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In The Beginning…ESPN Debuts September 7, 1979

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Eyes Of A Generation.com

The Entertainment and Sports Programming Network, had an interesting beginning in Bristol, Connecticut, and believe it or not, came to be with the help of Getty Oil. The whole story is at the link and this photo is from Day 1 and shows their first cameras, the Norelco PC70s on the Sports Center set. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_ESPN

As we will learn in this report from The Davenport Sports Network, there is actually more than one “angel” helping this fledgling experiment come to life.

On September 7, 1979 at 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time, an estimated 30,000 viewers tuned in to witness the launch of ESPN. Simultaneously, ESPN debuted its first SportsCenter telecast with anchors Lee Leonard and George Grande. The first words spoken were from Leonard who informed viewers: “If you love sports…if you really love sports, you’ll think you’ve died and gone to sports heaven.” The first score Grande announced was Chris Evert’s victory over Billie Jean King at the US Open. SportsCenter lasted a half-hour, consisting mainly of videotaped highlights. Following the conclusion of the telecast, the network aired a slow-pitch softball game along with other programming, including wrestling and college soccer. ESPN struggled financially during its early years. In 1980, Anheuser-Busch Vice President and Director of Marketing Michael Roarty persuaded his company to invest $1 million in ESPN. Anheuser-Busch gave an additional $5 million to the network in 1981. Roarty saw these investments as a smart business decision, telling the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 1994, “We gave them $1 million that first year. And if we hadn’t, they’d have gone under…I believed the beer drinker was a sports lover…The next year we gave them $5 million. I think it turned out to be the best investment we’ve ever made.”

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8 responses to “In The Beginning…ESPN Debuts September 7, 1979”

  1. Rhonda Lane

    That book left out a lot of ESPN’s studio and remote engineering pioneers, IMO, at least in my check of the index for their names. ESPN is now owned by Disney.

  2. Dave Armento

    Getty oil? Isn’t that one those big bad corporations that are keeping everyone poor?

  3. Vance Piccin

    Sorry, http://www.amazon.com/Those-Guys-Have-All-Fun/dp/031604301X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360250818&sr=8-1&keywords=these+guys+have+all+the+fun

  4. Vance Piccin

    For a great look at ESPN from the begining to a couple of years ago read “These Guys Have All the Fun”. The history is a series of interviews with ESPN people. Great read.

  5. Rhonda Lane

    I think they were pretty bare bones in those early weeks. They started broadcasting in early September. I didn’t come on board until December. The building had just gotten indoor restrooms right before I started. Also, the network hadn’t gone to 24 hours yet. By the time I arrived, most of the equipment looked new and they were adding on more rooms. My guess is they started on a shoestring and then raised capital along the way.

  6. Ann Hatch

    Interesting. Pretty simple stuff back then! 🙂

  7. Eyes Of A Generation.com

    Serge Bordeleau, my bet is a lot of the early equipment was second hand. If you look at the camera on the left, there is a 12 on it. Probably from a nearby channel 12 local broadcaster.

  8. Rhonda Lane

    Those Getty oil colors and the “racetrack logo” … 🙂 About three months later, I started working there running Chyron and Vidifont in a little booth the size of a veal pen. 🙂

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