The Terrible Catsafterme

SEASON 1 – CBS

Theme song composed by Roy Ingraham, Charles Koff, and Edward Paul

NOTE: This series was based on the 1937 film of the same title, as well as its two sequels “Topper Takes a Trip” (1938) and “Topper Returns” (1941). The original film was based on the 1926 novel “Topper” and its 1932 sequel “Topper Takes a Trip,” both written by Thorne Smith. The 1945 radio series “The Adventures of Topper” also pre-dates the television series.

• 001. Topper Meets the Ghosts – 10/9/1953
  • As he is returning from a business trip, stuffy banker Cosmo Topper (Leo G. Carroll) and his wife Henrietta (Lee Patrick) bump into socialite couple George (Robert Sterling) and Marion Kerby (Anne Jeffreys) at the airport. The Kerbys are heading out for their fifth anniversary weekend at a ski resort. While there, they encounter an alcoholic St. Bernard that they name Neil (Buck). All three are killed by an avalanche but have the ability to materialize as ghosts at will. Meanwhile, Topper and Marion consider buying the Kerbys’ old house, which they are shown by realtor Mr. Moulton (Lyle Talbot). The Kerbys make themselves visible to Topper only and give him background info on the house, as well as sabotage the deal so that Topper can get the house at a low price. 5/31/14

• 002. The Movers – 10/16/1953
  • The Toppers are moving into the former Kerby household, but George and Marion have no intention of vacating. Marion doesn’t care for the photos of Marion’s parents so she puts them in Neil’s doghouse and the dog ends up burying them. In order to locate them, Topper steals a pork chop from the moving men in hopes that when Neil goes to bury the bone from it, he will locate the pictures. After several misunderstanding by which Henrietta thinks Cosmo has eaten an entire leg of lamb and both of the moving men’s lunches, the pictures are located. Henrietta then says they need to hide the photos, as her parents are coming to visit and hate the photos. 5/31/14
• 003. Hiring the Maid – 10/23/1953
  • While Henrietta is laid up sick, the Toppers’ maid Velma quits, presumably after being scared by the Kerbys, who thought she was a terrible cook. George slips a note to an out-of-work exotic dancer named Lola La Vern (Barbara Knudson) that there may be work available at the Topper house. Meanwhile Topper has contacted every employment agency in the phone book and finally gets a call back from the Abba Agency, who sends over a potential cook. Before she can arrive, Lola shows up and both Topper and Marion are surprised when she puts on her dancing garb. Topper quickly gets her out the door just as the real maid Katie (Kathleen Freeman) shows up. She proves to be an excellent cook, and George, who has been given a black eye by Marion, watches in envy as the Toppers eat dinner. 8/9/14
• 004. The Hypnotist – 10/30/1953
  • Henrietta’s former classmate Amelia (Maudie Prickett), a pushy and prudish woman comes to visit the Toppers, and the Kerbys are immediately hellbent on getting rid of her. Marion starts moving objects around, but Amelia is convinced that Topper is trying to drive her crazy through hypnosis in order to steal her money. Amelia is an expert on hypnosis and had previously help Topper overcome his rose allergy. George hatches a scheme whereby Topper will being sneezing around a rose again and Maudie will put him back under. But this time when she does it, the Kerbys mysteriously elevate Topper and he yells out that Amelia is driving him mad – so that Henrietta throws her out of the house. 8/9/14

• 005. Reducing – 11/6/1953
  • Henrietta has been working with a personal home trainer for a series of 24 health treatments and exercise sessions. However when a spill off of a mechanical horse, Henrietta breaks her arm and has to stop the treatments. However this leaves 22 paid-for sessions remaining, so Henrietta talks Topper into taking them. The ghosts try to help get him out of it at first, but then Marion puts her foot on the scale to make Topper seem heavier than he is, thus causing Topper to lose a bet with Henrietta and take the treatments. Topper’s instructor is famous bodybuilder Joe Manurki (Steve Reeves), and Marion is positively smitten with him. Topper hates every minute of it, and tells George so, blaming Marion for most of it. When George seems obtuse about it, Topper tells him how much she moons over him. The word gets back to Marion what Topper said, and she becomes angry with him. Things between George and Marion finally reach a boiling point when George’s jealousy starts to fester and grow. George then decides he wants to get rid of Joe, but Topper decides he is getting stronger and wants to take Judo lessons from Joe. George interferes with the lessons, and throws Joe all over the room. Joe decides to quit, even when Henrietta tries to tell him how much good he is doing. Henrietta tries to thank him, but George then throws Joe down the stairs. George and Marion help Topper lift a heavy weight to impress Henrietta, but when they steal away to make up, the barbells fall on him and lay him up with a broken leg. He is perfectly content with the ghosts pampering and feeding him. 10/13/21

• 006. The Spinster – 11/13/1953
  • Henrietta’s best friend Thelma Gibney (Mary Field) is a clumsy spinster who finds an insurance salesman named Ed Merrill (Hugh Beaumont) who seems to be crazy about her, but the Toppers are concerned that he is only using her because she is buying his insurance policies. Cosmo arranges for Ed to come to their house under the guise of wanting to buy insurance. The Kerbys swipe Thelma’s bracelet, purse, and coat, causing Ed to fly into a rage because they will all have to be covered by the insurance policy. He gets thrown out, leaving Thelma to fear she’ll never meet another man. Meanwhile Neil keeps stealing the neighbors’ newspapers and bringing them to Topper. When their new neighbor Dr. Lang (Lewis Martin) follows his ‘floating’ newspaper over to the Topper house, he and Thelma hit it off immediately. 9/14/14

• 007. Bank Securities – 11/20/1953
  • Topper’s boss Mr. Schuyler (Thurston Hall) sends him to take some valuable securities to rich client Mrs. Baskerville. Unbeknownst to Topper, instead of taking the $50,000 Peerless Mining securities, he takes the Peerless Automotive insurance policy. Schuylar sends security guard Mr. Upperson (Clancy Cooper) to accompany him. They stop at his house where Henrietta makes them eat dinner first, and Neil causes Topper’s briefcase – containing what is thought to be the securities – to fall into the garbage, where it is incinerated. George takes a similar briefcase out the door and Upperson chases it and fires his gun, while Marion ties up Topper thinking he is trying to commit suicide. Henrietta thinks Topper is shot and unwittingly tells it to Schuyler when he calls. Topper is untied and becomes resigned to the fact of having to pay back the money, while Schuyler has realized the mistake and brings the real securities over to the house. Bakerville orders the Peerless insurance papers to be burned so there isn’t a similar mistake in the future. Marion still thinks Topper is trying to kill himself. 9/14/14

• 008. The Kid – 11/27/1953
  • Topper buys an old newspaper to help a desolate boy named Timmy Welch (Billy Chapin), who turns out to be a rich con artist. His mother (Ann Doran) sends him off to boarding school, but he heads back over to Topper’s with a further lie about being left alone. The Toppers decide to let him stay there, but soon the Kerby’s find his money clip and catch him calling the school and impersonating his mother. Topper thinks the Kerbys are threatened by having a new kid in the house, and discount their story. Meanwhile, Mrs. Welch finds out that Timmy didn’t report to school and thinks that Topper might have kidnapped him. Back at home, Katie catches Timmy rooting through her purse and makes an ultimatum that Timmy goes or she goes. The Toppers again take Timmy’s side, but soon realize that he is in fact lying – just as the police show up and Timmy claims to have been kidnapped. The Kerbys hold Timmy down until he tells the truth. Topper and the Kerbys ‘bury the hatchet.’ 10/14/14

• 009. Burglar – 12/4/1953
  • After Topper is caught drinking Neil’s hangover elixir, Henrietta talks to him about the burglar (Jess Krikpatrick) loose in the neighborhood. Chief McGraw (Edgar Dearing) comes to question the Toppers after a neighbor reports seeing a stranger outside their house. Turns out it was Topper up at night playing cards with the Kerbys. George gets a look inside the chief’s notebook and discovers that the dates of the robberies correspond to the addresses of the houses that are robbed. He stakes out 930 Ulysses Avenue – which belongs to the Chief – because it is September 30th. He knocks the Chief out and when he comes to, Topper is above him, making the Chief more suspicious of Topper. George then realizes that it is actually October 1st, and that Topper’s address is 101. The burglar does in fact break in and is subdued by the Kerbys. When the Chief comes to arrest him, Topper takes the credit, although the Chief is still a bit suspicious. Topper says he’s not agile enough to be a burglar, but then, with the’ help’ of the Kerbys, does a back-flip. 10/15/14

• 010. Uncle Jonathan – 12/11/1953
  • Marion’s Uncle Jonathan Ditzen (Rhys Williams) comes to visit, fresh back from a 15-years safari in India, not knowing that Marion and George are dead. Topper fills him in – even about the fact that he can see them – and invites him to stay, not knowing that he is traveling with his elephant Kipling. George, Marion, and Topper all com to suspect that Jonathan is telling a lot of tall tales, especially about the goldmine he own in India. He goes to the bank where Topper works and asks the president Mr. Schuyler for a large loan, but is refused. Topper is busy meeting with the bank’s biggest client Mrs. Baskerville at his house. Schuyler and Jonathan show up there, as does Kipling, causing havoc in front of Mrs. Baskerville. George and Marion offer to help get rid of Jonathan, but he surprises them by volunteering to leave, asking Topper to give Marion his check for $230,000. George rips it up in disgust, but soon Schuyler calls and tells him that he found out that Jonathan really does own three goldmines in India and is a millionaire. 11/12/14

• 011. The Car Story – 12/18/1953
  • Henrietta’s birthday is coming up and the Kerbys want Topper to buy a second car for the house. Topper wants to spend less so he goes shopping for a peignoir nightgown. Marion wants a gown as well so George steals an entire mannequin, causing Topper to run out with two gowns. The Kerbys then plant various car advertisements for Henrietta to see, so she assumes that Topper is buying her a car. He tries to talk her out of it, but they compromise on looking for a used car at Jovial Jerry’s. When the Kerbys see Jerry raise the price on a car when he sees the Toppers coming, they make the car fall apart before his very eyes. Anxious to get them off the lot, Jerry sells them a car for $1161, after George turns the sale price upside down. Henrietta is happy with the purchase, until Marion drives off with her in the back seat. 11/12/14

• 012. Christmas Carol – 12/25/1953
  • After decorating the Christmas tree with the Kerbys and getting conned again by neighbor boy Timmy and then shot with his water pistol, Topper joins Henrietta in hosting a Christmas dinner for their friends Thelma and Dr. Lang (now played by Frank Ferguson), followed by selections read by Topper from Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. When Henrietta continuously interrupts, he has her read it, and then falls asleep. He dreams that he is Cosmo Scrooge who fires Bob Cratchit (Dr. Lang) for taking money from the bank vault. He is visited by himself aka his conscience, who warns of visits by three ghosts. Marion shows up as the Ghost of Christmas Past, where he visits his younger self as he courts Henrietta. George shows up as the Ghost of Christmas Present – dressed as a Christmas Present – and they visit the Cratchits, who are rich. Bob’s wife is Thelma, their maid is Katie, and Tiny Tim is Timmy, who wants to grow up to be ‘successful’ like Cosmo Scrooge. He is so bratty that the Cratchits want to get rid of him, and Tim threatens to run off to live with Scrooge. The Ghost of Christmas Future is a talking version of Neil. Topper is woken up at this point to hear kids singing carols outside, and a visit from Timmy who brings him a slingshot as a peace offering. 12/25/14
    

