Summer Fun: Remembering Gilligan’s Island

The Boat in Gilligan’s Island Was Named After the Head of the FCC

Sherwood Schwartz was definitely taking a shot at the FCC with this one. Gilligan’s Island never had the explicit content that’s constantly under FCC scrutiny like modern shows such as South Park, but for some reason Schwartz still wanted to stick it to them.

At the time, Newton Minow was the chairman of the FCC. He had described modern television as “a vast wasteland.” Because of his description, Schwartz thought it’d be funny to name the broken boat the S.S. Minnow after Newton. That’s a pretty good burn, right?