Editorial: Mourning Mayberry’s loss

Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2006 | 7:33 a.m.

When actor Don Knotts died this weekend, a few of America's front porch swings and sidewalk lemonade stands went with him.

The 81-year-old died in a Los Angeles hospital Friday where he had suffered respiratory and pulmonary complications. His 50-year acting career included roles from such movies as "The Incredible Mr. Limpet" and "The Ghost and Mr. Chicken" and from television shows such as "Three's Company," in which he played the title trio's swinger-wannabe landlord.

But for most American television viewers, Knotts is synonymous with Barney Fife, the bumbling deputy sidekick for Sheriff Andy Taylor on "The Andy Griffith Show." The series, which aired from 1960 to 1968, remains on television in reruns, taking new generations of viewers to the idyllic town of Mayberry, N.C.

It's a place where everyone knows everyone else's business. Children walk to school without fear. The grocery store is a corner market, run by a man who sweeps the sidewalk out front each morning. Guys hang out at the barber shop. People sip lemonade on warm Sunday afternoons as they rock on front porches, cooled by breezes that smell faintly of magnolia trees and Aunt Bee's pot roast.

Barny Fife, Knotts' five-time Emmy-winning character, was an everyman's everyman. He couldn't sing, but joined the choir anyway. He hated Aunt Bee's pickles, but ate quarts of the "kerosine cucumbers" to spare her feelings. He treated school crossing guard duty as if it were a matter of national security. Barney Fife's mistakes were not results of carelessness. On the contrary, they happened because he cared so much.

We loved Barney and still long for Mayberry. We seek out homes in urban centers and sprawling suburbs, where words such as "safe" and "community" sell homes. We may never slow down long enough to sit on our porches or feel safe enough to use our sidewalks, but we want to see them. Mayberry, like Barney Fife, is a fantasy that exists firmly in our dreams and in our hearts. And Knotts played a large role in placing it there.