It’s difficult to conceive of just how shocking it was for the Nixon-led US government of the early '70s, when John Lennon - erstwhile Beatle and now a counterculture firebrand - and his wife Yoko Ono, took over over one of America’s biggest daytime television shows. Recalibrating a family-friendly programming touchpoint into a showcase of progressive, left-wing ideology.
The week allowed many with then-radical ideas to reach millions more ears than ever before.
But they were ideas that some saw as an existential threat to the nation.
John and Yoko's aim was to present middle-American viewers to counter-arguments against the government line on numerous social and political themes. Topics spanned feminism, race, the right to protest and government overreach.
Perhaps the most popular daytime television show in America at the time, The Mike Douglas Show reached upwards of 40 million viewers on a regular basis, many of whom lived in the heartlands of the US. Far from the more liberally-minded coastal regions.
