Seasons & episodes

Vernon tells Texas that they'll exclude George from the GGG until he's so left out that he'll come scratching at their door to be let in. Mary informs the family about Martha's kleptomania, a result of all her recent losses. Howie sleepwalks in frustration over thinking that the secret society he's investigating is in Austin. Lila demands that Merle convince the coroner to not perform an autopsy on Chief Nigel Quinlan, and after Wanda warns him that Lila's in possession of a personal diary, Merle's forced to comply.

Texas angers Vernon by bringing a stick of dynamite to the plant as part of a scheme to blow up a TV station because it aired Roots. Loretta and Mary decide to match make Mac and Lila to get Mac away from Charlie. Mary confides in George about Martha's problem. Lila meets Mac at the Capri and is disinterested, but Texas catches her eye. Wanda and Merle are stunned when they find that Lila has moved into their apartment.

Depressed over not being invited to the party at Mary's, George wanders Fernwood, seeking company from Grandpa Larkin and Barbie, Martha, Merle, and Cathy. Martha steals a lighter from a customer at the Capri and gives him $5 from the cash register. Wanda suggests that Lila get someone of her own, but Lila expects one to be a Jeeter. Tex passes out pink muumuus instead of robes as the official wardrobe of the GGG. George stops by Mary's kitchen and finds himself initiated into the GGG.

Vernon wants Mary to solicit Merle about the GGG, and Texas still has ideas about the TV station that showed Roots. Mary grimaces when George and Vernon talk guns. Howie is introduced to Vernon who warns him about the dangers of investigating secret societies. While the family keeps watch on Martha at the Capri, the wallet of a customer disappears. A rock bearing a threatening note smashes through Howie and Cathy's window. At the plant, Texas places a time bomb into a cardboard box.

Loretta offends Cathy while attempting to fix her up with Mac. Mac tells Loretta that he wants no part of a new romance since he's happy with her and Charlie. Texas presses Vernon about the TV station scheme. Tom reacts angrily when he finds Mary playing with Merle's toys and she tries to describe the nature of their childish relationship. Merle finds Lila entertaining Texas, and throws him out. Vernon offers to solve Mary's grievance about noxious fumes on the assembly line but secretly plans to do nothing. Texas loses his box on the conveyor belt, and the bomb detonates by Mary, George, and Tiny.

After an explosion rocks the auto plant, Texas admits to Vernon that it was the result of his bomb, not the noxious fumes reported by Mary. Howie receives a death threat warning him to stop his secret society investigation, and Cathy suspects him of being a virgin. Mary, George, and Tiny are trapped beneath the rubble of their collapsed work area. At the Capri, Lila shows Wanda's diary to Texas, but Martha swipes it. Texas and Vernon spot a convenient scapegoat for the bombing: Dewey, the auto plant's black janitor.

Trapped in the rubble of the plant, Mary asks George if he thinks she's good enough in God's eyes that she won't die. Loretta catches a distraught Merle praying for Mary in the Hartman kitchen. As Howie and network reporter Jud Thompson arrive at the scene of the disaster, Vernon says a clue's been found near the site of the bombing: an Afro comb used by foreigners and others of dark color. Lila uses Wanda's diary to blackmail Merle into appointing Texas as the new chief of police for Fernwood.

Vernon announces that a SWAT team has been called to rescue Mary, George, and Tiny from the rubble. After seeing Mac in action, Cathy decides that maybe "bigger" is her type. Merle attempts to reign in Tex's unorthodox police methods such as dismissing Cathy's claim that a dangerous right wing group is threatening Fernwood. At the Capri a distraught Tom and Martha talk about how different things could've been if they'd been more supportive of George and Mary, and they fantasize a life where George dances the tango, and Mary is a star chanteuse.

Mary, George, and Tiny laugh at George's suggestion that they're all going to die. Tom barges into the Jeeter apartment raging against Merle for his childlike relationship with Mary. Mary asks George and Tiny to share their innermost secret desires. Loretta's dinner party to bring Lila and Mac together is a disaster when both cancel, and Merle receives a phone call from President Jimmy Carter, who offers to send federal aid for the auto plant disaster. Vernon and Tom are stunned by the arrival of the SWAT team who are all midgets.