• 013. Masquerade – 1/1/1954
  • Henrietta wants Topper to attend a New Year’s Eve masquerade party the the home of their friends the Matthews in costume as Father Time and Baby New Year, with Topper playing the baby. Topper initially refuses and Henrietta gets angry and leaves without him. George and Marion convince him to go and give him the address of the party. Unfortunately, the Matthews have moved and Topper gets arrested for breaking and entering and impersonating a minor. He gets thrown into prison, where the Kerbys try to help him escape by bringing him a cake with a gun in it, and then stealing the keys to the cell for him. An escape of all the inmates is averted just as the year changes to 1954. The judge (Dayton Lummis) won’t listen to reason from Henrietta, but finally dismisses the case when he is harassed by the Kerbys. Charlie Hall appears as one of the inmates. 12/23/14

• 014. Second Honeymoon – 1/8/1954
  • To celebrate their 25th anniversary, Cosmo takes Henrietta to the Black Swan Lodge, the site of their first honeymoon. When they arrive it is dark and extremely stormy, and they meet the very odd desk clerk Luke Loomis (Guy Wilkerson) and his wife Carrie (Juney Ellis). Through the night they encounter numerous scary sounds and happenings leading Cosmo to believe that George and Marion were there picking on them. Marion senses that Topper needs him, and they in fact head to the lodge. George investigates where the sounds are coming form and find Luke playing a record of animal sounds. He had been trying to scare them into leaving simply because he doesn’t like people. 2/9/15

• 015. The Socialite – 1/15/1954
  • Although Topper, George, and Marion can’t stand them, Henrietta invites their socialite friends Randolph (John Eldredge) and Caroline (Natalie Schafer) over for dinner. George and Marion get tired of listening to Caroline, so start to occupy themselves with mischief. They spike the drinks, help Topper cheat at Bridge, and make Caroline believe that Topper is hitting on her by simulating playing footsie under the table and slipping her notes supposedly written by Topper. Randolph ends up finding the note that the ghosts put in a sandwich and gets angry and shows it to Henrietta, who recognizes that it is not Topper’s handwriting. They get into a fight and Randolph accuses Topper of being a wolf and cheating at cards. Thankfully the ghosts plant some cards in Randolph’s sleeves so it appears that he cheated as well and they storm out…which makes Topper secretly thankful. 2/11/15

• 016. The Surprise Party – 1/22/1954
  • Henrietta thinks that Cosmo has been acting strangely every since they moved into the house and orders him to be examined by Dr. Lang. Henrietta suddenly feels dizzy and the doctor arranges for her to stay at the hospital for a few days. With her gone, the most excitement the ghosts can find is when Neil’s tail gets caught in the vacuum cleaner. Marion decides to have a surprise party for her own birthday and mails out invitations signed as Topper. Henrietta decides to come home on that same Saturday and have a surprise party with Dr. Lang and Thelma. Topper is surprised when Marion’s guest, including Violet and Edna who continually kiss him, start rolling in. Topper is living it up when Henrietta, Lang, and Thelma show up. Henrietta won’t speak to Topper until she overhears him discussing his plan with Lang to appease her by saying the party was for her, and forgives him. 3/21/15

• 017. Decorating – 1/29/1954
  • Thelma borrows the Toppers’ car and locks her keys in it while shopping at an Interior Decorating shop, so Henrietta takes a spare set to meet her. When the proprietor Mr. Charles (Paul Bryar) finds out that Henrietta is the wife of Cosmo Topper, he hires the clumsy Thelma to help in the shop. Marion gets in the act too and decorates the front window with an ugly set of impractical furniture. Deep in debt, Charles talks Henrietta to purchasing this furniture for $3000, which Topper hates immediately and Henrietta comes to dislike as well. However Mr. Charles will not refund the Toppers’ money. George has the idea to have Topper dress up as a wealthy Frenchman and offer to buy the furniture that he recently saw in the window. Topper offers $10,000 for the furniture and gives Charles a $3000 down payment. Charles then gives Henrietta $6000 to buy it back. 3/21/15

• 018. Astrology – 2/5/1954
  • When Mr. Schuyler notices that Topper is out of sorts, Topper tells him his secret about the ghosts. Schuyler also sees a note that George has written indicating that Vale Mining is a phony outfit, and orders Topper to get some rest on the eve of the Vale-Bridgeport merger, telling him that a bonus had been planned for him… but he needs to cut out the ‘ghost’ talk. At home Katie has locked herself in her room and refuses to talk to Topper or Henrietta based on her horoscope from Madame Gaza (Dorothy Adams). Topper thinks it is ridiculous, but Henrietta has her read his horoscope and is told Topper’s outlook is prosperous… after tomorrow. She warns that he shouldn’t sign any transactions the next day. George and Marion force Topper to stay in bed the next way by hiding his clothes. Schuyler shows up livid that Topper blew the merger, but then gets a phone call that Vale had falsified their assets. Topper is seen as being brilliant and gets his bonus after all. Fred Sherman is telephone repairman George Workman. 6/17/15

• 019. Trip to Lisbon – 2/12/1954
  • As Topper tries to fend off George, who wants to come work at the bank, Mr. Schuyler tells Topper he wants him to travel to Lisbon, South Carolina to check on their branch there because it is being run badly. What’s more, one of Lisbon’s biggest businessmen Harry Devon is ready to pull his money from the bank unless the issue is straightened up. George is up to his usual tomfoolery and spins the secretary Miss Erskine (Lillian Bronson) in her chair when she doesn’t acknowledge him. He later comes home after a hard day’s work and wants to watch TV and they briefly settle on an espionage show. When they overhear Topper tell Henrietta that he is going to Lisbon, they assume that it is Lisbon, Portugal, and that he is on an essential espionage trip for the government. The ghosts follow Topper onto his train disguised as an old man and his nurse, thinking that the train is going to Washington D.C. When Topper meets up with a lady passenger in the Club Car, they become convinced that she is a spy intent on killing Topper. Making matters more suspicious, the lady is overheard in the room next to Topper’s talking about ‘getting rid of him’ before they get to Lisbon. She is actually referring to her and her husband’s valet. It also turns out that the couple are actually Harry Devon (Hugh Sanders) and his wife (Angela Greene). The ghosts become convinced that the Devons have constructed a bomb out of their clock radio. They take measure to protect Topper, first by swiping a gun for him, then by ransacking the Devons’ room and locking Mr. Devon in the berth. When Topper hears him screaming, he comes in to let him out. However, Devon thinks that it was Topper who let him in and he threatens to sue him. Topper assures him he didn’t lock him in, but Devon insists that berths don’t close themselves. Then thanks to George, it does just that. All is then forgiven, and Topper and Devon settle their bank business. Mr. Schuyler asks what he can do for Topper to reward him, and the ghosts replace his vice-presidential name plate with one that says that he’s president. Bill Walker is the porter. 8/12/22

• 020. The Proposal – 2/19/1954
  • Topper fumbles through taking a picture of Henrietta, with interference from George and Marion. Later Marion brings home a hat that she ‘borrowed’ from a millinery shop, but gets angry when George doesn’t compliment her. Henrietta find the hat later, and Cosmo gives it to her. Irritated with George’s boorish treatment of her, Marion decides to take their ‘until death do us part’ vow seriously and declare herself single until George proposes again. Deciding not to use Topper’s old love letters to Henrietta, George gives Marion her freedom, soon coming to regret it and miss her terribly. He then tries to woo her in old college fashion but still doesn’t win her over. Henrietta meanwhile gets confronted by a police officer (James Parnell) for wearing the stolen hat and she becomes disillusioned with her husband as well. Topper’s old love letters finally come into play for both George and Topper in order to win back their wives. Later Cosmo and Henrietta review the picture that he took and find miniature version of George and Marion in the photograph. 1/16/16

• 021. Katie’s Nephew – 2/26/1954
  • Henrietta leaves for a trip, leaving Topper home with Katie. When she is called away to take care of her 18-month-old baby Johnny, Topper suggests that she bring Johnny to stay with them. When a fellow maid (Marian Holmes) brags about her employers The Emmetts’ baby Phyllis being more advanced, George and Marion come to the rescue and make Johnny ‘walk’ and ‘jump’ far beyond the normal abilities of a baby that age. Mrs. Emmett comes to see Johnny’s abilities and are quite surprised and impressed with his acrobatic abilities… and his ability to write about the ‘witches’ in the house. Later the Kerbys take Johnny out for a walk, causing Katie to panic and call a policeman (James Flavin). The Kerbys bring Johnny back in the nick of time, but Buck continues to find babies around the neighborhood and bring them to the Topper house. The mothers and policeman frantically search for the babies, who are all in Topper’s back yard. Topper and Kerbys sneak the babies to the front sidewalk, where the mothers are all reunited with their babies. 3/22/16

• 022. College Reunion – 3/5/1954
  • Topper receives a letter from the Psychical Research Foundation answering an inquiry that he had made about his story of life with the Kerbys. They had opened up a case to investigate his situation but suggest that he might be suffering from hallucinations. Meanwhile, Topper also receives an invitation to Homecoming for a reunion at his alma mater Ardmore College. Since George had gone to the same college, he tries to talk Topper into going along with them. Topper is reluctant to go since he had always told Henrietta that he was a big shot at college and doesn’t want her to find out that he wasn’t. Topper tries to talk her out of going since panty raids are still common there, but she is insistent on him coming along, thinking that everyone will make a big deal of him being there. The ghosts try to help Topper appear to be a big shot by changing his pledge contribution from $5.00 to $5000. The ghosts try to ride in Topper’s stateroom on the train on the way there, but he throws them out, only to find that Neil is crashed in his berth. When they arrive at the train station, Dean Newkirk (Harry Antrim) gives them the red-carpet treatment, and completely ignores an VIP alum named Hartsock (Herbert Heyes). The Dean sets the Toppers up at his house and thanks Topper for his generous donation. Topper says that he might be inclined to double it, which prompts the Dean to make a call to start work on the Women’s Gym. Professor Quimby (Nolan Leary) stops by to see Topper, telling him he was a favorite student but referring to him as Potter. He asks for a research donation to the Biology department, asking for the same amount that he pledged to the school. He also gets a call from the editor of the yearbook to have him write an inspirational quote for the yearbook. Coach Anderman (Emory Parnell) asking for a donation for the football team, so he again pledges the same amount. He receives special treatment and headlines all through the week, culminating with an honorary degree. Hartsock also comes to see Topper and asks him if he will be available to help him with an investment, and Topper unknowingly agrees. The ghosts start to worry about the pledge that they altered, so they pull Topper aside to tell him what they’ve done. Before they can tell him, Topper tells them how happy he is about his treatment at the college. George and Marion join him at the ceremony but shy away when the Dean announces Topper’s $15,000 donation, which causes him to nearly collapse. When he gets back to his room, after summoning and chastising the Kerbys, Hartsock shows up at his room and tells him that his stock went up and he never even had to call on Topper, but still hands Topper his share of the profits amounting to $15,000. 9/29/23

