gstanley75 I lived near the ocean in Biloxi, Mississippi when Adventures in Paradise was in its prime. Sailing the oceans became a fantasy of mine. In 1963, I moved to Okinawa with my family and learned to sail at age 11. My fantasy was coming true. When bored in school, all my doodles were of schooners docked on tropical islands with puffy clouds and golden sunsets.To this day, I still have a wanderlust and spend as much time as possible vacationing, sailing and fishing in the South Pacific islands. I attribute this to AIP and my Hawaiian lineage.I have visited Fiji, Hawaii, New Zealand and Australia countless times and have sailed all of these areas. I have also sailed the California coast, St. Vincent and the Genadines, and the areas around Seattle and Victoria, BC.My adventures are not quite as exciting as Capt. Troy's, but I enjoy every moment in the South Pacific and elsewhere.I would love to have a boxed set of these TV classics for old time's sake.

jtmazibrook Before Magnum PI told us about another day in Paradise, James Mitchner and his Adam Troy lived it for us on the black and white miniature silver screen in our living room. These episodes were my first taste of Island adventure that I have feasted on many times since then. The shows were very adventuresome for the time but they were also exciting and demanded our attention as we watched.All my memories of the show are good and I too wish that someone would release the shows in a boxed DVD set for us "real" baby bloomers who watched TV in our very early teen years.I highly recommend any of the episodes for anyone who thinks McGarret is overkill and wants to see a normal person get in and out of trouble without any special effects creating the explosions we see on current shows.If only the old TV networks would pick this up or if digital recording was available in the 1950's.

schappe1 I, too, remember this one from my youth. I recall it as being re-run in the afternoons in the 60's, about the time I got home from school. It enabled me to immediately release the problems and tensions of school and go off into another world. I eventually made it only as far as Hawaii, (I'm kind of a homebody), but my brother has spent much of his life traveling the world, including many of the real locations the fictional Adam Troy had visited and, as a professor of history at the University of Hawaii has written extensively about that area of the world.I've been able to get some episodes of the series from internet collectors and thus have been able to revisit Adam Troy's world four decades later as an adult. Naturally, that impacts my thinking on the subject.My first impression is that, as good a job as they did with this, what an incredible show this would have been if they'd decided to shoot it on location and in color! That wouldn't have been such a far-fetched idea. Bonanza debuted the same year in color with many scenes shot on location in Nevada and California. Route 66 started the next year, (that also should have been in color), with episodes shot all over the country and not too many years later, I Spy was shot in color around the world. There is a trend toward remakes of old shows, both in the movies and on TV and Adventures in Paradise would be an ideal subject if they did it right- which would include setting it in its original time period, in the places where it takes place and in vibrant color.My major problem with the show, however, is that Gardner McKay is simply too young to play this character. He's clearly a sailor of considerable experience and has spent enough time in the pacific to have old friend, old enemies and old flames in every port. It takes a while to build a life like that up. In one episode, ( 11/16/59 Safari at Sea), Troy meets an old friend from his college days and they reminisce about their graduation five years before and how they couldn't have imagined being where they are now. (the friend, played by John Ericson, is married to a movie star). In other words, Troy, in five years, has learned all he knows about sailing schooners around the South Pacific and had all kinds of previous adventures where he has met all these people.I prefer to think of Troy as what Lt. Cable of James Michener's "Tales of the South Pacific" would have become had he lived. Cable was from Philadelphia, (Troy is from Texas), and found himself in a different world after he joined the Navy during WWII. He overcame his prejudices to fall in love with the new place and with the native girl in the story. Supposed he had lived and something had happened to end that relationship. He might have, after the war, sought a position in the merchant marine, decided to save up to buy his own boat and wound up in the Tikki. He might have gotten that in the early 50's and had a decade of adventures in Paradise and all the knowledge and relationship building the character has clearly gone through by the time the show started in 1959. He would have been young enough to still be handsome and sexy but old enough to be an experienced seaman and adventurer.That would have pushed the agreeable but boyish Gardener McKay out the picture. Who would have played Cable/Troy then? Among the actors that come to mind who were working in television then are Robert Stack, (who got a good gig for himself that same year as Elliott Ness), John Russell, (who already had one on "Lawman"), Guy Williams, (whose "Zorro" was just winding up at that time), Anthony George, Richard Egan, Tom Tryon and- how about this- Jack Lord! All were about a decade older than McKay or a little more but still handsome and virile. They all would have been convincing as WWII veterans, (as I suspect they all were in one way or another), who elected to stay in the Pacific.But then there's the opinion of a friend who also remembered the show from his youth and told me that Adam Troy didn't look too young to him at the time because he was just a kid. I suspect that the secret of enjoying this series is to be "just a kid" and to allow it to return you to your youth whenever you get to see it.

bernies93 I often wanted to somehow contact Garden McKay for his work in the TV series: Adventures in Paradise. The show, with 'Adam Troy' as the hero/adventurer, started a wanderlust cycle in me that has led to the South Pacific as well as Southeast Asia. The program intro was unique and captivating, the song penetrating (Claire d' Lune by Debussey, and the locations completely fascinating ..... to an idealistic 8th grader at the time. I've tried to track down the modernized videos with no luck. I loved the series as a youth and am sorry that Gardner McKay took himself out of TV and movies way too soon. "Welcome to James A. Michener's Adventures in Paradise, with Gardner McKay as Adam Troy .... sailing the South Seas....