could have gotten it for next to nothing, so Jones has no problem with Duke.
Moe is not happy with your assertion.
Anyone want to discuss Maj. Houlihan’s hair?
Might be imagined but the Soviets never claimed any UN transport a/c shot down by their fighters. I retrieved this page from Wayback Machine for December 2011. This list is not entirely complete or accurate but it’s a topic of some interest of mine and looking further into it there are no such claims, by the Chinese either, nor any propaganda claim by the North Koreans (a list by them of their official claims is still not available AFAIK).
http://www.korean-war.com/sovietunion.html
As to the Korwald list you linked, none of the transport losses are definitely attributed to enemy action except one. C-54 42-72648 was destroyed on the ground at Suwon airfield by North Korean a/c (Yak-9 prop fighters and/or Yak-11 trainers being used as attack a/c) on June 30, 1950 a few days into the war. Other transports were unsuccessfully attacked in the air around that time by NK prop fighters.
Otherwise a couple of C-47’s were lost in circumstances that might have been enemy action, AA that is, on basically combat missions, combat supply drop or propaganda leaflet drop. One C-46 was lost on a special operatives insertion drop over NK when an enemy double agent threw a grenade into the plane as he parachuted.
The MiG-15 had a quite short practical range and except for some early missions from bases deeper within China, the Soviet and Chinese MiG’s operated from Dandong near the mouth of the Yalu on the Chinese side, so only the northwest portion of NK was within their practical range: ‘MiG Alley’. Interception by MiG’s over the rest of NK was rare, and unheard of over the South or portion of the Sea of Japan east of SK. The Soviets once experimented with going after USN a/c near Wonsan on the east coast of NK, (that’s the ‘F6F-5’ claim on Nov 27 1951 if the list can be retrieved, actually an AD which was hit but not shot down, the vast majority of Soviet victory credits in Korea were overclaims) but the two MiG’s barely had enough fuel to make it back. In a few cases the North Koreans staged their MiG-15’s through bases inside North Korea to also appear in the Wonsan area and actually shot down a couple of USN a/c in that area in 1952.
Transport a/c travelling from South Korea to Japan during the static phase of the war (from mid 1951, front line near today’s DMZ, what ‘MASH’ basically presents) were at basically zero risk of enemy fighter interception. As you say a case might be imagined of a big navigational error, and UN radar ground control unable to raise and warn the plane for an extended period, and MiG’s happening to intercept it. But that remarkable sequence of events didn’t actually happen.
Transport a/c in those days were much more risky than now. The Korwald list has some WWII type piston C- type a/c which crashed at one end or other of trips between Korea of Japan. At least one disappeared over the S of J but again chance of that being due to external enemy action is basically nil. I guess it was just judged better dramatic effect on a TV show to say ‘shot down’ than the more plausible ‘crashed into a hill in bad weather’.
I saw Stevenson on the Tonight Show right after this, and he seemed surprised (and pissed) that his character got killed off.
I’m willing to be wrong about this, but I believe Moe’s haircut was for absurd comic effect.
Hawkeye’s hair was just how Alan Alda wore his hair during that period.
mmm
Apparently the surprise ending killed the mood for the season-ending wrap party, which is reason enough to be annoyed.
Yes, they most certainly mentioned his race. It has been decades since I read it, but I am certain that the omniscient point of view of the author allowed the reader to hear the internal musings of some of the characters. Specifically Dr. Pierce and Dr. Jones, Duke and Trapper’s views were verbally stated (as another poster mentioned concerning Duke). Dr. McIntire was completely indifferent being acquainted with several people of color in his home state of Mass. I recall that Hawkeye wondered about any latent racism he might have, and fretted about the sense of “other” (or “different”/etc.) he felt toward Jones. I also recall he felt that an integrated officers quarters (he proposed the situation because Jones was going to have to live with the other blacks who were all enlisted as I recall) was significantly less absurd than the war itself. Jones was concerned it might not work out and that a failure would weigh heavy on the entire black community especially within the armed services. He was also worried they just wanted him for his celebrity (he was a famous running back before his service), which he knew wore off really fast. That was a legitimate concern as the CO did use him as a ringer for the football game and accompanying bets. (A minor sub-plot was a pair of ringers playing for the other team that were eventually drugged due to their success on the field.)
I believe Richard Hooker only wrote one or two sequels even though there must have been a dozen. In the first and best MASH GOES TO MAINE, there is more internal musings upon race, and it leads to a funny circumstance. The swampmen all miss each other and Pierce quickly gets McIntire and Forrest to move to Penobscot Bay, Maine and open an office together. Dr. Jones being an overachiever is too qualified to practice in such a small community—plus the locals (especially in the medical community) would never accept a black doctor. Pierce through his network of Maine medical professionals gets the biggest and most prestigious hospital in the area to offer Dr. Jones a position without the board of directors knowing he was behind it. He (it seems at least some of the other doctors accompany him) travels to the big city where Jones is currently the head of a department or something very impressive. He convinces Jones to at least travel up there and hear their offer. The Maine papers all report a very prominent doctor is considering moving to our little hamlet, let’s all make him feel welcome. In the mean time Pierce and the others organize a protest and meet his plane with signs and chants. The medical establishment takes this as evidence that Pierce and the others (whom they hate) are afraid Jones would put them out of business. The hospital doubles down, every chance they get they ask the community to welcome Dr. Jones and his lovely wife, and encourage them to make this their home. More protests from the other doctors, this time including Duke with a large hunting dog straining for all he is worth at Jones (who knows the dog well from previous meetings and is carrying Dukes briefcase full of treats it turns out). Finally at a black tie dinner the hospital privately offers Dr. Jones a position over the loud and rude protests of Drs. Pierce, McIntire, and Forrest. Dr. Jones asks if he may discuss it with his wife and give his answer tomorrow at a press event before his flight. The hospital readily agrees and plans a big party for the next day. Our hero’s pledge Jones will never be a resident of this hospital (where they all must have privileges) and leave with much gnashing of teeth.
