Just The Ten Of Us

```

```

**Introduction**
****Just The Ten Of Us**** was an American sitcom starring Coach Graham T. Lubbock, who played the role of a very dedicated school teacher/athletics coach at St. Augustine Academy — as well as the patriarch of a large Catholic family — in Eureka, California. The series spun-off from *Growing Pains*, in which Coach Lubbock was only a recurring character. The new series originally aired on ABC, with a first season that was truncated, due to being merely a trial run — from April 26, 1988 to May 17, 1988. Following a successful test period of only four episodes, it continued to air for an additional two seasons, eventually ending after 47 episodes on May 4, 1990. While in first-run, the show was part of ABC's early *TGIF* programming block on Friday nights. After the series concluded, it was syndicated on USA Network for a period of time, prior to its premature cancellation.

Series Overview
The series focused on long-time schoolteacher and versatile athletics coach Graham T. Lubbock (*Kirchenbauer*), who was a devout Catholic father of eight children, as well as their pet dog, Hooter.

In what was technically the true pilot episode (which actually aired as an episode of *Growing Pains* in 1988), Graham's job in New York was in jeopardy, due to impending district budget cutbacks. Normally a slacker, student Mike Seaver remained loyal to the teacher by leading a protest after realizing that the Coach was actually trying to support a large family (including yet another baby on the way). Despite the conundrum, Graham eventually lost his job, only to be hired soon after at St. Augustine Academy, an all-boys private Catholic boarding school in Eureka, California. In a short period of time, the Lubbocks were forced to re-locate across the country, and lived in a house only a block from the school, on property that the school actually owned. Despite St. Augie's being exclusively an all-boys school, the daughters were allowed by the school's stern administration to attend. As expected, the entire male student body was more than thrilled to have the girls join them.

Graham started out as the centerpiece of the series, supported by the other nine members of his immediate family. Coach Lubbock was happily married to his wife, Elizabeth, (*Harmon*), who was prone to rely heavily to religion and God when in need. She was very much in favor of prayer, and also often encouraged others to do the same. She was capable of playing both/either "good cop" and "bad cop" in most situations, and often acted as a foil to her husband's occasionally questionable behaviors.

Six of Graham's children were girls, four of them teenagers. The teenage daughters were the oldest. They included: Marie (*Langenkamp*), the oldest and most responsible; Cindy (*Luner*), the most ditzy, yet generally good-hearted; Wendy (*Theiss*), the schemer and most flirtatious; and Connie (*Willette*), the Bohemian and an aspiring writer.

The Lubbocks' younger daughters were eight-year-old Sherry (*Zeigler*) and newborn Melissa (*Shane*). The only grown son was 11-year-old Graham, Jr., typically known as "J.R." (*Shakman*), who was wild and rebellious. He loved anything and everything related to the horror film genre and playing pranks on his family. The family also had another young son, toddler, Harvey (*Korstjens*).

In addition to the Lubbock family, several other actors had recurring roles, including various staff members at St. Augustine Academy, such as: Father Robert Hargis (*Bonner*), the affable headmaster and Graham's boss; Coach Duane Johnson (*Haysbert*), Graham's assistant and former protégé when they lived in New York. Interestingly enough, Duane was the one who had been secretly corresponding with Elizabeth, in a desperate effort to "pull some strings" to persuade the stern school administration to hire Graham. Also employed by the school were fun-loving priest Father Harold "Budd" Kimmel (*Richards*), and impressionable madcap elderly nun Sister Ethel (*Hicks*).

Once the series was officially picked up, fraternal twin sisters Cindy and Wendy seemed to switch personalities. This transformed Cindy from having average intelligence to being more inane, and Wendy becoming the schemer and rebel. As the series progressed, there was a much greater focus placed on the four teenagers, who eventually formed a singing quartet, who came to be known as "The Lubbock Babes", (partly to help bring in much-needed extra income for the cash-strapped family) at a local pizzeria. They also had numerous boyfriends and love interests, whom Graham took great pride in "testing" — and in most cases, fending off — but the most prominent among them was the goofy Gavin Doosler (*Arnold*), who also briefly was seen working as the assistant manager at *Burger Barn* fast-food restaurant under Mr. Pruitt (*Erwin*).

