JULY 1, 1988
The $25,000 Pyramid aired for the 1,404th and final time on CBS Daytime television. By this time, the show had renewed the format of the opening montage of past winners, one which had been long a staple on Pyramid during the '70s. The final 2 celebrity guests were Robin Riker-Halsey and Charlie Siebert. And, sadly, neither of the civilian contestants reached the top of The Pyramid in this final telecast!
This was actually the second cancellation of The $25,000 Pyramid. When CBS first dropped it on New Year's Eve, 1987 (with guests Anne Marie Johnson and Robert Hegyes), after 5 years and 1,339 shows, its replacement, the Bob Goen-hosted Jay Wolpert Production Blackout, left much to be desired. So, by popular demand, The $25,000 Pyramid returned to CBS after 13 weeks, thus making it the only game show in TV history to be replaced by another game and then in return replace that same game!
Rumor has it that CBS revived The $25,000 Pyramid as only filler while Mark Goodson Productions' revival of Family Feud starring Ray Combs was being groomed for its premiere, which occurred the following Monday, replacing Pyramid. This was the second time in daytime TV history that The Feud has replaced the timeslot of a cancelled Pyramid; the first happened in June 1980, after The $20,000 Pyramid completed a 7-year run on ABC.
The nighttime $100,000 Pyramid stayed humming in syndication for 2 months until September 2, 1988, thus closing the book on the Pyramid chapter for the 1980s.
