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The Beachcombers: A Canadian Treasure

© Jael Mehr

From 1972 to 1990, CBC television aired what was (as far as I know) the longest-running drama in Canadian history, "The Beachcombers". First airing on October 1, 1972, "The Beachcombers" spanned eighteen years in the life of Nick Adonidas, a middle-aged beachcomber who rented an apartment above "Molly's Reach", a local diner.

This series was a successful addition to CBC television for nearly twenty years in it's Sunday night time slot, but unfortunately, the last season on the air saw the series lose that timeslot, and, consequently, most of it's viewers. We watched Molly's grandchildren grow up, saw characters come and leave, marriages and deaths...but with one little time change, all that ended.

One of my cherished memories as a child is having the opportunity to see a filming of an episode of "The Beachcombers" when I was four or five. After all these years, the memory is more than a little fuzzy, but I still remember having the chance to meet Bruno Gerussi (Nick Adonidas).

Over the years, "The Beachcombers" featured a number of talented up-and-comings, the most notable of which was Canadian actor Cameron Bancroft, but it was the "lesser knowns" like Rae Brown (Molly Carmody), Jackson Davies (John Constable), Pat John (Jesse Jim), and Robert Clothier (Relic) that have stayed with us to this day.

Unfortunately, the hopes that "The Beachcombers" fans may have had of a TV reunion were forever dashed with the tragic 1995 passing of 67-year-old Bruno Gerussi.