• 023. Economy – 3/12/1954
  • Unavailable for viewing

• 024. The Diamond Ring – 3/19/1954
  • Acme Collection agent Oliver Larkby comes snooping around Topper’s house because George had only made one $5 payment on Marion’s engagement ring before they were killed. When Larkby hears Topper talking to the ghosts, he assumes they are alive and tells his boss Mr. Dillon (Harry Hayden), who turns the matter over to Metropolitan Mutual investigator Mr. Beamis (Harry Shannon) for insurance fraud. When they catch Topper with the ring that he’s taken from Marion, Topper is accused of fraud himself. He decides to come clean to policeman Sgt. Harper (Thomas E. Jackson), even admitting that he sees and communicates with the Kerbys’ ghosts. The matter is turned over to a police psychologist (Robert Warwick) and Dr. R. Lang (Frank Ferguson) for a hearing. During the hearing, they determine that Topper’s visions of the ghost is part of a wish fulfillment disorder… until George and Marion begin to disrupt the proceedings. The psychologist declares that Topper is no crazier than anyone in the room. Topper ends up paying off the engagement ring and returning it to Marion. 3/22/16

• 025. Topper Runs for Mayor – 3/26/1954
  • George sends in a letter to the Election Board offering Topper’s house as a voting location, and the letter is composed so well that Topper is visited by Edgar Horton (William Fawcett), chairman of the Election Committee, who suggest that Topper himself run for mayor. He refuses, but the Kerbys trick him into accepting the nomination, then go to work to campaign for him against the incumbent Mayor Bray (Nestor Paiva). Things are further complicated when Mr. Schuyler reveals that he is Bray’s campaign manager, and that Bray will withdrawal his massive account with the bank if Topper wins. The Kerbys won’t be swayed and insist that Topper stay in the race. The Kerbys disrupt Bray when he tries to cast his vote at the Topper house. In the end, Mr. Schuyler wins as a write-in candidate thanks to some of the Kerbys’ trickery. 6/24/16

• 026. The Painting – 4/2/1955
  • Henrietta has taken up painting as a hobby and she is being tutored by a phony art teacher named Mr. Simeon (Thomas Browne Henry), who keeps telling Henrietta she is doing well in order to keep her on as a client. Simeon brings in his partner Dr. Remington (Raymond Greenleaf) to validate that Henrietta has promise and will need several years of tutoring from Simeon. Marion is inspired to take up painting as well, so she slips one of her own works with Henrietta’s. Remington can’t stand any of the artwork but pretends it all has promise. Henrietta is quick to point out that the artwork from Marion was from the drunk woman who used to live in the house. Marion starts following Henrietta around to paint with her. Later, Henrietta comes home from the art museum excited that they are going to have the famous Blue Boy painting by Gainsborough exhibited, and there is a contest to see which artist can create the best impersonation of the painting. Marion’s comes out terrible, but Cosmo lies and tells her that it is great. She has been asked to show it to Simeon before she enters it, so she sends Topper to give it to him. George tells Topper that he can take it over so that he can hear what Simeon and Remington really think of her art. Marion comes along and slips her artwork in as well. George is so sure that the guys are phonies that he claims they won’t be able to tell her artwork from the original. To prove this, he and Marion go to the museum and swap the paintings. When Simeon and Remington get the paintings, they cast Marion’s aside, but are astonished at how perfect Henrietta’s work is. They decide to steal the original Blue Boy and swap it with Henrietta’s. They don’t realize that they are actually returning the original and taking Marion’s until they get it home, causing them both to faint when they see it. They are so traumatized that they turn themselves in, and the caper makes the front page of the paper, where the characterize Henrietta’s work as a caricature, and that she has a flair for the grotesque. Henrietta is a good sport and decides to burn all her own work, Marion’s work, and her supplies. However, she misses a tube of white paint, with which Topper attempts to brush his teeth. Steve Darrell is the guard. Robert Pike is Mr. Birmingham the museum curator. 12/10/22

•  027. Henrietta Sells the House – 4/9/1954
  • After Topper plays some badminton with the Kerbys, Topper finds out that Harriet has decided to sell the house and move. Naturally George and Marion are beside themselves and insist that Topper stand up to Henrietta and tell her they can’t sell it. Furthermore they threaten to rob Topper’s bank to buy it themselves. In the meantime the house sells to a man named Colonel Newby (Don Beddoe), his wife (Katherine Warren), and their children Orville (Anthony Sydes) and Arabelle (Isa Ashdown). The Newbys move in before the Toppers can move out. The Kerbys try to convince the new tenants that the house is haunted, but the Newbys simply think it is one of Orville’s magic tricks. They finally convince the Newbys to forget the buying the house by simulating it having termites… which is really the sound of Neil chewing on a bone. 6/24/16

• 028. Legacy – 4/16/1954
  • A lawyer named Mr. Jackson (Arthur Space) shows up at Topper’s house to announce that George’s grandfather Augustus Kerby has died and left them a million dollars. Jackson has also secretly hired two actors (Anne Jeffreys, Robert Sterling) to portray George and Marion and has given them fake identification to prove that they are actually still alive. The actors do so well at portraying them that Topper is nearly convinced it is them. Marion then exposes the actress’s leg and the fact that there isn’t a mole on it as stated in her medical records. During the court reading of the will, Marion again exposes the imposter’s leg to the judge (Douglas Wood) which proves she is not actually Marion. The money ends up going to charity, much to the chagrin of George and Marion. James Parnell is the deliveryman. 6/17/15

• 029. Topper Goes to Las Vegas – 4/23/1954
  • Although Henrietta has talked him into taking their boat for a trip on the lake, Topper is assigned by Mr. Schuyler to go to Las Vegas and put in a bid on a hotel and casino on behalf of their client Harvey Middleton. Topper takes Henrietta along, and George and Marion meet them there as well. The house detective Lefferty (Paul Bryer) thinks he recognizes Topper as a crooked gambler, but his boss Mr. Martin (Lee Roberts) warns him to leave Topper alone. Thanks to the Kerbys showing him how to gamble, and a misunderstood conversation with Topper’s boat repairman Olaf Larson (G. Pat Collins), Lefferty is convinced that Topper is involved in a gambling scam. When the Kerbys ‘help’ Topper win at craps, Martin finally becomes convinced, but before he can send Topper to jail, he finds out that Middleton is the new owner of the casino, and Topper is in charge. Topper claims that the cheating was a test and puts Lefferty in charge, with Martin as his assistant. 8/16/15

• 030. Topper Goes West – 4/30/1954
  • Under the guise of offering him some rest and relaxation, Schuyler sends Topper to inspect the operations of a Bar M cattle ranch in Indian Wells, New Mexico. The Kerbys are excited to make the trip with him to the west, and Henrietta comes along as well. George is afraid that the ranchers won’t take Topper seriously so he sends a note ahead from Cosmo “The Dude” Topper, written in cowboy vernacular and appearing a bit threatening. The foreman Dave Hutchins (Harry Shannon) and his assistant Charley Bartell (Frank Sully) don’t take kindly to the threats so they force Topper into a series of challenges – riding a horse and drawing a gun – all of which Topper succeeds in with the help of George and Marion. Finally they send him to talk down a supposed drunken ruffian whom they have planted. However when he arrives, there is an actual menacing cowboy (John Dierkes) there. Hutchins and Bartell try to stop him, but Cosmo is convinced he is fake thanks to inside info from the Kerbys. Topper manages to knock out the cowboy with the ghosts’ help. Buck then beats them all in a game of poker. 8/16/15

• 031. Sweepstakes – 5/7/1954
  • Although Topper is against gambling, Mr. Schuyler thinks he is a gambling addict when George and Marion’s actions make it appear that Topper is betting in the horse races and entering a turkey raffle. The Kerbys think it will help give Topper the courage to stand up to Schuyler by convincing him that he has won $800,000 in the Irish Sweepstakes. The plan backfires when Topper quits his job and begins spending the money before he gets it. IRS agent Mr. Kittler (Charles Lane) shows up at Topper’s house and begins systematically depleting his money. A gold-digger woman (Nana Bryant) also shows up to sue Topper, claiming that Topper fathered her two sons Junior (Ronald Miller) and Omsoc (Steve Miller). When Topper states he wished he never won the money, George and Marion say they can ‘make’ that happen. They prove that the woman is a fraud, and Schuyler, who is trying to get Topper to come back to work, finds an update in the newspaper stating that Cosmo’s win was a mistake. 11/14/15

• 032. The Package – 5/14/1954
  • A package arrives at the Topper house addressed to the Kerbys, but before they can open it, Harriet sends it back to the post office. Cosmo attempts to retrieve it from the postman (Phil Chambers) and a clerk (Edward Clark) at the post office, but fails. They then receive a follow-up letter indicating surprise that they have not responded to the package. This makes George think that the package could be filled with diamonds, after having bought stock in a diamond mine from the Golden Tomorrow Investment Company. Cosmo visits their office, but the owners Felton (Charles Meredith) and Snead (Terry Frost) run out thinking that Cosmo is a cop. The Kerbys get Topper to return with them to the post office where they are able to steal the package while Topper distracts the clerk. The package ends up containing nothing more than a free sample of Twinkle Soap. 11/14/15

• 033. Neil Disappears – 5/21/1954
  • Unavailable for viewing

• 034. The Picnic – 5/28/1954
  • Unavailable for viewing

• 035. The Wedding – 6/4/1954
  • Topper’s secretary Diane Manners (Joyce Mackenzie) is getting married, and although Topper writes her a $10 check as a wedding gift, but Marion changes the amount to $100. Meanwhile Henrietta plans a wedding party for 150 people at the Topper house for her niece, whom she then finds out has eloped. Based on a suggestion from Marion, Cosmo asks Henrietta if she’s still like to give the wedding, but for Diane. Henrietta is enthusiastic about the idea, but Diane’s fiancee Roger (John Bryant) is suspicious about the high-dollar gift and now the wedding that Topper is giving. When she shows up, he is accusatory toward Cosmo and tries to fight him, but George intervenes and makes Cosmo look like a tough guy. In addition George finds Roger’s little black book and tips Cosmo off to Roger’s girlfriends. Roger promises to apologize and never see the girls again if Cosmo will keep quiet about it. Naturally Henrietta finds the book and thinks it belongs to Topper, who then worms his way out of the accusation before giving the bride away to her new husband. 1/13/16

• 036. Preparations for Europe – 6/11/1954
  • Henrietta has a hankering to spend their summer vacation in Europe, and George and Marion are in agreement and want to go along. Topper claims he can’t afford it, and produces his checkbook to prove it. The ghosts then conveniently leave a contest in view of Henrietta to help complete a jingle for Individual Oats. To ensure that she wins, the ghosts pay a visits to the judges’ headquarters and either set fire or let the other entries blow out the window, leaving only Henrietta’s: Everyone loves Individual Oats, It’s the cereal everyone votes…for. With her entry the only one remaining, Henrietta is declared the winner, and soon reporter Ed Moss (Chick Chandler) and photographer Jack (Dabbs Greer) from Sneak magazine are hounding the Toppers’ every move and declare that they will be traveling with them. Mr. Schuyler is upset by the publicity but also thinks Topper might be of business use in Europe. When the Sneak crew captures an image of Topper, Schuyler, and a dancing girl for the cover of their magazine, George and Marion help Topper by exposing the negatives, causing Ed and Jack to get fired. The final challenge occurs when Marion packs and sends all of Topper’s clothes ahead and he is nearly forced to go to the boat in his underwear… until George lends him a suit. Richard Deacon appears uncredited as one of the judges. 9/14/16

