Fred Mertz’s Sports Illustrated Magazine

Fread reads Sports Illustrated Magazine
Fread reads Sports Illustrated Magazine in Little Ricky Learns to Play the Drums

In the I Love Lucy episode Little Ricky Learns to Play the Drums  Fred Mertz is seen reading a copy of Sports Illustrated dated Nov 22 1954. This was actually Season 6 (1956–57) of I Love Lucy and the film date of this episode was June 28, 1956 which aired on October 8, 1956 so the magazine was over a year and a half old when the episode was filmed. This was not just any back issue though, it was the magazine’s first cover to feature a professional football player.

Sports Illustrated Nov 22 1954
Sports Illustrated Nov 22 1954

Vol. 1 No. 15 Sports Illustrated November 22, 1954 with San Francisco 49ers quarterback and Hall of Famer Y.A. Tittle on the front cover.

See one on eBay HERE

Ref:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y._A._Tittle