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A Rare Look At The WNEW Control Room…Sonny Fox ‘Wonderama’ Tour

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Eyes Of A Generation.com


A Rare Look At The WNEW Control Room…Sonny Fox ‘Wonderama’ Tour

This clip is from the early 1960s and was sent to us from Barry Mitchell with this interesting note. “I’ve had this rare clip for years: it was on a reel of 2” tape that had been donated to my college, most likely by WNEW-TV. ‘Wonderama’ host Sonny Fox guides us through the Channel 5 control room at the Metromedia Telecenter, 205 East 67th Street, New York City. Last time I passed by the studio a couple of years ago, the front door handles still bore the old “MM” emblems.”

Thanks for the clip Barry! Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfo5wCwai2Q

Sonny takes his young viewers into the control room of his Sunday morning WNEW-TV program to see how a television show is made. Check out the 1950s DuMont br…

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23 responses to “A Rare Look At The WNEW Control Room…Sonny Fox ‘Wonderama’ Tour”

  1. Keith Nelson

    We were one of the first families in my neighborhood to get cable. Growing up in Binghamton NY, our cable offerings besides the three local network affiliates included Channels 5, 9 and 11 from New York. What a treat it was for us to be able to watch Wonderama with Sonny Fox on WNEW-TV!

  2. Frank Youngwerth

    Looks like the control room, and board, that we had at OU in 1959 when we did our bit to show how television could be used in teaching. Slightly larger here, but similar.

  3. Martin Gould

    I met Sonny Fox once as a kid, but not on Wonderama. He had a home in Westchester near a day camp I went to every summer. He came by one day to say hi to all the campers. Years later, when I interned at WNEW-TV, Wonderama was still on the air, hosted by Bob McAllister, whom I bumped into occasionally in the hallways. He was a great host but that show would always belong to Sonny Fox.

  4. Patrick Rocca

    Love it, thanks for posting

  5. Jerry McClellan

    Yep, those were the days. Seem light-years away from the amazing technology in television stations and networks today. Right, Bobby Ellerbee?

  6. Mike Plott

    Reminds me of my first TV studio tour at KBAK TV Channel 29 Bakersfield.

  7. Bill Gruber

    I love this site…..great stuff and a lot of memories.

  8. John Schipp

    The most innovative local station and group owner in television. As a kid growing up in NJ, channel 5 was it. Actually bought stock in Metromedia – that’s how much of a fan I was. Should have held on to it, the stock went to $500 a share when they invested in a new thing called cellular telephones.

  9. Mike Doughney

    The door handles are still there – these are on the service doors at 215, not the main door. Google street view. http://goo.gl/maps/AwRAR

  10. David Crosthwait

    Sonny Fox is both a professional and a gentleman. He’s been a frequent quest at our company. https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.630251247002237.1073741830.123809690979731&type=3

  11. Mark Tipton

    Love the ubiquitous cigarette smoke wafting thru the control room. Times were indeed different.

  12. Paul Forrest

    Here’s Arthur Forrest after directing NBC 2015 Rose Parade. Great job as always. The best there is.

  13. Joel Wilson

    These are NOT the “funny socks” who DJ’d on several Miami area radio stations and eventually on several SiriusXM classic rock and comedy channels.

  14. Gary Lee Horn

    I was a eight when I was in the Wonderama audience. I wish I had a tape of me on Stump a Sonny.

  15. Richard Hoctor

    Time machine!!

  16. Alan Rosenfeld

    I sat in this Control room watching them Direct Romper Room when I was 10 or 11. My first intro to TV Tech. A friend of my parents was a manager at NEW, he brought me in one day. My brother had been an audience member on Wonderama a few weeks earlier. We both ended up in the TV Biz, me doing what I do, my brother helping to build and manage the Fox network.

  17. Dave Miller

    And the director Arthur Forrest is still going … is the EP/director of NBC’s Rose Bowl parade coverage. Amazing career, from DuMont in NY to 2015’s HD digital world.

  18. Richard Melton

    I like hearing the “clunk” each time the technical director punches a button on the switcher. The first switcher I worked with had those heavy duty all mechanical switches and made that same sound.

  19. Russell Ross

    How primitive by today’s standards but also “how cool” was this? I guess they used the CBS system with the TD on the left side.

  20. Gary Walters

    Many times when I worked the overnight shift, that I heard that crazy song, ‘World News Polka’.

  21. Bob Hollis

    Love the cigarette

  22. Eyes Of A Generation.com

    This is Barry Mitchell on the ABC News set in TV 3 in 1996 with his backup singers and an Ikegami HK 377.

  23. Eyes Of A Generation.com

    Here’s one of Barry Mitchell’s many memorable moments on ABC’s ‘World News Now’ from Studio TV 3. The year is 2007. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q_NYulGppY

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