Dash, Skipper, and Chuck, the midget SWAT team, defend their qualifications to a skeptical Merle. At Mary's house, Cathy confronts Martha who is cleaning out the house, but Martha denies being a kleptomaniac. Mary scrambles to stop Tiny from committing suicide by hanging, bludgeoning, and suffocation. Merle and Wanda have a restless night worrying about their problems. Wanda attempts to trick Lila into going away to Miami. The SWAT team climbs through the plant's ventilation shaft in a last ditch effort to rescue Mary, George, and Tiny.

Martha feels like Lee Grant in Marooned as she and Tom anxiously await news of George and Mary. The survivors think they're hallucinating elves when the SWAT team breaks out of the ventilation shaft. Realizing she lost Wanda's incriminating diary, Lila turns the Jeeter apartment upside down and then frisks Wanda. The SWAT team blasts open the entrance to the buried work area. After Vernon suggests the explosion was intentional, Texas says he's found a clue... a Marvin Gaye album and Afro comb left by the bomber.

Mary and Tom's low-key reunion leaves her unfulfilled. The SWAT team visits the guys at the plant to say goodbye. Mary befriends Dewey and realizes talk isn't cheap. At the Capri, Lila spots Martha stealing a patron's lighter and confides to Tex that she thinks Martha has Wanda's diary. Vernon holds a GGG meeting in Mary's kitchen and is appalled to see Dewey doing an odd job for the Hartmans. When Mary makes a motion to have Dewey join the GGG, Vernon suggests ominously that they already have big plans for him.

After Howie reveals that he has documentation of a dangerous paramilitary group in Fernwood, Charlie suggests to Mac, Tex, and Vernon that the GGG protect him against death threats. Mary attempts to cure Martha's kleptomania with group hostility therapy, but only succeeds in making Martha angry at her daughters. Cathy encourages Howie to share her bed, and is dismayed when he puts her off until the day after tomorrow. Lila sneaks in the Shumway kitchen to search for Wanda's diary but is interrupted by Mary and then George, who catches Mary taking back Martha's cache of stolen goods.

Mac and Cathy each interrupt Charlie and Loretta's love in the afternoon, and lamenting Howie's disinterest in sex, Cathy probes Loretta for information about Mac. At the Capri, a drunken Howie admits to George that he's never known women in the biblical sense. George offers Howie advice about using women but is furious when he realizes Howie plans to use it on Cathy. Mary is shocked by what she reads in Wanda's diary. Merle calls Mary to tell her that Tom returned their toys. Lila phones Mary about the diary, but Mary refuses to give it back. After Mary tells Howie the significance of her hypothetical diary, Howie secretly steals it.

S2 · E125Episode 255 1977-03-25 · 22 min＋

Mary and Cathy attempt to shock Martha out of her kleptomania by having convicts Duke and Crude terrorize her. Fed up with Lila, Wanda and Merle decide to drive her insane. Howie tries to read Wanda's diary, but is interrupted by Cathy, who takes him to bed. Texas emerges from Howie's closet and steals Wanda's diary along with Howie's research on the GGG. Realizing the intruder, Howie chooses phoning the cops over making love to Cathy. At the GGG's Disco Night, Vernon brainwashes the crowd into leading a crusade against the school system's books, and Mary finds the party getting very strange.

As the GGG returns from their trip to stop school book delivery at the depot, Mary questions their actions. Merle and Wanda instigate their plan to drive Lila crazy. Mary confesses to Tom that she read part of Wanda's diary. George rigs an electric shock as aversion therapy for Martha's kleptomania.

Texas tells Vernon that funding has been pulled for the GGG, and they use the bombing to divert Tom's attention away from their school book ban. Lila convinces Mary to give her Wanda's diary, and they discover it's missing from the waffle iron. Mac brings a drunken Howie home, and he and Cathy seize the opportunity to get closer. Merle and Wanda's plot against Lila begins to take effect. The Jeeters convince Vernon that the GGG should incorporate into a political party known as the Guardian party, represented by Merle. To raise funds, they decide to hold a Dimes For Diseases telethon.