• 037. The Boat – 6/18/1954
  • Unavailable for viewing

• 038. Theatricals – 6/25/1954
  • Henrietta goes head to head with Caroline Vance (Ruth Lee) for the title role for the Drama Committee play Lady Sybil as a benefit for underprivileged children. With some assistance from George and Marion, Henrietta wins 36-3, despite the fact that there are only 11 ladies on the committee. Caroline’s husband Randolph (John Eldredge) has been chose to play Sybil’s husband, and is desperately trying to get out of it, especially since he can’t stand the persnickety writer/producer/director of the play Herbert Fulsom (Lowell Gilmore). In light of this he tries to get Topper to take over the part, but Topper refuses. George and Marion also want Topper to have the part so that they can coach him. On the night of the performance, the ghosts get Herbert drunk, so that Topper is forced to go on. The play is a disaster as Neil gets in the act and knocks over the set, compounding Topper being fed all the wrong lines from the ghosts. It turns out that Caroline purposely gave Topper the wrong script. Randolph feels so guilty that he donates the money he was going to use to buy Caroline a mink coat to the charity – ten times more than they normally make. Fulsom is still aghast that his play was ruined, so the ghosts dispose of him by locking him in a trunk. 9/15/16

• 039. George’s Old Flame – 7/2/1954
  • Cosmo’s goddaughter Ellen Bates (Frances Rafferty), who had already been divorced twice, approaches him to help convince her rich aunt Emma Baskerville (Mira McKinney), who is also an important client at the bank, to give her blessing for her to marry famous movie star Larry Hartford (James Seay). Topper suggest that she arrange a dinner so that he can meet Larry so that he can give an honest recommendation. It also turns out that Ellen was a former girlfriend of George’s, and his memories of her makes Marion jealous. Marion follows the Toppers to their dinner with them at Club 22, while George overhears Katie divulge the location of the dinner, he shows up at the dinner, concerned that Ellen is making a mistake and still pining over him. Despite the fact that the waiter keeps getting autographs of Harford to sell them, the dinner goes well and Topper takes a liking to Larry. Thanks to a note that George left her and signed Topper’s name, Mrs. Baskerville shows up at the dinner. Topper tries to tell her that Larry is someone else, but Mrs. Baskerville already knows who he is. Larry stands up to Mrs. Baskerville and threatens to fire Topper due to being deceitful, but he ultimately earns her respect. John Wayne is one of the advertisers for Camel Cigarettes, the show’s sponsor. 12/9/16

SEASON 2

• 040. Topper Tells All – 10/8/1954
  • A police officer is getting ready to give Topper a ticket while he runs into a liquor store to get Neil some booze, but George and Marion take matters into hand and drive off with both Topper’s car and the officer’s motorcycle. Topper is thrown into an Alcohol Ward where the tells the doctor (I. Stanford Jolley) about his history with the Kerbys via flashback of their ski trip that resulted in them getting killed in an avalanche, his first meeting with the ghosts when a realtor takes him to see the house, and how the Kerbys helped him swindle the realtor to get a low price on the house. After he finishes his story, Topper asks the doctor for his diagnosis, and ‘doctor’ tells him that he isn’t a doctor at all, but was merely hired to paint the bathoom. NOTE: The flashback footage in this episode is from the series pilot Topper Meets the Ghosts. 12/8/16

