The Beachcombers is a Canadian comedy-drama television series that ran from October 1, 1972, to December 12, 1990. At 387 episodes, it is the third longest-running dramatic series ever made for English-language Canadian television.
The Beachcombers followed the life of Nick Adonidas (Bruno Gerussi), a Greek-Canadian log salvager in British Columbia who earned a living travelling the coastline northwest of Vancouver with his partner Jesse Jim (Pat John) aboard their logging tug Persephone tracking down logs that broke away from barges and logging booms. Their chief business competitor is Relic (Robert Clothier) (whose actual name is Stafford T. Phillips), a somewhat unsavoury person who will occasionally go to great lengths to steal business (and logs) from Nick. The series also focused on a supporting cast of characters in Nick's hometown of Gibsons, often centering on a café, Molly's Reach, run by Molly (Rae Brown), a mother figure to virtually all the characters in the series (including Relic). Molly had two grandchildren living with her, Hughie (Bob Park) and his younger sister Margaret played by Nancy Chapple in the first season then by Juliet Randall from the second season onward.
The series' pilot episode was called "Jesse's Car" and was turned down by CBC for broadcast. The first episode to air was called "Partners" and described how Jesse and Nick formed their business ties.
During the run of the series, storylines became more complex as the characters developed. Many episodes focused on Nick's Greek heritage.
The series made Bruno Gerussi a highly visible star on Canadian TV, and between 1975 and 1984 he hosted a second series, Celebrity Cooks which aired initially on the CBC and later the rival Global network.
The series' title was shortened to Beachcombers in 1988 (with the CBC announcing that the intent was to give the aging show a new look)[citation needed], coinciding with the replacement of the show's original theme music with a new composition. Subsequent funding cutbacks at the government-supported CBC, however, led to Beachcombers being cancelled even though it was still popular in its homeland and syndicated around the world, though attempts to revamp the series by giving it more suspenseful storylines and making it more action-oriented met with fan criticism.
