Forget the smarmy Brady Brunch retreads, the real essence of the "Me" decade can be found in its seemingly endless pageant of dubious celebrities. Game show vagrants like Brett Sumner and George Gobel. Husband and wife acts like Shields And Yarnell and Marilyn McCoo and Billy Newton Davis. And daredevils like The Human Fly and the immortal Evel Knievel.
In 1952, 14-year Robert Craig Knievel was picked up for stealing hubcaps in his hometown of Butte, Montana, and incarcerated with another petty crook named Knaufel. The local paper declared that "Awful Knawful and Evil Kneivel" had been caught. Robert, visionary that he was, changed the spelling and a unique era in American pop culture was born.
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