• 041. Topper’s Ransom – 10/15/1954
  • Unavailable for viewing

• 042. County Fair – 10/22/1954
  • Mr. Schuyler goes on a business trip to Chicago and gives Topper several personal tasks for him to do, including babysitting Schuyler’s chicken Hildegard and entering her in the county fair if he isn’t back in time. Both Marion and Henrietta decides to enter chicken pies in the county fair. Topper enters Marion’s pie, and although the judge (Howard McNear) doesn’t care for it, the ghosts force him to stay until he gives Topper the ribbon. Schuyler arrives at the air and finds that Hildegard is no longer in her cage, causing Schuyler to think that Topper has used the chicken in hi pie. Realizing that Neil has released the bird, Topper chases it all over the fair winding up dancing the can-can, at a kissing booth, and in an acrobat act. Eventually the ghosts find the chicken and deliver it to Topper in his hat, much to the delight of Schuyler. Edna Skinner as Maggie begins working as the Toppers’ maid.  Eddie Garr is the barker. 3/27/17
• 043. The Seance – 10/29/1954
  • Henrietta heads off to her mother’s house, leaving Topper behind at home. The ghosts decide to try and spice up Topper’s life by instigating visitors to come over. They steal some local business signs to put out front, including that of mystic palm reader W. Wadell (Philip Ober). Pretty soon Topper has his first customer (Nancy Kulp), and naturally Topper has no clue what she is talking about. Then he gets a visit from the real Professor Wadell, who is impressed by Topper’s ‘trickery’ – courtesy of the ghosts – and suggests they go into business together. One of Topper’s associates Mr. Dillingham (Rex Evans) stops over and gets roped into a reading by Wadell, who proceeds to steal Dillingham’s wallet and diamond stick pin while performing a seance. Marion calls Henrietta to try and get her to come home, and she eventually does… thrilled because she thinks it was Topper silently making the calls to her to get her to return for her birthday. When the ghosts continue to taunt Wadell, he decides to leave and get out of his dishonest line of work. 3/28/17
• 044. Topper Strikes Gold – 11/5/1954
  • Topper is sent to a tiny town called Gold Rush, Alaska, a mining town with a population of 23, to shut down the John B. Quimby gold mine. Henrietta wants to come along to see the frozen North and to bring Maggie with them. Likewise, George has invested in the mine, and he and Marion want to come along as well. The two men, Howard (Ben Welden) and Frank (Charles Wagenheim), who are stationed at the Golden Nugget Hotel as watchman and superintendent of the mine for the past eighteen years. During that time, they’ve produced no output and done no work, and they do not want to have to go out and look for work. They decide they must get rid of Topper, so they show up to meet them in the frozen tundra near where they landed, but have no sled dogs, telling them they will have to walk back to the hotel. George has Neil attach to their sled to get them to the hotel. Howard and Frank then decide that their best course of action is to convince that there is a huge motherlode of gold in the mine. When they tell Topper that there is gold in there, Henrietta tells them that Topper knows how to operate a dowsing rod. When Topper put it in his hand, the ghosts make it appear as if it has a mind of its own, but it does manage to point to the floorboard where Howard lost his golden tooth years earlier. Howard and Frank then smash up Howard’s gold watch and bury it in the cave. They bring Topper to the cave to have him use his dowsing rod to search for the gold. This time the rod directs them to the gold, but there really is a motherlode of gold near the watch parts. As the ghosts are celebrating, the trigger a cave-in. Stuck in there for two days, Topper and the guys pass the time playing poker for gold, with the ghosts helping him cheat. Eventually, he starts talking openly to George and Marion and introduces them to Howard and Frank, who think he is losing his mind. However, when Neil finds a stick of dynamite, and the ghosts use it to blow a hole in the cave wall, the miners are more accepting of the ‘ghosts’. When Neil brings them his little keg of brandy, Howard and Frank think they’ve been in the cave too long. 10/15/24 
• 045. The Chess Player – 11/12/1954
  • Topper has been playing long-distance chess with a penpal named Francis Prescott, who agrees to come for a visit with the Toppers. When he arrives, Topper finds that Francis is a young boy. He offends George and Marion when he says that he doesn’t believe in ghosts, so George ends up fencing with him and ripping his pants. This sends him running downstairs where the Toppers are hosting a dinner party with the Schuylers and rich bank investor Mrs. Baskerville. When Francis espouses his knowledge about stocks at the dinner, Mrs. Baskerville wants to go over her investments with Mr. Schulyer and Francis. Schuyler insists that Topper make sure that Francis plays with the spaceship toy that Mrs. Baskerville has sent to him. The ghosts make the experience terrifying for Francis. Baskerville shows up as Francis appears to be flying around the room, and is ready to confront the toy store where she bought the rocket. Later Francis is seen practicing baseball in the uniform that Baskerville traded the rocket for. This time the Kerbys help him with his practice. 9/29/17
• 046. Topper Goes to Washington – 11/19/1954
  • Topper has the idea that a seven-cent dime would put a stop to inflation, so with Mr. Schuyler’s permission, he heads off to Washington D.C. to present the idea to the Treasury Department. When George finds out he is going, he assumes that Topper has invented something huge, so puts wires out that Topper’s visit should be closely guarded by Secret Service. Upon arrival he is greeted by reporters and secret service agent, whom the ghosts attack and throw down. The reporters think that Topper must have an invisible force ray. Topper is then visited by Congressman Charles Sudbury (Douglas Wood), whom the ghosts don’t trust either and mistake for a spy, throwing him down as well. When actual spies Emil Barco (Anthony Warde) and Dr. Fenster (Herb Vigran) read about the ray, they plot to steal it from Topper, and send over a seductress named Marlene (Lisa Daniels) to try and swipe it. The ghosts’ antics chase her out as well. George assumes that the spies have kidnapped Henrietta and Marion, and even though they have no idea what he is talking about, they pull a gun and try to rob Topper. George overpowers them and throws Fenster out the window. The girls come home from a day of shopping, so they have no case against Barco. Once Topper reveals his dime, Barco loses all interest. 10/1/17
• 047. Jury Duty – 11/26/1954
  • Unavailable for viewing
• 048. Topper Lives Again – 12/3/1954
  • Topper and Henrietta are visited by their friend Theresa, a recent widow with a new young husband Hank, who obviously married her for her money. Topper begins to worry that Henrietta might poison him, and after a Hawaiian dinner, Topper starts to feel ill. Topper goes to see Dr. Peters (Frank Wilcox). Topper is x-rayed, while George interferes and appears in the x-ray as well. When Topper hears Nurse Kennedy and Dr. Peters discuss the oddity in his x-ray, combined with their conversation about a faulty oxygen pump, which has been interfered with by George and Marion as they attempt to sober up Neil, and jumps the conclusion that he is deathly ill. Later Henrietta and Maggie discuss Toppers whimsical flights of fancy and decide to ignore him completely. This leads Topper to conclude that he is actually dead when they won’t respond to him. George and Marion are thrilled at this prospect and coach him through the great beyond. When Nurse Kennedy visits him to have a document signed, Topper assumes that she is the only one who can see him, much like only he can see the Kerbys. Topper then goes to her apartment to ‘bring a little happiness to her life.’ She naturally thinks that his intentions romantic and becomes afraid of him. However once she realizes he thinks he is dead, she humors him calls for Dr. Peters. When Topper tries to walk through a door, he fails and is knocked out… only to wake up at home, and realize that his ‘death’ has all been a dream and he hasn’t yet visited the doctor. 5/10/18
• 049. The Army Game – 12/10/1954
  • Topper receives a letter from the selective service drafting him into the army. George thinks it must be a joke or mistake, and Marion confirms it; she did it as a joke to help whip Topper into shape. Topper visits medical examiner Dr. J.J. Drybread to get a physical, which George helps him pass. Topper is assigned to a military base, and George and Marion follow. He quickly gets on the bad side of his sergeant and is assigned to clean garbage cans. Topper writes Henrietta and tells her that he is a Major, but George and Marion find out that he is still a Private, and not only help him clean the cans, but swipe a General’s uniform for him to wear for a meeting with Harriet. Meanwhile the Sergeant finds out that Topper is wearing the uniform and confronts him by kicking him… only to realize he has kicked the actual General, causing the Sergeant to be demoted to private. Topper runs into General Cordway, who thinks that Topper is General Miller who is replacing him. Cordway sets up Topper in his new office, where he is mistaken by the actual General Miller for General Cordway. Topper, while portraying Cordway, also accepts the apology of the Sergeant… but when his right-hand man Callahan convinces the Sergeant that Cordway was actually Topper, the Sergeant kicks him once again… but this time it General Miller, who blows his stack and threatens to court martial the Sergeant. Cordway gets word that Topper is in the army by mistake, and when he runs into Miller and Topper at the same time, Topper makes a hasty exit. As he departs the camp, he runs into the Sergeant, now a Private cleaning garbage cans. George gives him a swift kick into one of them. 12/25/18
• 050. Topper’s Accident – 12/17/1954
  • Topper and the ghosts shop at a hardware store, and the ghosts make it appear that Topper is robbing the place, but when the clerk (Renny McEvoy) tries to detain him, Marion pours paint on him. Meanwhile at home, Henrietta has hired a handyman named “Woody” Woodhead (Tom Dugan) to fix the doors that keep opening on their own. A hunter named B.J. Mahoney (Robert Burton) comes looking for Woodhead, claiming that he stole his tools. Woodhead accidentally knocks Mahoney in the closet where he gets his head stuck in a vase. Topper calls Dr. Peters to check out Mahoney for injuries, but all the doctor finds is that Mahoney has ‘rabbit fever’ from a recent hunting trip, so he quarantines the house. Efforts by the ghosts to sterilize Mahoney makes it appear that Topper is spraying him with bug spray and removing his pants. The doctor is able to find a bed for him at the crowded, local hospital, but when he finds out what the crowded conditions are like, Mahoney decides to stay with the Toppers. As Mahoney berates Topper, the ghosts stick ears and a tail on him and make him hop, convincing Mahoney he needs to be a hospital after all. Woodhead returns to fix the door by nailing it shut but passes out when he sees George parading around in a rabbit costume. 5/25/18  
• 051. Topper’s Quiet Christmas – 12/24/1954
  • It is Christmas Eve and Topper hasn’t bought a tree yet, so he visits Mr. Woodhead’s tree lot where the picking are bottom of the barrel. Woodhead tells Topper he will be over to clean out his basement that evening even though it is Christmas Eve. Topper shows up at home with a tiny tree, while Henrietta laments that she’s bought and hidden all of her gifts and now forgets where they are. Topper finds one of the previous year’s gifts inside the piano, and when Woody shows up, he gives it to him. Henrietta sends him out to get another Christmas tree. Marion has told George and Topper that she doesn’t want anything for Christmas, but clearly expects a gift. In any case, Topper has bought a watch for her. George brings home a Christmas turkey named Prudence, and when Marion’s watch disappears, George and Topper think that Prudence ate it. While George tries to capture Prudence, Woody returns with a giant tree so big that he can nearly get it through the door. Mr. Schuyler shows up at the house bearing gifts, then tells Topper that he wants to foreclose on the mortgage of a turkey ranch that evening for their client B.J. Mahoney. Although no one lives there, Topper and the ghosts feel bad about displacing 12,000 turkeys. Marion wants to invite Mahoney over to put him in the Christmas spirit, but Mahoney shows up on his own. He wants to shoot Woodhead for stealing trees off of his property to sell as Christmas trees. He becomes even more enraged when he recognizes Topper’s tree as one of his own. He tries to shoot Woodhead, but George has switched out his rifle with an axe. Thinking that he is having hallucination, Mahoney fears he may on death’s door and decides to both forgive Woodhead and not foreclose on the turkey ranch. However, Marion has already begun gathering the turkeys in crates and bringing them into Topper’s house. When Mr. Woodhead finds Henrietta’s stack of gifts in the basement, he brings them upstairs and accidentally knocks over the stacks of crates, causing turkeys to scatter everywhere all over the house. Topper and George lament that they’ll never find Prudence, and therefore the watch. However, Marion has already found the watch and is wearing it on her dress. 1/26/24
• 052. Topper’s Happy New Year – 12/31/1954
  • It is New Years Eve, and Topper and Henrietta have plans to go to the Schuylers’ place to celebrate. George, Marion, and Neil are dressed for a masquerade party, but first they realize they have to have their ectoplasm recharged as Neil starts to disappear. They want Topper to wait for them to get their fresh ectoplasm because rules state that they have to haunt the first person they see in the New Year. Topper tells Henrietta that he has to tend to some bank business for a bit and to go on ahead with Mr. Schuyler to his place. As they are heading to the party, Mr. Schuyler tells Henrietta that there isn’t any business to do that night, so they decide to return to check on him. Meanwhile, a woman named Mrs. Smith (Phyllis Coates) stops by to use Topper’s phone when her car breaks down. The Kerbys return freshly charged, but there was a shortage of ectoplasm at the bank and Neil didn’t get his recharge. All that remains is his tail, which is slowly disappearing. They fear that he is leaving them forever, so through tears, they drink a toast to him. Neil’s tail then drags the Kerbys off to animal shelter. Mrs. Smith returns because she forgot her purse. Topper invites her to stay and have a drink while waiting for the tow truck. Henrietta and Mrs. Topper come back home and find Topper drunk, with Marion’s lipstick on his face, and Mrs. Smith drinking champagne with Topper. Over at the animal shelter, Neal’s soul enters a horse, while George and Marion find a dog named Otto that looks just like Neil. Goerge goes into the stall to help Neil exit the horse. Marion drops Otto off at Topper’s house and returns to the animal shelter. Topper is surprised when both Mr. Schuyler and Henrietta can see the dog, who he believes is Neal. Because of Topper’s strange behavior, Schuyler and Henrietta run off to find a psychiatrist. Henrietta is later called into court, where the judge (Dayton Lummis) explains that Topper has been arrested by Officer Martin (William Haade), just like he had been last year. Topper is brought into the courtroom dressed like a horse jockey. He explains that the ghosts returned to his house, but George was now trapped inside the horse. He tells Topper that he needs him to take him back to the animal shelter, so Topper has to dress like a jockey in order to not arouse suspicion. However, Officer x sees him leave the house with the horse, who kicks the officer and knocks him out. When he awakens, he finds Topper and the horse waiting for a streetcar because George had grown too tired to walk any further inside the horse’s body. When the Officer cannot come up with any charges, the judge dismisses the case against Topper, and he and the Kerbys return to the shelter, where they find that the horse is eating grain inside George’s body. George goes back into the stall with his body and is able to make the switch. They all head off to celebrate the New Year. After the party, Topper comes home with the Kerby’s with Neal riding atop the horse. 5/25/24