Mary confesses to Wanda that she skimmed her diary thinking it was a posthumous Jacqueline Susann novel, and subsequently lost it. Wanda wants Loretta to emcee the telethon. As Charlie and Loretta celebrate her being back on the road to superstardom, they're being watched through the window by an unseen heavy breather. Lila phones Tex when Wanda says she knows the diary is lost. Mary and Dewey secretly agree to perform a scene from Othello for the telethon. After a talk with Mary, Texas and Lila believe Howie has the diary, and Tex is ready for violence.

Loretta and Cathy agree that men like Howie are funny in the head and are also funny in bed. Lila and Vernon separately phone Howie and offer to meet him with tips for his story. Everyone meets at the Haggers home to rehearse acts for the telethon but end up arguing about who gets to go on the air in prime-time. Lila gets Howie into a hot tub and tries to seduce him for the diary, but Texas catches them, jumps in the tub, and tries to strangle Howie... until Wanda walks in and finds all three together in a compromising position. Tom warns Mary to not hang out with Dewey because he could be part of the black militant group in Fernwood. At the plant, Vernon hides himself in the shadows and tells Howie that the black militant group was responsible for the plant explosion. Howie accidentally finds GGG paraphernalia hidden in the plant break room.

Cathy sends Howie to the Shumway house to hide GGG paraphernalia. Once there he realizes Martha and George are members, and he vows to stop the telethon after Martha reveals that the GGG is backing the Guardian Party. Loretta becomes unnerved when she thinks someone's outside her house and the lights go out. Charlie finds that someone ripped out their fuse box, while the heavy breather watches them through the window. Wanda and Mary argue over Mary bringing Angelo Bickett as their Dimes for Diseases poster boy, because he's in an iron lung. Tex overhears Howie tell Cathy he has to stop the telethon. Texas handcuffs Howie to a cactus as the telethon goes on air.

The telethon continues with Charlie performing bird calls while doing yo-yo tricks. Texas gags Howie. Mary sees Howie gagged and handcuffed to a cactus but thinks it's an act. Mac performs a bad ventriloquist act. Merle continues the plot to drive Lila crazy by disrupting her sleep with a blaring TV and dripping water. Martha taps for dimes. Vernon suppresses disgust over Mary and Dewey performing together. Cathy frees Howie but wants to discuss their relationship. Mary receives a bomb threat to blow up the telethon, secretly sent by Texas to frame Dewey.

The Dimes for Diseased telethon continues. Vernon orders Texas to take care of Howie permanently. Howie can't convince anyone that the GGG is a threat. Loretta and Texas exploit the bomb threat to make the money roll in. Mary and Dewey's recitation of Othello entrances the audience. The telethon reaches its $25,000 goal. Texas catches up with Howie and bribes him to leave town with the Dimes for Diseased proceeds. Vernon fears that a freed Howie will now expose them.

Merle realizes the telethon proceeds are missing. Vernon discovers a watermelon in the safe and wonders if it, along with the Afro comb and Marvin Gaye album, might be a clue to the robber being the same person responsible for the bomb threat and plant explosion. Merle suggests the clues point to an Afro-American, and Mary laughs at the notion that it's Dewey. Cathy plans to break up with Howie to date Mac, but Howie dumps her first as he leaves for LA. Martha is caught shoplifting, but George persuades the cop to let her go. Martha announces she's leaving the Shumway home. Loretta and Charlie spot an enormous footprint outside their home. Tom wants to be left alone to reflect on his life.

Vernon and Texas make the men think that there's a black militant group in Fernwood, and the GGG forces Tom to stop Mary's friendship with Dewey. Cathy reluctantly takes Martha as a roommate after she leaves George. Dewey warns Mary that she and Tom don't know what they're getting into and vows to stay away from her for her own safety. George leaves in disgust after discovering that he and Martha are making out in the same apartment as Mac and Cathy. Tom and Mary receive a death threat that appears to have been sent by Dewey.