The First TV Show to Portray X:

[Miller]

@terentii

I think they were also the first show to get away with a character saying “Son of a bitch!”

First use of the word “scumbag” on TV, too, IIRC.

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@Mahaloth

Is this a first of some sort? We were discussing primetime shows in my point about Soap. Were they first to have a gay character at all?

Archie Bunker had a gay pal in a 1971 episode of All In The Family.

[terentii]

@Marion_Wormer

What was the first show where a woman wore trousers? I’d like to exclude jeans or something like that when she’s cleaning or gardening or horseback riding.
The reason I ask, was that during the 60’s I was watching one of the astronaut launches and there was a woman in the control room wearing trousers. I was shocked! This was before pant suits. I can remember the furor from that.

Trousers as part of a suit, as opposed to stretch pants or slacks? Lucille Ball and Vivian Vance wore the latter quite often back in the '50s and '60s, as did Mary Tyler Moore in The Dick Van Dyke Show.

In both the first and second Star Trek pilots, the women wore trousers as part of their UESPA (Starfleet) uniforms. The short miniskirt uniforms weren’t worn until after the series went into full production in 1966.

[terentii]

Shirley Jones and Susan Dey performed in velvet suits with trousers on The Partridge Family. I think Peggy Lipton regularly wore bell-bottoms on The Mod Squad.

[Doug_K]

Steambath, shown on PBS in 1973, was the first show on American broadcast TV to show nekkid breasteses (Valerie Perrine’s) on purpose. It also showed the bare butts of two males.