• 053. Topper’s Deception – 1/7/1955
  • Maggie has told her Papa (Britt Wood) that she is rich and successful, and it is actually the Toppers who work for her instead of the other way around. Henrietta wants Topper to act as the butler, and despite his initial refusal, he decides to do it since he doesn’t want to lose Maggie and her great cooking. Topper visits the costume store and gets a butler and maid uniform, while George and Marion get costumes just for fun. George dresses from the Victorian era, while Marion’s French Maid uniform gets mixed up with Henrietta’s uniform. When Papa arrives, he takes an instant liking to Henrietta in the French Maid uniform. While Harriet struggles in the kitchen when her pressure cooker blow the collard greens onto the ceiling, Papa spies Topper eating food in the kitchen with the ghosts, insisting the Maggie fire Topper. Henrietta calls Topper in sick, but when Mr. Schuyler comes to bring him flowers, he spies Topper acting as a butler Henrietta as the maid and begins to question his own sanity. Topper explains what is going on, but Schuyler wants Topper to report to work immediately. Papa tries to fire Topper, but he and ghosts decide finally that it’s time for Papa to leave. The ghosts help ‘convince’ Papa that he’s got muscle twitches, is seeing things, and has fever, chills, and depression. In short, he believes he has city-itis, and heads back home to his farm. Maggie sees him off, and then reveals that she has taken a liking to the French Maid uniform and is now wearing one. 12/25/18
• 054. Topper’s Guest – 1/14/1955
  • Topper and Mr. Schuyler prepare to handle the execution of a will of their client Arnold Griswold, whose money he has left to a South American man from Argentina named Renaldo Lopez. Topper plans to host Lopez at his house along with his valet Wickashaw Bates (Skelton Knaggs). Henrietta has Maggie get things ready for him, and invites Elsie Worble (Elvia Allman) to entertain him, despite the fact that she can’t see anything without her glasses. It is not until he arrives that they all realize that Lopez is actually a chimpanzee, except for Elise, who just thinks he is a man with a giant beard until she puts on her glasses… causing her to faint. At the reading of the will, Griswold’s nephew Julius (James Westerfield) arrives and finds the notion ridiculous that the money has been left to a chimp. George and Marion overhear Julius trying to make an arrangement with Wickashaw. This puts them on high alert, and when Wickashaw puts Renaldo to bed that night, the ghosts are right there to keep an eye on him. They first believe that he is trying to poison him, then think that he is putting up a noose from the chandelier to hang up. However, when Wickasahw explains that he was only giving Renaldo his vitamin pill and was putting up the rope so that he could swing before bedtime, George has to admit that he is wrong. However, outside the house, Julius has brought in Wickashaw’s evil twin brother Humphrey, whom he sends into the house to knock out his brother and then kill Renaldo after all. George and Marion don’t realize that Humphrey is not Wickashaw, so they think he is just playing with Renaldo as he chases him around the room, but when things start to get rough, they sic Neil, who has made fast friends with Renaldo, on Humphrey, who then confesses that it was Julius who hired him to kill Renaldo and tells them that his brother is passed out under the stairs, before hastily exiting the house. Renaldo and Neil fall asleep together, and then later get into Topper’s alcohol to have their own party. 5/25/24
• 055. Topper’s Rejuvenation – 1/21/1955
  • Unavailable for viewing
• 056. Topper in Mexico – 1/28/1955
  • Unavailable for viewing
• 057. Topper Hits the Road – 2/4/1955
  • Topper opens a safety deposit box that is now due for its rental after a client named Wesley Farrington (Jesse White) had rented it and pre-paid it twenty years earlier. The box contains stock for Felton Tool, which George tell him has since been absorbed by the B&L Railroad and is worth roughly six and a half million dollars. Topper and Mr. Schuyler show it to the president of the railroad Mr. Meeker (Stanley Andrews), who is also a client, and he unethically suggests that they tear it up. Topper vows to find Farrington, and with the help of the ghosts, they track his address to a vacant lot where they encounter a hobo named Shorty (William Phillips), who introduces them to Farrington… also a hobo. The two of them along with another hobo named Kewpie (Tom Kennedy) all live on the lot together. Farrington is not much interested in collecting the money but his friends encourage him to claim it. When the three men are taken to the bank so Farrington can sign the stock, Meeker tries to intervene and buy him out so he will have controlling interest in the railroad. However Farrington announces that he is turning the stock over to Schuyler to sell and give the proceeds to charity. Meeker is escorted out by the ghosts, who drag him out on a rug. 12/24/19
• 058. Topper at the Races – 2/11/1955
  • The ghosts encourage Topper to add some excitement to his life. Later Topper meets an eastern royal named Ali Kyber (Jack Reitzen) who wants to deposit four million dollars in the bank, and also wants Topper to accompany him to the racetrack with a briefcase full of his money. The ghosts are happy that Topper is getting some excitement, but when they find the case of money, they fear Topper is having too much excitement and is embezzling from the bank. They follow him to the races, and when they overhear how much Ali has lost, they assume that its Topper’s money. Ali runs into his friend Henri (John Banner) and tells him he is betting $15,000 on Solid Girl, a tip that Henri then passes to his friend Pierre, which is overheard by the ghosts. They relay the information back to Topper, and when he tells Ali, he adds $15,000 more to the bet. The ghosts lay down a bet as well. Solid Girl comes in last in the race, leading the ghosts to worry that Topper is in trouble when he stays out late with Ali, and then find out that the Bank Examiner Mr. Pettigrew (Thomas E. Jackson) as is at his office. Trying to help him, they go the bank and steal money from a bank clerk (Jank Rice) across the street and add it to the money that Pettigrew is counting, causing him to be $50,000 over is his audit. When the ghosts realize what they’ve done, they ‘float’ the money back to the bank… but each accidentally takes $50,000. When Pettigrew re-audits, he comes up $50,000 short… just in time for George to ‘float’ his back for a third count. Jess Kirkpatrick is the betting window clerk. 12/24/19
• 059. Topper’s Racket – 2/18/1955
  • Unavailable for viewing
• 060. Topper’s Amnesia – 2/25/1955
  • Topper is buying flowers in a flower store and the girl (Darlene Fields) is making eyes at him, so the ghosts attempt to drag him out. Topper hits his head on a hanging plant and when he comes to, he can no longer see the ghosts. George and Marion deduce that if they hit him again, he will remember them. So they grab a bat and try to force Henrietta to hit him, but she is caught by Mr. Schuyler, who has come to take Topper to meet a man named Lord Boomer to give him some paperwork for a line of credit. Then the ghosts give Schuyler the bat, and force him to hit Topper. This however just makes Topper forget who everyone else is including himself. The ghosts decide to take him to Vienna, but while he is at the airport, a police officer (Edgar Dearing) mistakes him for Lord Boomer since he is carrying papers for him in his coat. They assume he is royalty but when Topper goes to the address on the paper he is mistaken for a professional wrestler from England named Lord Boomer. What’s more his childhood sweetheart Cynthia (Edith Leslie) plans to marry him. The wrestling promoter Max (Joe Devlin) takes him to the wrestling arena where he meets his opponent for the evening’s fight Tina aka Blackbeard the Gouger (Henry Kulky). The Gouger throws Topper around during rehearsal, so the ghosts interfere, which angers Gouger enough to say that he is going all out in the match that night. Cynthia finds out that Topper is not really Boomer and hits him over the head with a framed poster, causing Topper’s memory to return. He sends the ghost home to get his clothes, but Max, who has placed large bets on Topper, forces him to the ring at gunpoint. The ghosts, followed by Henrietta and Schuyler, see Topper fighting on TV and head to the arena. The ghosts interfere and help Topper win the fight. Flowers delivered by the girl from the floral shop await, and when George attempts to kiss Marion, he accidentally kisses the floral girl just as Henrietta and Schuyler walk in. Topper then feigns amnesia again. 4/3/20
• 061. Topper’s Arabian Night – 3/4/1955
  • Mr. Schuyler is working a $50 million oil deal with a Sheik from the Arabian country of Fezarania, and plans to go in person to get his signature, mostly because he is fascinated by the 219 wives in his harem. Topper doesn’t care to go, but Schuyler thinks Topper won’t run the bank in a dignified manner so forces him to go along. George and Marion and Henrietta go along as well, and Neil is kept energized by martinis along the way as they travel by donkey and camel. The Sheiks prove to be con men who go by the names Sidi (Benny Rubin) and Ali (John Banner), and have hired the harem and the acrobats. Topper suspects him right away upon arrival thanks to some prodding from George. The acrobats perform a routine that Topper somehow gets in the middle of. Topper and Schuyler have brought along cosmetics as a gift offering to the harem, but Ali thinks that Topper is offering Henrietta, so she is dragged into the harem. Schuyler is about to sign the contract when George drags Topper out to stop it. This leads to a fight between Sidi and Ali, and it becomes clear they are crooks. Schuyler gives Topper the credit, while Marion reminds Topper that it was actually George who recognizes the scam. Before they leave, Schuyler is roped into another acrobat performance. As they travel home through the desert, Neil sees mirages of martinis. 4/3/20 
• 062. The House Wreckers – 3/11/1955
  • The ghosts intercept a letter to Topper indicating that they must all vacate the house within the next 24 hours, as the city is about to tear it down to put in a freeway. George and Marion believe that Topper may have sold the house, but Topper denies having any knowledge of the sale. They spot Topper with his suitcases, but he claims that he is merely going on a business trip to Chicago. The ghosts start to believe him, and they suggest that the city can’t move a sick man, so they advise him to pretend he is ill. Henrietta calls in a doctor, and Schuyler comes over to see why Topper has missed his plane to Chicago. When Topper tells the doctor about the ghosts, he thinks that Topper may be drunk and delusional. Meanwhile, the house starts to tilt onto it’s side, as the construction crew has already begun their work of picking up the house and physically moving it. The workman (Allen Jenkins) tells Topper that he’s already been paid for the house. The doctor starts to believe that Topper is in denial about selling the house, and declares him a sick man. Topper wants nothing to do with being laid up, and insists that he go to see the Superintendent of Housing to straighten it out. However the ghosts warn him that if he leaves, they may move the house. Topper tries to call him, but George gets on the other line in the house, and tells him the only way the freeway can be stopped is if the homeowner is sick. Mr. Schuyler brings over his attorney Mr. Quincy to represent him in the case versus the highway commission, but Topper throws him out when he thinks Topper actually sold the house and is claiming amnesia. Topper tries to settle the matter with the construction workers by flipping a rigged coin to see if they stay or go. However the workers have a rigged coin of their own, and begin bracing the inside of the house. The ghosts start messing with the workers, and they all get in a fight and start to destroy it. The Superintendent of Highways shows up and tells the men that they have the correct address, but the wrong city. He promises to pay Topper retribution for all of the damage that they made. He also claims that this is the workers’ first mistake on the job… right before they accidentally drive a bulldozer through the living room. 4/23/22
• 063. Topper Makes a Movie – 3/18/1955
  • The bank has loaned a movie production company money to shoot a western, so Mr. Schuyler sends Topper to an Indian reservation where the shooting is taking place to scope out how it is going. Schuyler warns him to remain incognito so as not to stir up trouble. Henrietta and the ghosts join him on the trip, all of them hoping to be put in the picture. Topper is against the ghosts coming, and upon arrival when he sees an Indian couple, he assumes it is George and Marion dressed up in disguise. When he berates them, they throw him into a barrel of water. Meanwhile on the set, the main actor Mr. Frampton (Lowell Gilmore) is refusing to do his own stunts. When Topper wanders over to check on the production, the director Mr. Keech (George Givot) hires him as a stuntman. The ghosts help him through the first dangerous stunt and the director is so impressed that he writes some extra pages of script for Topper, who actually wants no part of acting. Topper is about to tell Keech that he is with the bank, but then learns that the Indians have been waiting for someone from the bank, presumably to catch them up on their salary since they haven’t been paid. Topper continues to pose as a stuntman and films several scenes with the beautiful Indian Princess (Jonni Paris). Unfortunately once Topper performs each dangerous stunt, he leaves the scene and Frampton gets to kiss the princess. After a while Topper is ready to throw in the towel, shortly before he has to be filmed doing an Indian dance. The ghosts tell him he’ll be giving up his movie career and they force him into the dance. Once he breaks free, he admits that he doesn’t want to act and is actually with the bank. The Indian Chief (Steve Darrell) tells him that the Indians have actually been wanting for him so they can pay back their loan and have controlling interest in the movie…which they now want to end with a happy ending for the Indians for once. 7/15/20
