[Redfern]

First watched DW when a local PBS affiliate WFSU started broadcasting the Tom Baker stories in daily episodic format during Agust 1982. About a month or so later, WFSU started airing them in collected "movie" format on Saturday nights as well.

A couple of months (maybe January '84) after it aired a special broadcast of "The Five Doctors", Georgia Public Broadcasting also started to show the "movie" cuts on Saturdays, though an hour later than the WFSU broadcast.

I think the Florida station never aired anything past Peter Davison's serials and possiblity the Pertwee's that survived as full color cuts. The Georgia network eventually aired everything from "Spearhead from Space" (Pertwee's debut) through "Survival" (McCoy's last story).

For me, Doctor Who arrived at the perfect time. Earlier that summer I witnessed the cinematic death of my childhood fictional hero, Spock, so I was needing (okay, wanting) something to fill the fannish void.

Thankfully, I wasn't totally clueless about this "nameless" alien with his "magic box". Upon learning it would air at the end of Summer, I dredged up whatever articles and snippets StarLog magazine had printed about the series. Thus I wasn't totally confused when the title character's face changed just 30 seconds into Tom Baker's debut story "Robot". I understood the gliding, conical shells in "Genesis of the Daleks" were NOT robots, but miniature "tanks/life support armor" for radiation induced mutated "creatures". I knew the silver suited figures in "Revenge of the Cybermen" were effectively Steve Austin gone horribly overboard.

But even with that information, it was a science fantasy concept unlike any I had previously experienced. I was hooked...big time!

Now, here I am, 30 years later, and I still eagerly await each new presentation with teenaged abandon, just like it was when I was 19.

Sincerely,

Bill