TV History

An Exclusive From The Eddie Brinkmann Archives…Part 2 This is a rare run sheet for ‘The Ed Sullivan Show’ for St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, 1957 which explains a the Irish theme. In green is the autograph of Dublin’s Lord Mayor Robert Briscoe. Yogi Bera was at the theater that night and after learning…

Another Look At The Sullivan Theater Balcony Thanks to Dennis Degan, we got some new information on the balcony at Studio 50. In the comment section, I am posting an enormous photo of the balcony as it looked in 1927 and in that, you can see how big it was. I said yesterday that…

Ever See This Before? Me Either! I acquired this and the other two very rare photos in the comment section Sunday afternoon, just hours before I saw them on the 8 o’clock CBS concert special. This black Mylar set was the first one up for the Beatles Saturday morning rehearsal. You can see Neal…

An Exclusive From The Eddie Brinkmann Archives…Part 1 How’s this for a resume? To help you get to know more about Eddie’s amazing carrier, that covers Broadway and television, I thought we should start with is resume. The first page (left) and half covers a lot of big names in theater, but be sure…

Welcome To An Eyes Of A Generation EXCLUSIVE! Starting now, we will all be privy to some very interesting facts, details and even a few secrets about ‘The Ed Sullivan Show’, that before now, were never available. Thanks to Dee Wexler, we are going to be able to explore the extraordinary photos and papers…

Ed Sullivan…A View From The Control Room On the left is director John Wray and I’m not sure who the others are at this console. From the stage, this would be in to back left corner behind the audience and I think the booth was entered from a door that would be to the…

The Studio 50 Audio Booth On the left you see the new audio booth built in 1936 when CBS took over the theater for use as a radio studio. In 1950, it was converted to a television studio. On the right, Lucy is in rehearsal for a 1956 Sullivan show and behind her, you…

A Rare View Of ‘The Ed Sullivan Show’ This is the only photo I know of that shows the RCA television projection system in use at Studio 50. The screen is roughly 16 x 19 and gives a good look at the broadcast image to those in the upper balcony. The balcony was built…

Waaaaaaaaaay Down Memory Lane… This is The Ed Sullivan Theater in 1928 as we look south from 54th Street. At the time, it was The Hammerstein Theater and had only been open about a year. The marquee display is for “Good Boy” which ran from September 5, 1928 till April 13, 1929 and starred…

“In The Bucket” With the exception of the Chapman Electra in NBC’s 8H, there are virtually no crane cameras left in modern broadcast studios, but back in the day, when they were in wide use, the cameraman on the crane’s position was referred to as “in the bucket”. I suspect, but don’t know, that…

A Hard Day’s Night…The Party After “The Really Big Show” February 9th had been a very long, but amazing work day for The Beatles. To celebrate, NY DJ Murray The K took the boys clubbing. The night’s first stop (left) was the Playboy Club, but after they had seen the bunnies, they left for…

It Was 50 Years Ago, Today… Here is the CBS press release on the Beatles debut on Ed Sullivan and the TV Guide listing for the Los Angeles area. Thanks to David Schwartz at GSN for the TV Guide page. Tomorrow, a wrap up of a few very interesting weeks for me and, what…

Here’s Where The Historic Sullivan Cameras Retired To… https://eyesofageneration.com/where-the-ed-sullivan-beatles-cameras-finally-wound-up/ At the link above, you can read the whole story on the Gallery page of my main website. CBS was very good about donating outdated equipment to colleges and religious broadcasters. Occasionally, public broadcasting stations got some help too, like WCNY in Syracuse NY, which…

Without The Cameras, It Would’ve Been A Radio Show… Below are a couple of shots of my Marconi Mark IV camera. It is one of only four known to exist in the US. Less than a dozen exist world wide. The night The Beatles performed for the first time in the US, six of…

Jimmy’s Last Late Night… Here’s the monologue from last nights final show. At the end of the show, Fallon walked out of 6A and down the hall to 6B, the new Tonight Show home where he was greeted by his cheering staff. Break a leg Jimmy! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1S86FiI3HY In his last Late Night monologue, Jimmy…

Thanks For The Tickets Daddy! On the left is Nancy Cronkite and on the right, sister Kathy with Paul and Ringo after the Saturday rehearsal. I wonder if Walter brought them? The girls returned Sunday night for the live show. There is a story that Jack Paar’s daughter Randi, brought Julie and Tricia Nixon…

Beatles 50th Sullivan Anniversary Count Down…1 Day Tomorrow, we’ll see pictures from the Sunday afternoon press gaggle, but today we’ll look at the Saturday afternoon press gathering. There had been a rehearsal that morning that had stand ins for George who was ill at the Plaza Hotel, but by late afternoon, he was well…

Hot Off The Press…New York Times This week, I had the pleasure of meeting and comparing notes with reporter James Barron, who’s article in today’s New York Times appears at this link. Like me, he’s been doing a lot of deep digging through fifty year old details to uncover some of the people and…

Hail And Farewell Old Friend… Johnny Carson would have been proud of the way Jay Leno continued the legacy of ‘The Tonight Show’. So would Steve Allen, Jack Paar and the man who had the vision to bring it to life in 1954…NBC’s Pat Weaver. On September 24, the show will celebrate it’s 60th…

Beatles 50th Sullivan Anniversary Count Down…2 Days Today, the sound problems. Notice anything missing in any of the Beatles stage photos either in New York or Miami? No? How about the guitar amplifiers…not a single one anywhere. As mentioned here before, “the sound” was a big problem for all three shows, and most of…