TV History

Video Rarity #4…Inside ABC Studio TV 2, November 7, 1952 This show-within-a-show depicts a live telecast of ‘Tales of Tomorrow’, an actual ABC dramatic series, which keeps being broken into by a phantom broadcast. It’s far fetched, but it gives us a rare look at the early years of ABC’s TV 2.  My guess…

Video Rarity #2…Jerry Lewis Sings On A Crane With A TK60…MUST SEE! This is as good as it gets and is one of my all-time favorite clips! Here, Jerry spends over three minutes on a Chapman Electra singing “Birth Of The Blues”. He gets the full treatment too, as they boom him out over…

Video Rarity #1…Jerry Lewis Hosts ‘Tonight’ With TK41 Shot This is doubly rare! First, you almost never saw the TK41s on the ‘Tonight’ show with Jack Paar or Johnny Carson, but at the 3:00 minute mark, we do! Announcer and Paar sidekick Hugh Downs is off camera in Studio 6B, but to make a…

The Start Of ESPN…A Hometown Newspaper Article From The Birstol Press Today there are only seventeen of the original staffers that started with ESPN in 1979, and this story is told by three of them. Thanks to ESPN cameraman Ryan Balton for sending this along. Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee By the way…Bristol, Connecticut…

The Start Of CNN…January – June 1980 Photos From Jeff Jeffares Jeff was hired January 2, 1980 at CNN to help Chief Engineer Jack Ormond put it all together, and was one of the original 200 hires. In the beginning, there was a big empty studio and boxes of new equipment everywhere. Oh, and…

Picture Parade #6…76 Trombones And A Cameraman! Now you know the secret. Back in the early days of portable cameras, this is how they hid the cameraman in the big parades. This Macy’s shot reminds me that The Rose Parade is just a few days away. If any of you are working that, bowl…

Picture Parade #5…It’s The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year The Andy Williams Christmas Specials were always great, but his weekly show was also a piece of art, in every way. There were always lots of crane shots and elevated performances, like the one seen here during rehearsal at NBC Burbank. Enjoy and share!…

Picture Parade #1…Recognize This? Think About Jackie Gleason… The building with the red facade is 328 Chauncey Street in Brooklyn as it looks today. Jackie Gleasen grew up here and later used the address as that of Ralph and Alice Kramden on ‘The Honeymooners’. Originally named Herbert Walton Gleason Jr., he was baptized John…

Speaking Of Norelco Cameras…Here Is A Classic Ad For The PC70 Source

CBS New York, Deep Studio History…Part 2 Before we start, a word on the photo. We see three brand new Norelco PC60s…so new their CBS Color logos have yet to be applied. I think this may be in Studio 43 or 44. Can anyone tell? The following is part of an chain of emails…

December 28, 1956…The Last ‘Ding Dong School’ Airs On NBC ‘Ding Dong School’ was developed by NBC’s Chicago station WNBQ and was first broadcast November 24, 1952. The show quickly gained popularity among young children and soon, was broadcast nationally on the NBC network, Monday through Friday. In that year, Dr. Frances Horwich, the…

Speaking Of Howdy Doody…Here’s A Little Something Extra! You never know who you’ll meet here at EOAG, and this morning I found this fun video in a message from Barry Mitchell, who many of you will recognize. Here, Barry visits Buffalo Bob Smith in his home and we get a look at one of…

December 27, 1971…’The Sonny And Cher Show’ Debuts On CBS It was a 1971 guest spot on the ‘The Merv Griffin Show’ that convinced CBS programming head Fred Silverman that Sonny and Cher could be the network’s next big thing. When ‘The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour’ debuted on CBS the first day of…

‘Howdy Doody’ Color Control Room…NBC Studio 3K, 1955 This is the only known photo of the control room for NBC’s first in-house color facility, Studio 3K, which went live the afternoon of September 12, 1955. The first colorcast from 3K was ‘The Howdy Doody Show’. NBC had color at The Colonial Theater and in…

‘Howdy Doody Show’…The Unforgettable Clarabell Goodbye Until those awful days in Dallas in 1963, September 24, 1960 was television’s most memorable moment…at least for us kids who watched ‘Howdy Doody’ every Saturday morning. The show debuted with Iconoscope cameras December 27, 1947 but by early April new RCA TK30 Image Orthicon cameras were in…

December 27, 1932…Radio City Music Hall Opens In the embedded video below from 2007, we see some rare footage from opening night and a quick shot of none other than David Sarnoff, who’s RCA/NBC building next door would lend to the name of the grand new showplace. 30 Rockefeller Plaza was still under construction…

Behind The Camera With Mark Stacy…NBC Sunday Night Football Here’s short but sweet look at how Mark shoots Sunday Night Football. Although the trucks are marked NBC, they are owned by NEP. I think that is John Howard in the TD position with the cap. Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=879344075451886&set=vb.112955302090771&type=2&theaterYou can’t start the…

Elton John…The Central Park Concert, September 13, 1980 We don’t see the RCA TK46 often, but thanks to John Senuta’s recent email of this great shot of Elton, it’s time to take another look. The other photos here are from our friend Dennis Degan, who I think was still working at Reeves Teletape at…

ABC, Color College Football…Texas Tech, 1971 Back in the TK41 days, brute strength was part of the requirement for assignment to the sports trucks. The camera weighed about 260 pounds and the viewfinder, another 60 for a total of around 320. And then there is the cable, but at least these are single cable…