Also making several guest appearances was St. Augie's Hippos star quarterback Todd Murphy (*LeBlanc*), who was capable of being a good student when he put his mind to it, but also very pre-occupied with girls, as is typical of boys at his age. With the St. Augie's Hippos historically (especially recently) struggling to make a name for themselves, Coach Lubbock was very high on Murphy (and other top performers) to turn their luck around.

**Cancellation Controversy**
All in all, the series actually proved to be a fairly decent success for ABC and its *TGIF* Friday night lineup, having concluded its first season ranked in a decent 42nd place with a 12.5 rating. As far as the other series that flanked it, *Perfect Strangers* ranked 38th with a 13.2; and *Family Matters* ranked 33rd with a 13.7. Such a respectable rating for a show in its particular timeslot would be seen as somewhat strange to outright "pull the plug on".

The truth of the matter was that Miller Boyett Productions, which produced *Full House*; *Family Matters*; and *Perfect Strangers*, desired for Friday evenings to exclusively showcase its own productions. Due to an apparent lack of capacity for scheduling purposes, and a measly 47 episodes produced (well below the standard syndication mark), ABC opted to cancel *Just the Ten of Us*, in favor of the fledgling series *Going Places*, starring Heather Locklear, which Miller Boyett also produced.

Unfortunately, ABC fully admitted to "making a huge mistake", as *Going Places* only lasted for a single season. Not only that, but the reasoning for the pre-mature cancellation was that it had previously been exceedingly rare for any series of the same ilk as *Just The Ten of Us* to succeed in the unfavorable 9:30pm timeslot. Not only did *Going Places* also succumb too soon, but *Baby Talk*, which was seen as nothing more than a *Look Who's Talking* knock-off, also suffered the same tragic fate.

ABC seemed to have downplayed the crucial factor that three of its longer-tenured sitcom franchises - *Perfect Strangers*; *Who's The Boss*; and *Growing Pains* - were all in either their 5th or 6th seasons. Too little too late, *Just The Ten of Us* may have actually been the perfect series to fill an undesirable timeslot, judging by the evidence that the remainder of the 1990's decade had experienced even more scheduling potholes.

**Main Characters**

**Episodes By Season**

**Episodes By Leading Role**

Other Media
Former star Bill Kirchenbauer is personally aware of this site and has agreed to add a link to this site to his own social media page. However, he is not the only cast member either on here or in the know. There are other members of the Lubbock family on this site, including Riquel and Kylee Shane, who portrayed baby Melissa, and have become friends of mine. In addition, feel free to check out these other fan sites online, including Jeremy Logsdon's own website with streaming review videos of every episode of the series.

Fan Poll
***Who is your favorite character?***

Join Me
The goal of this site is to rekindle the flame lost by a television sitcom that was taking from us way too soon. I would like to collaborate with other fans to create a reliable, accurate resource with as much detailed information about episodes, characters, story elements, and other unique features as possible. All are welcome to join in and contribute here, so long as edits are constructive, discussions are positive, and both are relevant to this series.

We are currently housing 459 articles, and 518 files.
We need *you* to help us expand and add articles to this wiki!

For starters, please sign up to create a **free** personal account, or log in if you already have one.
Having a username helps us get to know users in the community.
 *You **must** be at least 13 years old to register.*

Please keep in mind that over 50% of Wikia visitors access content via mobile platforms, such as tablets and smartphones. Some custom templates may not properly show on mobile devices. To make sure everything looks great to all visitors, follow our best practices.

If you're looking to help with clean-up, you can start here:

Wanted pages | Orphaned pages | Dead-end pages | Broken redirects
Check out the **community portal** to see what the community is working on, to give feedback,
or just to say hi.

Theme Song
*See Theme Song for details*
The "*Just The Ten Of Us* theme song", titled "Doin' It The Best I Can", was composed by Steve Dorff, and performed by Bill Medley.

Filming Location
The real-life house where the show was set (exterior only) still sits today at 15548 Iron Canyon Road in Santa Clarita, California.

Did You Know?

