Mama

Mama was a weekly Maxwell House and Post-sponsored CBS television comedy-drama series from July 1, 1949 until March 17, 1957. Based on the Kathryn Forbes memoir Mama's Bank Account, which was also adapted for the 1944 John Van Druten play and subsequent 1948 film I Remember Mama, it told the ongoing story of a loving Norwegian family living in San Francisco in the 1910s through the eyes of the elder daughter, Katrin Hansen, who was seen looking through the pages of the family album at the start of each episode with the opening narration: "This old album makes me remember so many things in the past. San Francisco and the house on Steiner Street where I was born. It brings back memories of my cousins, aunts, and uncles; all the boys and girls I grew up with. And I remember my family as we were then. My brother Nels, my little sister Dagmar, and of course, Papa. But most of all when I look back to those days so long ago, most of all, I remember ... Mama." The show was originally broadcast live from a television studio located above the Oyster Bar in Manhattan's Grand Central Terminal.