# TV theme lyrics -
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [June 26, 2001, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209 "2001-06-26T15:09:29Z")
**Posts on this page:** 11
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Knighted\_Vorpal\_Sword](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knighted_Vorpal_Sword)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/1 "2001-06-26T15:09:29Z")
Please help me remember the missing lines:
“Lady Godiva was a freedom rider
She didn’t care if the whole world looked.
Joan of Arc with the Lord to guide her,
She was a sister who really cooked.
**da da da da** was the first bra burner,
**da da da da da da** (oh yeah)
And when the country was falling apart,
Betsy Ross got it all sewed up.”
I remember watching “Maude” as a kid, and I can’t believe that I would have understood it as a 10 or 11 year old. Did anyone else watch it as a kid? Did your parents let you?
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### Author:  [@The\_Big\_Cheese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Big_Cheese)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/2 "2001-06-26T15:23:40Z")
Lady Godiva was a freedom rider;
She didn’t care if the whole world looked.
Joan of Arc, with the Lord to guide her;
She was a sister who really cooked.
Isadora was the first bra burner;
Ain’t ya glad she showed up?
Oh, yeah!
And when the country was falling apart,
Betsy Ross got it all sewed up.
And then there’s Maude,
And then there’s Maude,
And then there’s Maude,
And then there’s Maude,
And then there’s Maude,
And then there’s Maude,
And then there’s…
That uncompromising, enterprising, anything but tranquilizing,
Right on, Maude!
as sung by Donny Hathaway no less.
I don’t know who Isadora was either.
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### Author:  [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/3 "2001-06-26T15:27:35Z")
Without looking it up online, I seem to remember those missing lines as,
“Isadora was the first bra-burner,
Ain’t ya glad she showed up?”
I was NOT a child when Maude was on. I was more the age of:
"Meet Cathy who’s lived most everywhere,
From Zanzibar to Berkeley Square . . . "
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### Author:  [@screech-owl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/screech-owl)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/4 "2001-06-26T15:28:18Z")
“And Isadora was the first bra-burner/
Ain’tcha glad she showed up? (whoa, yeah!)”
I’m assuming Isadora Duncan?
“She was a sister who really cooked” - that is just so wrong, but still funny.
So what are the other lines during the still shots:
“blah blah blah blah anything but tranquilizing, Right on, Maude!”
My imagination, or was there a big thing with gospel-style theme songs during the 70’s? [Maude, Good Times, The Jeffersons?]
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### Author:  [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/5 "2001-06-26T15:34:58Z")
tlmtlm59—You make a good impression by jumping with with the complete lyrics and singer, then blow the whole effect by saying “I don’t know who Isadora was either?”
[http://www.isadoraduncan.org/](http://www.isadoraduncan.org/)
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### Author:  [@screech-owl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/screech-owl)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/6 "2001-06-26T15:35:03Z")
Thanks **tlmtlm59** , your post was not there when I first previewed.
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### Author:  [@The\_Big\_Cheese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Big_Cheese)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/7 "2001-06-26T16:28:56Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Eve \*
> \*\*tlmtlm59—You make a good impression by jumping with with the complete lyrics and singer, then blow the whole effect by saying “I don’t know who Isadora was either?”
>
> [http://www.isadoraduncan.org/](http://www.isadoraduncan.org/) \*\*
I have heard the name, and now I know and will probably never forget who she is. Dance is not one of the arts I know a whole lot about, and if you’ve seen me dance you’d know why(yes, I’m a guy). So she was also the first bra-burner in addition to the dance I’m assuming???
I never liked the show that much, Bea Arthur was never a favorite, and I’m sure my parents would have let me watch if I wanted to. It was a spin-off of All in The Family if I remember??
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### Author:  [@screech-owl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/screech-owl)
#### Post date: [June 26, 2001, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/8 "2001-06-26T17:00:00Z")
> [@](#):
>
> It was a spin-off of All in The Family if I remember??
Yes, as was “The Jeffersons” (the next door neighbors), and “Maude” (Edith’s cousin, IIRC), spawned “Good Times” (Florida, the maid). I don’t remember if George Jefferson’s maid got her own show.
Isadora was a free-spirit and independent woman. As Eve’s web-reference pointed out, she was a cataclyst for change in dance, breaking free of stodginess (not the word I am lookjing for but you get the idea). On thinking it over more, I believe the line in the theme song compares her to the ‘Women’s Lib’ movement of the 60s and 70s, breaking free from “societal norms” (of which, from what I have read recently, no one actually participated in undergarmental conflagrations - more of a journalistic myth [I’ll find a cite later]).
Then again, she may have burned a bra. I wouldn’t put it past her.
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### Author:  [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)
#### Post date: [June 27, 2001, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/9 "2001-06-27T01:17:52Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by screech-owl \*
> **I don’t remember if George Jefferson’s maid got her own show.**
She did: _Checking In_. Also, Gloria Stivic had her own show called _Gloria_.
(This _All in the Family_ spin-off post is dedicated to the memory of Carroll O’Connor, without whom, none of these spin-offs would be possible. I think.)
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### Author:  [@The\_Big\_Cheese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Big_Cheese)
#### Post date: [June 27, 2001, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/10 "2001-06-27T12:57:17Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Knighted Vorpal Sword \*
> \*\*I remember watching “Maude” as a kid, and I can’t believe that I would have understood it as a 10 or 11 year old. Did anyone else watch it as a kid? Did your parents let you? \*\*
I personally couldn’t stand those long, floor length vest things she wore. What was up with that?? Oh, how I _don’t_ miss the 70’s.
And let’s all pray there’ll be no more spin-offs from AITF.
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### Author:  [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)
#### Post date: [June 27, 2001, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-theme-lyrics/70209/11 "2001-06-27T13:16:43Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by tlmtlm59 \*
> uncompromising, enterprising, anything but tranquilizing,
I am not kidding: _just yesterday_ I considered using this line as my sig.