Of course the next day at the press conference Dr. Jones thanks the hospital board for their hospitality and their job offer. But informs them he cannot accept their offer as he has already committed his services to the Finestkind Health Clinic and Fishmarket. It turns out the guys bought an abandoned fish warehouse which they remodeled into a first rate surgical center and rented one end to the fisherman who keeps them square with the blue collar locals. Thanks to the free advertisement they received from their competition the hospital, Dr. Jones has a thriving practice from day one. In those days a good hustle was admired, as long as it served the greater good.
All of that to say, this second book contains many more moments of internal musings on race by all the principals. As a kid who never met a black until he was in high school (and actually he was mulatto- not fully black I found out later), I found those thoughts very enlightening. I found it interesting to see Duke and Spearchucker became particularly close because they were both often perplexed by these Yankees.
Being so distant from race tensions myself (we had many Hispanics, but they couldn’t be more homogenous with the rest of us if they tried), racial divides were very abstract to me- entirely a thought exercise. Books like this made people of color into real human beings for me, just like me and mine. The other thing the books taught me was that you could be a genuine smart ass and have zany adventures if you were outrageously competent. (The TV show, not so much. Alan Alda did not seem zany to me despite the writing and acting because his contemporaries were [to me] Willy Gilligan, Gomer Pyle, and Cpl. Randolph Agarn.)
I guess I just have to assume that this was shorthand, because for an audience conditioned to a show that is set in Korea and uses Japan as a rear area where people go to relax, “Sea of Japan” would be familiar sounding and make them think of someone headed for Japan, whereas anything else would leave the audience going “where?”.
Does it make logical sense? No. But neither does the war lasting 11 years (MAS*H lasted 11 seasons).
Nowhere is it written that 1 season of a show = 1 year. E.g., the first three seasons of Grey’s Anatomy spanned less than one calendar year. The next two seasons spanned a second year. Some shows fit multiple years into one season.
We are currently watching The Bob Newhart show and the year/season correspondence is non-linear. An episode featuring Christmas is soon followed by one with hot weather and then it’s cold again. But how long Bob/Emily have been married, that Mr. Carlin has been a patient of Bob’s, etc. follows the shows season progression.
You can try to judge by changes of seasons, holidays observed, the rare actual date mentioned how much show time actually elapsed. But TV writers just don’t care in most cases.
If one were to be particularly picky, one would note that in the series, Col. Potter officially took command on September 19, 1952. Since the opening episode is dated “Korea 1950” that means that Henry Blake would have been in command for two years, while Potter would have only served the nine months before the cease fire in July 1953. But Potter was in more than twice as many episodes as Blake. Same for BJ and Trapper.
Not to mention that there was one episode of MAS*H that spanned an entire year.
And yet the episode that spans a year, mentioned by Dave.B, explicitly begins on January 1, 1951, and ends just after midnight of December 31, 1951. Potter is in charge of the unit for the entirety of that year, despite the fact that he would not take command until nearly 10 months later.
As many people have observed over the years, don’t bother trying to figure out the timeline of MASH*–it can’t be done! 
MASH isn’t the only thing with this problem. I rad my daughter about 40 Nancy Drew books - the version from the '50s and '60s. Nancy is around 18 to 19 in these. Some stretch over a month or more. To make the timeline work Nancy and her friends would have to be in at least 4 or 5 places at once.
And I’m sure there was no mention of Nancy clones.
A little info on attempts to secure an operational MiG.
It’s a feature of pretty much all popular episodic fiction. The readers/viewers want more, the writers, publishers, producers are in business to provide more, but the timelines become more and more implausible the more long running it is. And imagining there are shorter and shorter time intervals between episodes doesn’t really work either, because in fiction with any kind of interesting action, such unusual things couldn’t possibly occur that frequently. Like ‘Murder, She Wrote’: people get killed every time this lady comes to visit anywhere, so who’d invite her?
Suspension of disbelief, obviously, is required and also standard. And it’s on a more basic level than the implausibility Potter’s plane would have been shot down in that war*. But it’s a fair question how unlikely this would been in the Korean War: extremely.
*US transport planes shot down by the enemy even in WWII were generally on front line missions, airborne operations or supply drops to troops in contact. It was relatively rare even in that all-out war for transports supplying or moving personnel to/from rear areas to be downed by enemy action; the main exception was Japanese Army fighters in Burma periodically going after the US aerial supply route from India to China. Germans a/c of all types OTOH were eventually menaced by long range USAAF fighters that could show up almost anywhere in German airspace in daylight, and British and eventually US night fighters on offensive intruder missions presented risk to German domestic transport flight even at night. The only transport downed by fighters in the Korean War I can think of was a Soviet Il-12 on its way from Port Arthur to Vladivostok downed by a USAF F-86 the last day of the war. The Soviets seemed to really think it was flying over Chinese territory and filed a diplomatic protest. USAF fighters sometimes strayed across the border deliberately but it’s not clear in this case AFAIK. The Soviet shoot down of a US RB-50 recon a/c two days after the Armistice is assumed to have been retaliation.
People have been driven to distraction working out the chronology of the Sherlock Holmes stories, too.
Blake, not Potter
(this minor error does not diminish the other relevant information you provided - much appreciated).
P.S. If I recall the family story correctly, my mother was on the phone with my aunt back in the early 70s, while my aunt had MASH on in the background, and thus my mother got to hear my aunt’s great surprise and distress at the surprise of Henry’s death.