On a Monday afternoon on this date in 1962, CBS News anchorman Walter Cronkite entered NBC’s studios at 30 Rockefeller Plaza to co-host this historic broadcast with NBC’s Chet Huntley. ABC’s Howard K. Smith was at the UN Building. The twenty minute broadcast from the US to Europe was slated to start at 3 PM eastern, but the Telstar signal was acquired a few minutes early so they started then.
Aside from the historic transmission event, the sight of Cronkite and Hunley working together is nothing less than extraordinary.
As you will see, there are shots fed into NBC from all across the country including Cubs baseball from Chicago, President Kennedy in Washington, the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, Mt. Rushmore, the Statue Of Liberty, buffalos on the planes, The Mormon Tabernacle Choir from Utah and much more.
In Europe and Canada, 100 million viewers tuned in and it seems that the baseball game was their favorite part. A few hours later, the tables would turn and Europe would broadcast live to the US with Howard K. Smith joining Cronkite and Huntley at NBC, and all three networks would air this live, simultaneously. -Bobby Ellerbee
There was also a round-the-world satellite link in the mid-1960’s which included Australia, whre I was living, and England – the Beatles performing which brought a storm of proest as there was much more than The Beatles in Britain’s long history! t In Melbourne, the program began in the early hours – around 0500 and showed trams/streetcars leaving the depot for their first runs of the day. One of the DImblebe’s anchored, including some behind-the-scenes shots of the control room in London. Despite the mundave events shown, it wass exciting to think and watch live events literally from around the world.
That would be 23 days after I first started working in television. I started July 1, 1962, at KFDA-TV, TV10, the CBS affiliate in Amarillo. This was a very memorable day to see technology still in it’s infancy, growing so fast.
Everyone knows the Ventures version, but this is the original.
https://youtu.be/ryrEPzsx1gQ
I watched that broadcast as a 10 year old, and it is too bad the Europe to North America broadcast is not posted online. Opening image was of Big Ben in London, showing 11pm where it was 6pm edt here.
Some other points of interest on the Wiki page
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telstar
Also amazing, the amount of equipment neeeded to accomplish this. It was not done with a 1.5 meter rooftop dish and 15 watts output.
What’s even more amazing is this first broadcast was done with a NON-geosynchronous bird. That wouldn’t come until Early Bird (Intelsat 1) came online in 1965. Imagine what the uplinks had to do to maintain the signal! I visited the Telstar uplinks in Hawley, PA & Maine a number of years ago and the original 60m dishes first used for Telstar, then later the Deep Space Network for NASA and the Apollo program, were still there. A sight to behold.
How far broadcast technology has come in 54 years…amazing. I have seen so many advancements in my lifetime! Thanks for the post!
And now we have the Kardashians.
I remember being at that Cubs game with my Dad.
This was an historic event in television history and I remember it happening! I was 11 years old at the time and the memory of the US flag flying over the Andover, Maine station (which I don’t see on this video) will be with me always.
WFGA TV out of Jacksonville FL did the remote from Cape Canaveral. I was the camera operator at Mercury Mission Control. It was the 1st time that NASA allowed a live broadcast from Mission Control in Hanger Seven at the Cape.
There was an earlier relay bounced off a giant balloon over the Atlantic Ocean if I recall right. Telstar was start of an era, however.
Any link to the later European telecast?