December Bride

December Bride
Lily (Spring Byington) helps guest star Mickey Rooney with a crap game set up as a trap for those who robbed his home.
Genre	Sitcom
Created by	Parke Levy
Written by	Bill Davenport Lou Derman Arthur Julian Parke Levy Bob Schiller
Directed by	William Asher Frederick de Cordova Jerry Thorpe
Starring	Spring Byington Frances Rafferty Dean Miller Verna Felton Harry Morgan
Theme music composer	Eliot Daniel
Composer(s)	Wilbur Hatch
Country of origin	USA
Original language(s)	English
No. of seasons	5
No. of episodes	156
Production
Producer(s)	Frederick de Cordova Parke Levy
Running time	30 mins.
Production company(s)	Desilu Productions, for CBS
Release
Original network	CBS
Original release	October 4, 1954 – May 7, 1959
Chronology
Related shows	Pete and Gladys

December Bride is an American sitcom that aired on the CBS television network from 1954 to 1959, adapted from the original CBS radio network series that aired from June 1952 through September 1953.

December Bride centered on the adventures of Lily Ruskin, a spry widow played by Spring Byington, who was not, in fact, a "December" (rather old) bride but very much desired to become one if the right man would come along. Aiding Lily in her search for this prospective suitor were her daughter Ruth Henshaw (Frances Rafferty) and son-in-law Matt Henshaw (Dean Miller), and her close friend Hilda Crocker (character-actress Verna Felton). A next-door neighbor, insurance agent Pete Porter (Harry Morgan), was frequently seen. Married miserably himself, according to his constant complaints about his unseen wife Gladys, he also envied Matt's positive relationship with Lily, as he despised his own mother-in-law. The pilot episode premiered on October 4, 1954 and involved Lily Ruskin moving in with her daughter and son-in-law. December Bride was unusual in that all five stars appeared in all 111 episodes of the sitcom. Most of the scenes filmed for the series took place in the Henshaws' living room.

First-run episodes of December Bride aired for 5 seasons (1954-1959), sponsored by General Foods' Instant Maxwell House Coffee. During the first four seasons, the program was not shown in the summer, supplanted by "summer replacement" series (such as Ethel and Albert) but in its final year, repeat episodes were run in its timeslot during the summer months. On March 26, 1959, as the program wound down, Rory Calhoun, star of CBS's western series, The Texan, appeared as himself in the episode "Rory Calhoun, The Texan."