• 064. King Cosmo the First – 3/23/1955
  • The ghosts want Topper to go to a baseball game but he is far too busy at work. Mr. Schuyler on the other hand is willing to give up his services when a potential client named Mr. Hopak (Philip Van Zandt) wants to borrow Topper for the evening. It turns out that Topper is the spitting image of the visiting King Rupert the 13th of Borokovia (Leo G. Carroll), who is marked for assassination from a party who wants to usurp his power. Schuyler is unwilling to put Topper into danger until he finds out that the King wishes to invest his $30 million dollars in the bank. They think it best that Topper is unaware of the danger, so Schuyler tells him that he has rented him Suite B at the Carlton Towers in order for him to work in peace. Meanwhile the King goes home to Henrietta for the evening, unbeknownst to her. When the ghosts come home from the game and the King doesn’t seem to be able to see them, George thinks he has amnesia again and knocks him out. Schuyler starts to feel guilty about putting Topper in danger so he goes over to his house to tell Henrietta that the man there is not Topper. They and the ghosts head over to the Carlton, where Topper had met the Queen (Phyllis Coates) who has no idea that the man in her room isn’t the King. Topper initially thinks she is the stenographer he ordered, but he quickly falls under her seductive spell. It is broken when she shows him all of the money brought over from Borokovia, and Hopak enters the room and confesses that he and the King stole the money, and plan to have it covered up having the ‘King’ assassinated, the King in actuality being Topper. The ghosts intervene and knock out Hopak with a bat and throw him in the trunk that contained the money. When the King returns to the room as well, he gets the same treatment and gets thrown in the trunk by the ghosts. 7/17/20
• 065. Topper’s Double Life – 3/30/1955
  • George and Marion visit Topper at his office, where he is trying to fix a female mannequin from the display window. He is also visited by a customer with bifocals who can barely see anything named Elsie Worble, who thinks that the mannequin is an actual woman and that Topper is having an affair. Making matters worse, she hears Topper talking to Marion, and thinks that Topper’s lady friend is named Marion. Elsie calls Henrietta to tell her that Topper is cheating on her with a woman named Marion. Meanwhile George and Marion tells Topper about a contest George entered in the American Pigeon Journal for the most understanding wife of a pigeon breeder. He sent along a photo of Marion with his entry, and then signed the entry with Topper’s name. George ends up winning the prize of a flock of pigeons, so Topper rents out an apartment so that the editor Horace Pumphrey can deliver the prize to George via Topper. The room he rents happens to be next door to Elsie, so she now reports to Henrietta that Topper has rented a room. George puts a photo of Marion up in the apartment to convince the editor that she is his wife. Henrietta then goes to Topper’s office to question Mr. Schuyler about the so-called affair, but he defends Topper. However, Elsie later takes him to the apartment Topper rented, where he finds him with Pumphrey. Both Schuyler and Elsie tell Pumphrey that the photo hanging on the wall is not Mrs. Topper… unless Topper is a bigamist. Henry tries to explain what has happened, although he claims they are talking about another person, but has a hard time explaining it. George wants to break into Pumphrey’s hotel to switch the photo he took of Topper for one of him, so that the world won’t think that Topper is married to two wives. Topper goes along with them, but when Pumphrey and the house detective come into the apartment, George knocks out the detective Pumphrey then goes to see Schuyler to report Topper, but Schuyler says he needs more evidence, so they go to Elsie’s room to eavesdrop. They hear Topper talking to George and Marion, and they believe that George and Neil are the sons of Topper and Marion. However, when they think they’ve found where Marion is hiding, they find Henrietta, who has come to rescue her husband. She tells Elsie that Topper took the apartment because their house was being painted. Topper tells Elsie that she needs new glasses, but she claims that she can see just fine… as she walks into the closet while attempting to leave. George tries to use a whistle to call his homing pigeons, but he only succeeds in getting Neil to come. 8/11/22
• 066. Topper Fights a Duel – 4/8/1955
  • Topper is working on a secret deal for Mr. Schuyler that involves on investing in the French to fund a truffle hunting expedition. Schuyler tells Topper to come to the French Consulate to meet with the French Envoy George Fromage (Henri Letondal) and his wife Marie (Teresa Tudor). The ghosts insist on coming along despite Topper’s objections. Trouble starts almost immediately when Topper kisses the hand of Marie and gets poked in the eye by her snake bracelet, making it appear that he is repeatedly winking at Marie. Topper then struggles with the ghosts over a champagne bottle, resulting in the cork hitting Fromage in the eye. Then when Neil tugs on Madame Fromage’s bracelet, she winds up in Topper’s lap during the struggle. George has also been watching Fromage hit on Henrietta, so when their anger reaches a boil the two George’s exchange a glove face slap and a challenge to duel with swords at midnight. The ghosts try to work with Topper on his fencing technique, but when George and Marion start dueling with each other, Fromage spots the two swords dueling by themselves and thinks Topper can duel without hands. He looks for an excuse to call off the duel, while Topper tries to find where George is to help him. A pig has brought in to help hunt the truffles, and Marion thinks that George has taken the form of the pig. When Fromage overhears Topper talking to the pig and calling it George, he is insulted and starts the duel right then and there. George finally shows up and helps Topper gain a victory, as Fromage battles a sword with no hands. Fromage and Topper finally make up and make the deal, with Topper promising to give Fromage fencing lessons. 10/31/20
• 067. Topper’s Egyptian Deal – 4/15/1955
  • Mr. Schuyler is upset that an oil expedition in Canada has failed, but Topper informs him that he had financed an expedition of his own in Egypt, where Professor Slatkin has located the elusive Nefertanium, a mummy of an Egyptian princess, valued at $30,000. Schuyler is fearful that the mummy might carry a curse, so he insists that Topper takes it home. Topper had some trouble explaining it to Henrietta, but the ghosts are fascinated by it. However, Mr. Schuyler rushes over to Topper’s house to tell him that the mummy’s discoverer Professor Slatkin was found strangled in the East River. They phone Dr. Hassan (Edward Colmans), the professor of Egyptology who they hope can arrange the mummy’s sale to a museum. Unfortunately Hassan’s assistant Ammed (Benny Rubin) is one of the assassins, so he gathers up his henchman (Charles Horvath) and heads to Topper’s house. George has been busy unraveling Nefertanium to see what she looks like so he can find her in the afterlife, but when he throws the bandages on Marion, he mistakes her for the princess. The assassin makes an attempt on Topper’s life while the ghosts go bring back a tied-up Hassan, mistaking him for the assassin. Schuyler comes over as well, thinking that Ammed is Hassan, and looking to get everything that was going to be given to Topper. The assassins again attempt to kill everyone, but George stops them, strangles both Ammed and his henchmen, and ties them both up to deliver them to the police. Topper explains that it was a trick his ‘mummy’ taught him. 10/31/20
• 068. Topper’s Uranium Pile – 4/22/1955
  • While playing golf in the backyard, George finds a rock that he insists is filled with uranium. Just then a salesman named Harry York (Charles Maxwell) comes to the door selling a Geiger counter, and tests it out on the rock which does in fact prove to contain uranium. It is ten revealed that York is working with another con artist named Tom Burton (Tom Browne Henry), who goes to the door and claims that the rocks fell off his truck, and then he was hauling them from his 60-acres which contain more of this rock… and then offers to sell the land to Topper. Later while Topper is at work, one of Mr. Schuyler’s clients F.K. Marsen (Robert F. Simon), who recently became rich on uranium, is looking to invest his money, and Schuyler calls Topper and has him pretend he is talking to his wife, while Schuyler tells Topper to sell him some junk bonds. When Henrietta comes to the office, it is obvious that Topper has been lying. Marsten recognizes the uranium rock that Topper has at the office, and begins scheming with Mr. Schuyler to buy Topper’s property. Meanwhile George and Marion have gone shopping, and spending Topper’s money on celebratory clothes. When Harriet sees it all there, she thinks Topper has bought it for her, and claims it as her own. Schuyler and Marsten come to the house and offer Topper $100,000 for his property, but then they take back the offer when Burton shows up and tells them that rock came from his property. Schuyler and Marset give him $25,000 for the property, but then Burton attempts to swindle York and keep a larger share of the money. George finds out what is going on a instigates a fight between the two, then takes their money from them. Schuyler and Marsten find out that the rocks on the property are worthless, and come back to Topper to demand that he buy the property from them to cover their losses. He states that he has no money, but George returns with the $25,000 and throws it up in the air, until Topper, Schuyler, and Marsten are doing a rain dance to order to bring more falling money. 2/19/21
• 069. Topper’s Spring Cleaning – 4/29/1955
  • Henrietta has planned for Spring cleaning at the Topper house, and she has handyman Mr. Doolittle (Allen Jenkins) come over early one morning to assist. Meanwhile, George is working on an invention, an attachment to the vacuum cleaner that makes martinis. Topper is preparing for a meeting that afternoon with Mr. Schuyler and their client Mr. Bixby (Howard Wendell), who is planning to buy Mr. Hudson’s food processing plant. When George leaves through the front door to go get supplies for his inventions, Henrietta asks Mr. Doolittle to work on the door to stop it from opening and closing on its own. Mr. Bixby also shows up at the house, because he has locked himself out, and while Henrietta goes to get Topper, Mr. Doolittle accidentally knocks the door into him, and stumbles into the closet and passes out. Mr. Schuyler comes over in a panic because the option for Bixby’s deal is going to expire at noon and he wants him to get together with Mr. Hudson. They eventually find Bixby in the closet and try to put him to bed. George starts converting the vacuum cleaner into a paint sprayer, but accidentally fills it with paint remover. Neil thinks it still has martini in it, so he sprays the paint remover all over a chair. Topper and Schuyler put the Bixby in the chair since the beds are all taken apart so Katie can clean the bedsprings. The pain remover dissolves much of Bixby’s robe. Since Topper’s suits are all at the cleaners, they wind up dressing Bixby in old, dirty overalls from the garage. Mr. Hudson shows up at the house, and thinks Bixby is a hired hand, and speaks to him rudely. Bixby declares the deal off, but the ghosts intervene and put a rat trap in front of Bixby, so that Hudson can save him from stepping into it. This allows them to reconcile and continue with the original deal, offering much relief for Mr. Schuyler. All of the men are stunned when George’s invention simply explodes. Henrietta is upset because Doolittle cuts the door down to half its size to try and prevent it from opening and closing. Neil does his own Spring cleaning and rids his doghouse of all of his empty liquor bottles. 4/24/22
• 070. Topper Goes to School – 5/6/1955
  • Henrietta talks with Abigail Gouge (Mabel Albertson), the dean of her alma mater Gouge Hall School for Girls and finds out that an unscrupulous cross-dressing janitor posing as a woman has stolen forty thousand dollars in bonds from the school. She asks Topper if he can try and talk Mr. Schuyler into giving the school a loan to cover the loss. George and Marion join Topper in his office during his conversation with Schuylar and they get him to tell Mr. Schuyler that he wants the money to finance a play that will be as big as South Pacific. On the strength of this, Schuyler agrees, so Topper goes to visit the school and give the check to Miss Gouge. As they wait for him, Gouge tells her assistant Leslie Fenning (Darlene Fields) that no man can be trusted and that the school has survived all its days without the help of any man. George insists on coming along with Topper just so he can get a look at the girls’ dorm, which has never been seen by any man. George keeps rubbing Leslie’s leg, much to her delight, during their visit. Both women think the perpetrator is Topper, and Miss Gouge throws him out. George takes control and tells Topper they are going to hide in the Anatomy lab, which is actually the girls’ dormitory. When the girls see Topper, they all scream. Henrietta gets a call that Topper is roaming around like a dirty old man in the dorm, so Henrietta calls Mr. Schuyler to come with her and find out what is going on. Schuyler asks repeatedly to allow him inside so he can retrieve Topper, who George has led into a broom closet, but Miss Gouge keeps repeating that no man has ever been in the dorm. Schuyler sneaks in and finds Topper in the closet. Marion also knows that George is responsible and is tired of his philandering, so she joins them as well. Schuyler calls an ambulance to try and use the gurney to sneak Topper out. While they are all in the closet, Neil keeps clawing at the floorboards, and underneath they find the jar filled with the missing bonds. Schuyler makes his exit first and is beaten by the girl students. When Topper emerges, Henrietta knows he’ll have a good explanation. He does… and shows Miss Gouge the recovered bonds, and uses that as an excuse why he entered the dorm. The Kerbys set up Neil’s dog house like Gouge Hall with a sign that says ‘School for Men’. 5/26/23
• 071. The Blood Brother – 5/13/1955
