“Everybody hated me. They thought I was a loser – how come I was 30 and still not married.”

And yet Mary Tyler Moore – who dies on January 25 at the age of 80 – came to inspire generations of American women since the 1970s through her role of journalist Mary Richards in the television show The Mary Tyler Moore Show, which ran from 1970 to 1977.

Moore was never the single woman that the 30-year-old Mary Richards was on the show. “But the gut reactions to the situations were my own. I made them like me,” she said Moore one of her interviews. Over the time, both became symbols of the modern American woman.

Richards was witty and graceful in the way she criticised the overpowering presence of masculinity in her office. Here’s a snippet from the show.

The Mary Tyler Moore Show explored questions of equal pay, workplace sexism, birth control and even journalistic ethics. Moore balanced these serious issues with a light touch. The show’s theme song (video below) started with the words, “You can take the world on with a smile.”

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Perhaps the video below of Richards trying not to laugh at Chuckles the Clown’s funeral seems most apt for her fans to remember the legendary TV icon.

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