Long before there was “Lost,” there was “Gilligan’s Island,” which was just as fantastical as the desert island drama. Airing 98 episodes over three seasons (and canceled through no fault of its own), “Gilligan’s Island” centered on a ragtag group of castaways who find themselves marooned on a tropical island after their ship gets caught in a storm. There’s first mate Gilligan (Bob Denver); the Skipper, Captain Jonas Grumby (Alan Hale Jr.); the millionaire, Thurston Howell III (Jim Backus); his wife, Lovey (Natalie Schafer); the movie star, Ginger Grant (Tina Louise); the Professor, Rob Hinkley (Russell Johnson); and farm girl Mary Ann (Dawn Wells), all of whom thankfully had everything they could possibly need when they embarked on their now famous three-hour tour. Yet stretching credulity wasn’t the main concern a CBS executive had when Sherwood Schwartz pitched the series to the network.

In his book “Inside Gilligan’s Island: From Creation to Syndication,” Schwartz recalls a particularly tense meeting with CBS Television president James T. Aubrey, who, in the 1960s, had brought the network to the top of the ratings game against rivals ABC and NBC. With network executives William S. Paley and Frank Stanton in attendance, Aubrey tried to sell Schwartz on the idea of losing the whole island thing entirely and instead refocusing the show in a new direction. What if, Aubrey pitched, the shipwreck was isolated to just the pilot, and after the castaways are rescued, each episode would find Gilligan and the Skipper taking a new set of passengers to a different exotic getaway? Schwartz was, to put it mildly, not convinced.

For CBS executive James T. Aubrey, “Gilligan’s Travels” felt like a can’t-miss idea. Granted, both “The Love Boat” and “Fantasy Island” were hugely popular throughout the ’70s and ’80s, so his instincts were understandable, but he wasn’t right when it came to “Gilligan’s Island.” Aubrey thought creator Sherwood Schwartz was missing an opportunity to create a TV travel guide with a brand new cast of characters each week to be played by celebrity guest stars. Besides, having a show set on a deserted island was too confusing and would require extensive exposition for audiences to understand why the castaways couldn’t escape. Luckily, Schwartz had a solution: “The Ballad of Gilligan’s Island.” 

Even if you haven’t seen a single episode of “Gilligan’s Island,” you’ve likely heard its theme song, a nifty little tune that catches the audience up on the ill-fated journey of the SS Minnow. Faithful viewers will recall the ship set sail with five passengers for a three-hour tour, was hit by a massive storm, and became shipwrecked on a desert island. The song, which recapped exactly those events, would be sufficient exposition for the show, Schwartz assured the apprehensive Aubrey, allowing audiences to buy into its high concept. (It’s an approach Schwartz would later employ in his other hit series, “The Brady Bunch,” which began each episode with a theme song about a lovely lady with three very lovely girls who met a man named Brady with three boys of his own.) Aubrey was sold, and “Gilligan’s Island” was born.

As creator Sherwood Schwartz explained in a 1997 interview with TV Academy, the high concept of “Gilligan’s Island” was a means of exploring what he believed to be “the most important idea in the world today” — a group of people from disparate backgrounds forced to get along and work together when thrown into a desperate situation. Considering the series aired between 1964 and 1967, when the Civil Rights Movement was in full swing, it’s understandable why he would be so committed to this scenario. While it probably would’ve helped to have a cast of characters from different racial backgrounds, there was only so much that could be done at a time when most Southern states still had laws against interracial marriage and would’ve surely boycotted any TV show that hinted at this possibility.

Although “Gilligan’s Island” ended without a proper finale (the castaways never did make it off the island), that did little to hamper the show’s legacy. If anything, it helped the series achieve a kind of magical realism, as Gilligan and the others learned to live harmoniously thanks to some nifty inventions by the Professor. Three made-for-TV movie sequels followed, with the island inhabitants getting rescued and then once more becoming shipwrecked, time and again. Schwartz even tried to launch a “Gilligan’s Island” feature film adaptation that would’ve capitalized on the success of “The Brady Bunch” movie, but it failed to leave port. No matter, because at least his original concept set sail.