  • Harriet leaves town to spend time with her sick friend Elsie Warble, so Topper has a night free as a bachelor. He also gets a letter in the mail that is addressed to George from one of George’s old college friends named Roger Hartley (Larry Blake), who wants to come for a visit to see George for the first time since being released from Alcatraz prison. Topper also gets a visit from a policeman named Tom MacCready (Jay Novello) who tells Topper that the police had intercepted the letter and wants to see if MacCready will lead them to a valuable ruby that he stole and has hidden in the house. Topper agrees to allow both Roger and MacCready stay the night in the house. George doesn’t know about the ruby, although Marion has a bad feeling about Roger since she knows he’s an ex-con. MacCready keeps a close eye on Hartley, and hears him get up in the middle of the night and make a phone call to his girl Trixie. Topper and MacCready overhear him tell her that he is going to find the ruby in the basement and then leave. George is still trying to celebrate with Roger, and he slips a sedative in his champagne because he thinks Roger seems nervous. Topper and MacCready try to wake him up so that he will lead them to the ruby. Hartley manages to get into the basement alone, but when George tries to bring him warm milk, they find him removing a brick from the wall and claiming the ruby behind it. He gets it upstairs and has to hide it in a jar of strawberry preserves. The next morning when he comes down for breakfast, Henrietta has returned. Roger requests strawberry preserves for breakfast, and when he opens the cabinet, it is now filled to the brim with jars of strawberry preserves which she and Elsie made all day long. Roger eats jar after jar looking for the ruby until they are down to just the original jar that was still left. Topper decides that since Roger has been enjoying them so much that he’ll have some preserves himself. He winds up finding the ruby in his mouth, but Roger takes it from him and tries to escape. George knocks him out with a jar of the preserves, and MacCready arrests him. Henrietta heads out to get supplies to make more preserves. 12/10/22
• 072. Topper’s Highland Fling – 5/20/1955
  • Mr. Schuyler has fired the company’s accountant Mr. Moseby from the firm, and now wants Topper to interpret the ledgers since Moseby has coded them. In loyalty to Moseby, Topper refuses to work on the ledgers, but Schuyler threatens his job, so Topper agrees to work on them. Meanwhile at the Topper home, the nearly blind Elsie Worble is visiting with Henrietta and answers the door when a Scottish attorney named Angus MacIntosh (Tudor Owen) stops by and tells her that Topper is the sole heir of a great uncle named Sookie MacTopper, and has inherited the Crown & Castle. She shows Elsie a photo of the Crown & Castle, which is a Scottish brewery. Elsie can’t see the photo and thinks that Topper has become a Lord. While helping Henrietta make tamales, she wraps on of them with the photo and MacIntosh’s phone number.  The Kerbys congratulate him when Henrietta calls him with the news, and Topper again refuses to work on the ledge, despite the fact that the Federal Reserve Investigator (Russell Gaige) is not investigating Schuyler. When Topper finds out that Henrietta never actually spoke to MacIntosh and that she had gotten the message from Elsie, he assumes that the whole thing is a false alarm. Schuyler is pulling his hair out trying to interpret the ledgers and is ready to call and beg him to come back, even planning to offer a raise and to give him his office. However, it is Topper who calls and begs for the job back, so Schuyler pretends to be reluctant to agree to it. Back at home, the Kerbys eat one of the tamales and find the remaining piece of paper with MacIntosh’s phone number. Topper calls MacIntosh and verifies that he really did inherit the Crown & Castle, and again believes he will be a Scottish Lord. As Schuyler is disarming the gun that he was going to use to kill himself, Topper once again calls him and quits, so Schuyler starts reloading the gun. Topper engages a tailor (Arthur Gould-Porter) to outfit Henrietta and himself in Scottish garb. Schuyler and the Federal agent show up at the house to see Topper, but he is out. George plays around with a suit of armor that he wants to bring to Scotland. Elsie stops by and mistakes the armor for Topper. MacIntosh returns to the house to read the will, and Topper then learns that the Crown & Castle is a brewery. MacIntosh has liquidated the asset and all that remains is a barrel of beer, which Neil is happy to fully claim. MacIntosh tries to charge Topper a fee, but Topper refuses to pay it. This leads to a fight between them, but George enters the suit of armor and takes over the fight, driving MacIntosh out in fear. Topper once again returns to help Schuyler straighten out the books, as the auditor threatens an indictment. The ghosts try to talk him into going out to play Badminton, so Topper puts on his earmuffs. Later at Topper’s house, Schuyler puts his cigarette ashes into the armor outfit, and the armor pours a pitch of water into its head. 9/27/23
• 073. Topper’s Desert Island – 5/27/1955
  • Schuyler works out a shady thrill million-dollar deal with business associate Mr. Van Loon (Louis Borell) to send Topper to Bali to make a deal, knowing that if it goes sour, it will be Topper who takes the rap. The ghosts are anxious for Topper to get a vacation and to go along. At the last minute. Schuyler decides to go along too. However, after they board the plane, Van Loon announces that his pilot hasn’t shown up and plans to abort the trip. George wants to go so bad that he decides to fly the plane, which appears to everyone else as if Topper is doing the flying, which includes quite a few loop-the-loops in the air. They get a distress call from the ground indicating that Van Loon is a crook and has been turned in by the pilot, and that he had planned to throw everyone overboard and keep the three million dollars that Schuyler has brought along. Van Loon pulls a gun, but Marion quickly disarms him and gives the gun to Topper. Van Loon attempts to jump overboard, but Neil jumps after him and brings him back onboard. The plane then runs out of gas, and everyone is stranded on a desert island. They become so hungry that they eat the fake fruit out of Henrietta’s hat. They also spot giant footprints all over the island. Two girls named Florrie (Barbara Bestar) and Mabel (Anna Navarro) show up to lay out on the beach. Since George thinks they are in Bali, he instructs Topper to speak the native language and rub noses with the girls, which earns him a punch in the face. They also reveal that the giant footprints are an advertising promotion leading to a hamburger stand. Topper sees the Statue of Liberty and realizes they are in Hudson Harbor. Schuyler is beginning to go mad and offers Topper two million dollars for the banana he found in the girls’ lunch bag. Van Loon shows up with his gun and attempts to take the money, but when he sees the giant footprints, he is taken aback and loses the gun to Topper again. 2/19/21
• 074. The Neighbors – 6/3/1955
  • New neighbors Mr. (Frank Sully) and Mrs. Bandle (Nancy Kulp), his parents, and their daughter Hermione have moved in next door to the Toppers, and Maggie has started dating their butler Albert (Reginald Denny). Neil has stopped drinking and is in love with their family dog Snowball. Topper has no desire to meet them, and when he finally does, he wishes he hadn’t. They are rich folks from Texas, boisterous and overbearing, and keep them up late playing records at their house. When Hermione tries to recite one of her poems from school, the ghosts shove an apple in her mouth. This kicks off a feud between them all, with the Bandles playing their loud music, and the ghosts stealing the tube from their radio. Albert mentions to Maggie that the Bandles now don’t like him dating someone who works for the Toppers, and he suggests that she come work for the Bandles. The ghosts overhear this and throw Albert out of the house. Maggie decides to go work for them, but as soon as she does, Albert starts being rude to her and seems to have lost any romantic interest. The ghosts try to drive her to come back home by ‘haunting’ the kitchen. Albert doesn’t believe she is seeing floating objects around the kitchen, so she gets mad and quits. The ghosts continue to haunt the house, and eventually the Bandles move out. When Neil finds out that their dog Snowball has left, he starts drinking again. 6/16/21 
• 075. Topper’s Counterfeiters – 6/10/1955
  • The bank has been taking in counterfeit ten dollar bills, so Mr. Schuyler and Topper bring in F.B.I. agent Mr. Fox (Francis De Sales) to help track it put a stop to it. Topper puts an ad in the newspaper indicating a healthy reward for anyone who can help stop the counterfeiters. The actual counterfeiters Norman (Jimmy Ames) and Frank (Sid Melton) see Topper’s ad in the paper, and decide to move their operation to where they are least expected to be found: Topper’s basement cellar. They pose as exterminators who tell Mrs. Topper that they will be fumigating against termites in the basement, releasing deadly fumigation down there for several days. They begin printing phony hundred dollar bills. The ghosts find the money down there, and start to think that Topper is part of the operation. They decide to burn the money so they won’t be exposed as accomplices, but they give it to Neil to take to the incinerator, but instead Neil takes the money and adds gives it to the money that Topper gave to Henrietta to go shopping. Topper sees George and Marion down in the basement with the fake money, and takes the rap for it for himself. Mr. Fox goes down to see it, and catches Norman and Frank down there, who hold everyone at gunpoint until the ghosts get involved and get their guns away from them and help detain them for arrest. Henrietta returns from shopping, having not spend any of the counterfeit money because she couldn’t decide what to buy. 10/13/21
• 076. Topper’s Insurance Scandal – 6/17/1955
  • While Topper is hanging a photo of his Uncle Jeremiah, he falls off the ladder, leading the ghosts to see dollar signs when they think he can make an insurance claim on his injury. Neil then pulls the bear rug out from under him causing another fall. Topper doesn’t have any noticeable injuries, he wants no part of it, but George insists that he file the claim with his Assured Insurance Company. When Henrietta hears Topper telling the ghost that he’s not going to call Assured, she volunteers to do it for him. George puts Topper in bed and they wait several days for the insurance claims adjuster to show up. In the meantime, Mr. Schuyler wants Topper to report to work to take over a new account that is worth millions of dollars. When Topper shows up, he meets T.S. Gilford (Stanley Andrews) who happens to be the president of the Assured Insurance Company. Gilford make it a point to tell him that they are looking to crack down on all of the false claims that they are getting and prosecuting them to the fullest extent of the law. While Topper is at the office, the insurance adjuster Burton Brown (Hal K. Dawson) shows up, so George knocks out the handyman Mr. Doolittle (Allen Jenkins) and puts him in Topper’s pajamas and into his bed. When Brown examines him, the ghosts play with putting the thermometer in Topper’s food and water causing it range between 114 and 30 degrees, causing him to doubt his own sanity. Mr. Schuyler and Mr. Gilford show up at Topper’s house and find Brown wandering around in Topper’s pajamas. Gilford is convinced that Topper was trying to defraud the company, so Topper shows him that it was Doolittle who Brown actually saw in his bed, and then tells him the tale of the Kerby ghosts. He tells them that it was the ghost dog Neil who pulled the bear rung out from under him. Gilford tells him that if he can prove that this happened, he would give them the account. George then has Neil pull the bear rug out from under him, so he does indeed give them the account. After he leaves, Schuyler asks him how he did it, then witness the bear skin rug ‘walk’ out on its own. 5/26/23
• , 077. Topper’s Other Job – 6/24/1955
  • Henrietta invests the Toppers’ last $5000 in her cousin’s scheme to triple the money by shooting a man out of a cannon over a lion’s cage at the County Fairgrounds. Unfortunately, the man who is shot out of the cannon doesn’t clear the cage and he is eaten by the lion. Things get even worse for Topper when he arrives at the bank, only to find out that Mr. Schuyler is selling it off to businessman named Mr. Skinner, meaning Topper will be out of his job. George is angry at Schuyler’s treatment of Topper, so he puts an ad in the paper indicating that the bank will give out two tens for a five dollar bill. Otis approaches Topper with a scheme to get his money back, which involves Topper stepping in for the man being shot out of the cannon. George and Marion encourage Topper to do it, and George promises to dress up like a lion and take the place of the real beast in case he doesn’t clear the cage. Schuyler tells Skinner that he isn’t going to sell the bank when he sees all of the people flocking to the bank. In fact, he thinks that Topper is brilliant for the idea, but doesn’t understand how he’ll come out ahead spending $15 on every customer. He goes to see Topper to tell him that he has his job back, but the ghosts have already shoved him in the cannon. He doesn’t clear the lion cage and comes down in the cage. Unfortunately, it is a real lion, as the lion had chased George out of the cage. With Neil’s help with biting the lion’s tale, Topper is able to tame the lion. Schuyler is even more impressed with Topper and offers him his job back. He realizes that spending $15 on every customer is great promotion, and money that he can easily earned back. After all is said and done, the ghosts use the cannon again…this time to launch an olive into a martini for Neil. 6/16/21
• 078. Topper’s Vacation – 7/1/1955
  • Topper is told both at home and at work that he is looking tired and stressed out. Mr. Schuyler offers to send Topper on vacation to his lodge on Bear Lake, but he then later stipulates that he is going to come along with him and Henrietta. Naturally, the ghosts are excited for the getaway as well. Furthermore, he has a giant stack of operational books belonging to the J.B. Quigley Bank that he wants Topper review. Mr. Schuyler has his sights on merging with the bank and plans to bring along Quigley’s son Preston (Ray Montgomery). Once they arrive, Henrietta and Mr. Schuyler go out to sunbathe, while Topper is stuck inside reviewing the books. Schuyler tells Topper that Quigley will be participating in the resort’s Junior Olympiad and wants to make sure that he wins so that he will be put in a positive frame of mine to encourage his father to make the merger. George wants to complete against Quigley, especially when Marion sees him and tells him how she was crazy about Quigley in college. Quigley is both competitive and egotistical. Thanks to help from George, not only does Topper come out on top in a ping-pong game, but Quigley winds up crashing through the table. George enters Topper into the Olympiad, but Schuyler warns him that he’s better not beat Quigley for fear of wrecking the merger. George helps Topper again in the shotput event, where he breaks the record by 40 feet thanks to George carrying the ball. George also causes Quigley to fall over as he attempts to throw the ball. George also assists Topper in the weightlifting event by making appear that Topper is holding the weight by one end. Topper winds up winning every event except for one. During the Fishing Derby, Topper’s fish is tiny, but George makes it appear that it weighs 180 pounds. When the judge questions him on the weight, Marion brings a seal to the weigh-in to make it appear that Topper caught it in the derby. Quigley is so furious that he vows that as long as Topper works for him, their companies will never merge. Schuyler is about to fire Topper, but then a messenger (Leon Burbank) brings a telegram to Quigley, which George takes and gives to Topper. It is a telegram from Quigley’s father telling him to sign the moron Schuyler to the merger since they are unable to hold off the creditors another day. Schuyler is then thrilled with Topper. Later, Topper presents Neil with the Olympiad trophy, which is naturally filled with beer. Ollie O’Toole is the Olympiad announcer. 1/25/24

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