Denver Clan

In the mid-80s I was a summer exchange student in what was then West Germany. I grew up in a mid-sized town in Iowa. Okay, for Iowa it was mid-sized, most people would consider it a small town. My whole family was from a very small town south of where I grew up. So, when I went to West Germany, I hoped to be in a city since it would be the complete opposite of everything I knew. Where did I end up? A small rural town surrounded by corn and cows. Like Iowa.

My host family was great. Really. My host father was strange. I'm not going to go into serious details, but he was kind of a man-child. My host mum and host sister? Awesome. Really awesome.

So, it was the mid-80s and American TV and American stuff was all the rage. My host sister was obsessed with James Dean and most of the country was in love with 1950s America. Some company was giving away a 1950s-era Cadillac. I tried to explain to my host sister just how big a Caddy was and how it wouldn't fit anywhere in the country, but she didn't get it--at least she didn't until she came to America a few years later.

Anyway... American TV. Shortly after I arrived, I kept hearing about this American TV show called Denver Clan. Of course I knew Denver Clan, I was told. And the excitement I heard in everyone's voice when Denver Clan was on? Crazy.

Denver Clan? What the fuck? I didn't watch any of the nighttime soaps, but of course I knew what they were, who the characters were and even some of the plot lines. But Denver Clan? Was I missing something?

So, we settled down on Denver Clan night and this is what I saw:



Denver Clan was Dynasty.

I was asked about Denver Clan several times. I was asked about a lot of TV. And other stuff. One guy asked me if I was from New York or Hollywood.* I told him I was from a place in the middle. Then he asked me if I had horses and if there were Indians. Um... Well, no, not in the way you are thinking, I told him

Anyway, what's all this about Denver Clan? Because I spent two days holed up in the Denver suburbs talking about libraries and librarians. It was a good little meeting and I can feel an actual library-related post bubbling away in my head. But in the weeks leading up to the conference, all I could think of was my host sister squealing, "Denver Clan! Denver Clan!"

And you know what's fun (fun in a dorky kind of way)? Reading the German Wikipedia entry for Der Denver Clan converted into English (I used Chrome's translator). 'Cause you read along, it's making sense, and then you read a phrase or title that is just off (George of the Jungle is translated back into George, Who Came from the Jungle).


*While I was in West Germany I met several other American exchange students. One of them was from Dallas. When he told me where he was from, I started laughing. I didn't even have to ask him the natural question before he said, "Yeah, people keep asking me if I know J.R."