Things We Know To Be True About Mrs. Columbo

Previously in Columbo coverage: Columbo in Six Attitudes, Columbo’s Perfection and the Perfection of God, Things I Might Say to that Rumpled Little Detective From the LAPD, Columbo reads your aura, A Very Columbo Thanksgiving: Cooking with Columbo.

I’ve collected almost everything the lieutenant says about his unseen wife in the first ten seasons of Columbo.¹ As it is written in John 1:18, “No one has ever seen Mrs. Columbo, but the one and only Lieutenant Columbo, who is himself a Columbo and is in closest relationship with her, has made her known.”

She admires skill, even a limited skill in an area where one is generally incompetent. She will freely admit this; she does not withhold honest praise:

“I’ll tell you, Mrs. Ferris, I’m the worst cook in the world. But there’s one thing I do terrific, and that’s an omelette. Even my wife admits it.”