Our Story
We Love TV!
MyTVLife™ is the brainchild of Gary Frisch, who began collecting TV Guides as a child growing up in the 1970s. Sadly his mother – like many moms before her – threw away his budding collection while cleaning the house. Undaunted, Gary got back on the horse and began collecting again with a vengeance, storing his beloved time capsules under plastic on shelves in the basement, out of the way of his mother. In fact years later, when he moved out, his mother kept collecting them on his behalf, even saving them for him chronologically.
Much More Than Just TV Listings
To Gary, TV Guide was more than just television listings. Its covers, articles, reviews, and even crossword puzzles served as a lens into American history and popular culture. From the premiere of the first big miniseries, Roots, and the Frost-Nixon interviews, to the many Olympic Games, to national tragedies, to the dawn of the VCR age, TV Guide reported on it – and how television viewers were reacting to it.
A Peek Into TV, and U.S., History
His collection spans such notable TV events as “Who shot J.R.?”, the final episodes of M*A*S*H, Happy Days, and other iconic shows, the broadcast premiere of Gone With the Wind, the rise of pop culture legends such as Michael Jackson and Oprah Winfrey, the wedding and death of Princess Diana, the O.J. Simpson trial, and the phenomena of Twin Peaks, Star Trek, Barney, The X-Files, The Simpsons, and reality television. It also includes historic events like the Challenger explosion, the assassination of John Lennon, the fall of the Berlin Wall and 9/11.
Gary (and his mother) kept collecting until October, 2005, when TV Guide published its last digest-sized issue.
Your TV Life
MyTVLife spawned from the intrigue of learning what was on television – and what people were talking about – on the day you were born, or got married, or graduated college. Like the innate urge to find out where you came from gave rise to genealogy services, Gary believes people want to mark their life events with touchstones of American and cultural history. MyTVLife was created to share the joy of his collection with everyone.