Jack Lloyd (December 23, 1922 - May 21, 1976) was an American songwriter and Special material writer of CBS TV's "Red Skelton Hour".
The irony about the entire homosexual hush-up of the 1950s and 1960s was that gays and lesbians found more creative work in early television than in the movie industry, and there were real opportunities for gays on the small screen. Gay actors, writers, and production designers found acceptance of their work in TV. One homosexual screenwriter—Jack Lloyd—wrote for 77 Sunset Strip, The Red Skelton Show (for more than a dozen years), Love American Style, and The Brady Bunch. CBS TV vice president Hunt Stromberg Jr. also gay, was the longtime network supervisor of Green Acres, Lost in Space, and The Beverly Hillbillies. Social journalist William J. Mann revealed that even technical fields, which were "implicitly off limits to gays in the movie studios", saw major gains for homosexuals. By 1964, gay industry involvement could no longer be hidden, and one tabloid, Inside Story, ran this headline: "How the Homos Are Ruining TV." A particular portion of the article dripped venom, to wit: "Nobody knows for sure how many pansies there are in TV. But things have gotten so out of hand in this new Sodom on the Coaxial Circuit that you can't tell the he-men from the she-men without a scorecard.... Right now the twisted twerps not only are in a position to tell you what you can see as entertainment, they are recruiting others of the lavender set to give it to you! Their numbers are legion. The shocking fact about homosexuality in TV is this: the queers make no effort to hide their twisted tendencies." Because of such moral panic, the deliberate suppression of gay discourse remained intact. Even a passing mention of homosexuality on American primetime 1950s television would be unceremoniously cut, not only by Helffrich and NBC but by censors at the other networks, too. Period. No appeal.
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