After School Specials: 1976-1977

Generation X-ers retain fond memories of coming home from school, casting aside their Trapper Keepers, and cozying up to moralistic tales of teen pregnancy, suicide, and drug abuse on ABC's Emmy Award-winning AFTER SCHOOL SPECIALS. Airing on weekday afternoons from 1974-1989, the series' issue-oriented storylines were adapted from young-adult novels and starred some of the most popular teen actors of its day: Rob Lowe, Dana Plato, Nancy McKeon, Eve Plumb, and the queen of 1970s television melodrama, Kristy McNichol. This collection offers a quartet of early specials produced by Martin Tahse between 1976-1977: "Francesca Baby," about a teenager struggling to deal with her alcoholic mother; "Beat The Turtle Drum," starring Melissa Sue Anderson as a sensitive girl coming to terms with the accidental death of her younger sister; "Trouble River," in which a tough-minded adolescent and his even tougher grandmother brave a wild river; and "The Pinballs" co-starring McNichol as a pre-teen outcast forced to live with an elderly foster couple.