Top Ten 1970s TV Detectives

1. Joe Mannix
Where: Los Angeles
When: 1967-75
Actor Mike Connors carried off Mannix with typical 70s machismo. Although Mannix worked for hi-tech detective agency Interect (which used computers to solve crimes) Mannix himself was old school hard. He kept his office messy, disobeyed orders and had one massive punch-up per episode. The other thing that marked Mannix out as a maverick: he shunned the staid black suits of his workmates and busted out a neat line in checked sports coats. By the second series Mannix was out on his own, the computers were gone and the punch-ups became more frequent. Oh, and Mannix drove a Plymouth Cuda 340 convertible.

2. Theo Kojak
Where: New York City
When: 1973-78
Bald, dapper king of the 13th Precinct, Theo Kojak ruled lower Manhattan with an iron fist and face full of lollipop. In the very early series Kojak’s oral trademark was, in fact, a cigarillo, which was dropped to reflect growing anti-smoking sentiment on American TV at the time. Kojak is assisted in his crime busting by Crocker and Stavros (played by Telly Savalas’s brother George). Kojak’s catch phrase is 'who loves ya baby?' and in Brazil they really loved him: Kojak is still the main slang term for bald man. In poker terms the opening cards KJ are also known as Kojak.

3. Jim Rockford
Where: Los Angeles
When: 1974-80
James Garner, star of the Rockford Files, had, in the 1960s, played Maverick, a gun for hire in a long-running TV western. The same team that created Maverick created Rockford: Maverick as modern detective. Each episode began with Rockford’s answering machine playing back a client message. Rockford himself was ace: an ex-con who had served time in San Quentin, he lived in a trailer on the coast, he was a bit lazy, didn’t carry a gun and he made famous the ‘j-turn’ in his Pontiac Firebird Espirit.

4. Frank Cannon
Where: Los Angeles
When: 1971-76
William Conrad carried off the neat trick of making us believe a really fat bloke could be a successful detective. An ex-Los Angeles policeman, Cannon quit the force when his wife and child were killed in a bomb meant for the fat man himself. Cannon’s obesity is perhaps a reflection of his expensive tastes: he eats well, likes wine and drives a fat Lincoln Continental Mark lll. Cannon’s big novelty was his car phone. Nobody had car phones at the time.

5. Barnaby Jones
Where: Los Angeles
When: 1973-80
Buddy Ebsen played ageing private eye Jones, a spin-off from Cannon. Perhaps realising that a very old man solving cases might be a wee bit dry for American tastes at the time, Barnaby was helped out by his daughter-in-law, played by the fairly sexy Lee Merriweather. Jones had been retired until his son was murdered: after that you couldn’t stop him in his pursuit of bad men. Jones seldom had fights, relying instead on clever tactics like slamming doors on gun-toting villains and tripping them into unconsciousness.

6. Tony Baretta

Where: New Jersey

When: 1975-77

Working out of the 53rd Precinct Tony Baretta is an unorthodox plain-clothes cop who lives with his pet cockatoo in a rundown hotel in a rough part of town. Baretta wore many disguises and had a string of informers, the coolest of whom is Rooster, a streetwise pimp in the Huggy Bear mould. Baretta’s catch phrase is ‘You can take dat to da bank,’ and he drives a rusty 1966 Chevy Impala. Actor Robert Blake was cleared in 2001 of the murder of his wife, but found liable in a California civil court.

7. Tony Petrocelli
Where: San Remo
When: 1974-76
An Italian American Harvard educated lawyer from south Boston, Petrocelli gives up the big money and the urbane lifestyle to relocate to a sleepy south Western town where he becomes an odd detective-lawyer hybrid. Petrocelli (Barry Newman) usually took a conviction and over-turned it by clearing the wrongly accused and revealing he real culprit with the then original TV device of flashbacks.

8. Sam McCloud
Where: New York City via Taos
When: 1970-77
Ludicrous and awesome: McCloud, a Stetson-wearing horse riding Marshal from the west on semi-permanent assignment in the big city. In one early scene McCloud actually gallops down the middle of a street through Manhattan. McCloud’s New York is brilliantly crime-ridden: a dark portrayal of a city, which at the time was widely viewed as heading rapidly down the shitter.

9. Stewart MacMillan and Wife (Sally)
Where: San Francisco
When: 1971-77
MacMillan is the police commissioner for San Francisco, played with light charm by Rock Hudson. His wife Sally (Susan St James) is sexy, bright but just a little bit daffy. Still, she often helps MacMillan solve a case when all seems lost. After a contract dispute Sally was rather hastily killed off in a plane crash, and the show re-named MacMillan. It was not a success. Fact: the interiors of Macmillan’s home were filmed in Rock Hudson’s real home.

10. Mike Longstreet
Where: New Orleans
When: 1971-72
James Franciscus played the short-lived and mostly forgotten private eye Longstreet, whose unique talent is blindness. After a bomb hidden in a champagne bottle leaves him blind and his wife dead, Longstreet gets a guide dog, tracks down the killers and brings them to justice. He gets a lot of help from his dog Pax, and martial arts training from Bruce Lee, convincing as Li Tsung, master of Jeet Kune Do. Sadly, Longstreet was cancelled after 23 episodes.