The program was based on several novels by Ernest Claes,[1] who died just a few months before the show first aired.
[2] At the time it was one of the most popular TV series in Flanders, attracting almost 2,960,000 viewers which is about 3/4 of all Flemish people.
[2] Tourism to the village boomed, while it hardly had enough bars, let alone restaurants to accommodate the tourists.
In a 2004 interview with Het Nieuwsblad actor Fons Exelmans (who played the Witte) remembered that tourists were often confused because certain houses and buildings were located less close to each other than in the series.
Meneer Pheip says in the album "Magelaan 2" (1971) that he prefers watching Wij, Heren van Zichem, while the Maasai doctor Zongo in "Zongo in the Kongo" (1971) also happens to own a TV set in the middle of the jungle where he watches Wij, Heren van Zichem.