Censorship Timeline -- Pedro Ramirez

Chicago enacts the first movie censorship law in America. Cities and states around the nation create local censorships boards in the following years, resulting in a variety of different rules and standards

Tweety Bird first appears in "A Tale of Two Kitties." Animator Bob Clampett drew her without feathers but the Hays Office censorship bureau thought that she was just a little too naked. So Clampett covers Tweety's titillating flesh with yellow plumage.

Clampett doesn't let this pass quietly.

Durring Lucille Ball's pregnancy during an entire season of "I Love Lucy," the actual word "pregnant" isn't allowed on air. Instead, the writers came up with phrases equal to the word.

A banner year for censoring music from radio. ABC radio bans from all of its network affiliates Billie Holiday's song "Love For Sale" because of its prostitution theme.

Elvis' first appearance on "The Ed Sullivan Show" is seen by 60 million people His famous pelvis, however, isn't so lucky. After his cover of a Little Richard song -- complete with trademark pelvis -- the camera switches to a close-up of his face as not to over-stimulate the American public. By January of 1957 he is only shown from the wast up.

On the dramatic anthology series "Playhouse 90," an episode titled "Judgment at Nuremberg" has all references to gas chambers eliminated from its re-enactment of the Nazi trials. This is done at the behest of the show's slightly sensitive sponsor, the American Gas Association.

The American Motion Pictures Producers Association requests that Alfred Hitchcock recut his new film Psycho for classification

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre is released. It has come to be representative of the extreme horror film.

Metal band Judas Priest is sued by the family of two young men. The families contend that “hidden” messages in the band’s “Stained Class” record prompted the youngsters to beat and choke one of their mothers, walk around town exposing themselves, and steal money.

The X-rating is replaced by NC-17 to differentiate art film from pornography. Nonetheless, religious activists pressure large video chains and retailers, such as Blockbuster and Wal-Mart, not to stock NC-17 titles.