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They weren't a real family. Except for the mom, perhaps, who was a real-life stepmother of the eldest son and lead singer. And they weren't really musicians - other than the mom and again, her stepson.
But the actors who played a family that became pop stars would enjoy four seasons of their own sitcom on ABC and would be credited with three Top 10 hits and six gold albums.
The first of those singles - "I Think I Love You," the only one that would hit No. 1 - was released Aug. 22, 1970: 55 years ago today.
The Birth of The Partridge Family
Screen Gems Television had a major hit on their hands in the mid-1960s with "The Monkees." The idea in 1969 was to duplicate that success, but this time with a real singing group, the Cowsills.
The Cowsills was a group of six siblings and their mom from Newport, Rhode Island, who really did play instruments and sing their own songs - unlike the Monkees at their start. The Cowsills had pushed three singles into the Top-10: "The Rain, the Park & Other Things" was a No. 2 hit in 1967, "Indian Lake" hit No. 10 the next year and they hit No. 2 again in 1969 with the title song to the hit musical "Hair."
But when Screen Gems producers met the Cowsills, they were disappointed to find the kids aging. They would be too old to present on television as a group of singing children.
In addition, Screen Gems had its heart set on casting Shirley Jones - a veteran of musical films like "Oklahoma!," "Carousel" and "The Music Man" and who had won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for her role in "Elmer Gantry." The year before, Jones had declined the role of the mother on "The Brady Bunch" because, she said, she didn't want to become known for "pulling a pot roast out of the oven every week."
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