* Spin-off of *Growing Pains* (1985). Jamie Luner, Brooke Theiss, and JoAnn Willette all had roles on the parent series before being cast as Lubbock daughters.
	+ Bill Kirchenbauer first appeared as Coach Graham Lubbock in seven episodes of that series, including: "Fast Times at Dewey High", "Dream Lover", "A Star Is Born", "Broadway Bound", "How the West Was Won: Part 1", "How the West Was Won: Part 2", and "The Scarlet Letter". He also played Coach Graham Bullock in *Clueless*, which shared some of the same directors, namely Joanna Kerns and John Tracy.
* The theme song was sung by the same man, who sung key songs in *Dirty Dancing*.
* The real-life house where the show was set (exterior only) was also used in the movie *Don't Tell Mom The Babysitter's Dead* (1991), and still sits today at 15548 Iron Canyon Road in Santa Clarita, California.
* Matt Shakman, who played horror buff J.R., was constantly wearing *A Nightmare on Elm Street* (1984) clothing, and referencing the film series. Heather Langenkamp; JoAnn Willette; and Brooke Theiss, who played his sisters, all appeared in the film series.
	+ Heather Langenkamp as Nancy Thompson (Parts 1 & 3), herself (Part 7; Brooke Theiss as Debbie (Part 4); JoAnn Willette as a bus passenger (Part 2).
* In one particular episode, Heather Langenkamp and Deborah Harmon's characters are eating lunch at a remote diner, and one of the patrons says, "Hit me with another cup of joe, Mabel. I'm heading all the way to Nickel Mountain tonight." *Nickel Mountain* was the name of Heather Langenkamp's first movie.
* Deborah Harmon, who played the mother/wife of the Lubbock family, was only 13 years older than TV daughters Heather Langenkamp and JoAnn Willette.
	+ Despite playing teenagers, both Heather and JoAnn were actually in their mid-20's. Brooke Theiss was actually 19, and Jamie Luner was actually 17.
* Both Matthew Perry and Matt LeBlanc guest-starred on the series before starring in *Friends*, with both developing crushes on Wendy.
* First acting role for Jamie Luner.
* JoAnn Willette appeared in the music video for the song "Your Love" by The Outfield in 1986.
* The Catholic school at which Coach Lubbock works is called St. Augustine, and the team he coaches is called the St. Augie's Hippos. The "St. Augustine" that is famous for writing *The Confessions and The City of God* is known as "St. Augustine of Hippo", the North African town in which he was Bishop.
* The series was part of ABC's inaugural TGIF Friday night lineup in 1988, along with Full House; Perfect Strangers; and Mr. Belvedere.
* Frank Bonner also portrayed irritating salesman Herb Tarlek on the series *WKRP in Cincinnati*.
* Dennis Haysbert had acting roles as Senator/President David Palmer on *24: The TV Show*, and as Jonas Blane on *The Unit*.
* Both Matt Shakman and Frank Bonner had one-time roles in separate *Night Court* episodes prior to this show.
	+ Shakman played an orphan, and Bonner played a double-dealing government agent.
* While most of the Lubbocks have 2 different theme-song intro graphics, J.R. has 3 of them.
* The first song that the "Lubbock Babes" sang on-stage as a group was a version of The Beatles' "*I'm Happy Just to Dance with You*".
* Cindy's middle name was Ann.
* Connie's middle name was Sarah.
* Marie's middle name was Elizabeth.
* We never learn Wendy's middle name, but her full first name was actually Gwendolyn.
* The series was actually cancelled more for politics among the executives at ABC than for bad ratings. ABC had decided to continue their other four family-friendly comedies on Friday nights for their Fall 1990 schedule. Management felt that all four TGIF comedies should be produced by the same production company. *Full House*; *Family Matters*; and *Perfect Strangers* were all produced by Lorimar Television, while *Just the Ten of Us* was produced by Warner Bros. Television. Thus, *Just the Ten of Us* was dropped, and ultimately replaced with *Going Places*, another Lorimar-produced series. Nonetheless, after only one year of *Going Places* and its lackluster ratings, ABC released a press statement, officially admitting that they may have "moved too quickly" when they cancelled *Just the Ten of Us*.
* Most likely, *Just the Ten of Us* really did deserve a fourth season, as it won the ratings battle for its time slot every season, it had a large number of fans that had originally come to the series from the *Growing Pains* episodes and stuck around for three years. After its pre-mature cancellation, the episodes were extremely popular as repeats on ABC during the summer of 1990, and later in syndication on *USA Network*, where they ran until 1996.