Preserving the 1000 Greatest Icons and Significant Events of Television History... A project by Greg Howell exploring the history and development of television and its cultural impact.
Frenetic, surreal, careless, and grotesque...these are just a few words to describe The Pinky Lee Show. Critics of children's television in the early 1950's were alarmed, and while parents and children welcomed Pinky Lee into their living rooms, it is hard to imagine that anyone would allow the checkered, silly clown through their front doors. This was not the gentle sophistication of Kukla, Fran, and Ollie, but crass production geared toward selling children's products.
The show itself was heavily adlibbed, and the super-kinetic pace kept children's attention; but, the lack of studied scripting allowed questionable content to air live across the nation, and in the prime schedule spot just prior to The Howdy Doody Show. Divided into short, fast-take segments, the show featured sketches, audience interaction, and music. One episode featured a children's song promoting playing with scissors, while another performance featured a ditty about girls hearing wedding bells. Intermingled with this was Pinky Lee's lap sitting with the kids and rapid-fire product placement, such as the Miss Sweet Sue Doll and Pinky Lee's own merchandise, such as Pinky Lee shoelaces and the Pinky doll.
The show, however, was nearly as popular as Howdy Doody, and millions of children adored Pinky's antics and parents adored his baby sitting services. Then came the day that horrified children for years to come. The author of Classic Kids TV perhaps states it best:
One of my most vivid memories from my earliest days of TV watching is the day that I watched the live broadcast of the Pinky Lee Show when Pinky Lee appeared to have a heart attack right in front of his studio audience and millions of young, impressionable at-home viewers. On the day in question, I was sitting on the living-room floor watching the show as my mother was in the kitchen. I think it was at some point near the end of the show when Pinky suddenly stopped singing and running around and clutched his chest, looking straight at the camera, and said something like “Somebody please help me” before he keeled over onto the floor. I think the camera stayed on the empty spot where Pinky had been standing for a few seconds, and then the TV went blank. I remember running breathlessly into the kitchen and wailing at my mother, “Mommy, Pinky Lee fell down! Pinky Lee fell down!” before I burst into tears.
Indeed, children were stunned, and parents too...and as they tuned in the following day, there was still no Pinky. Nor the following day, or the next. Pinky Lee's collapse from acute nasal problems kept him off the air for a year and a half, instantly ending the popular live broadcast. Rumors abounded that Pinky had died of a heart attack. Ironically, when Pinky finally returned to TV - as host of the new Gumby and Pokey Show, his short run ended quickly on November 16, 1957, soon after he did have a heart attack. Fortunately, this time not on television, but Pinky's career never recovered to the heights of his short-lived heyday in the mid-1950s
Television pioneer Charles Francis Jenkins is credited with several early broadcasts on the east coast, and on April 17th (some sources credit the date as April 9, 1927), arranged the first city to city television transmissions - or as Jenkins called it, radiovision - of a conversation with Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover. With a mock studio set up in a Washington DC funeral parlor, Hoover - who had been receiving as much press as President Coolidge due to his radio broadcasts about the thriving U.S. economy - spoke with AT&T president Walter Gifford and was transmitted through the phone companies lines:
Hoover: It is a matter of just pride to have a part in this historic occassion. We have long been familiar with the electrical transmission of sound. Today we have, in a sense, the transmission of sight, for the first time in the world’s history.
Gifford: The elaborateness of the equipment precludes the possibility of television being available in homes or businesses generally, What its practical use may be, I will leave to your imaginations. As well as being displayed on a small screen, the images are shown on an array of lamps three feet high and two feet wide.
Hoover: Today we have, in a sense, the transmission of sight for the first time in the world’s history. Human genius has now destroyed the impediment of distance in a new respect, and in a manner hitherto unknown. All we can say today is that there has been created a marvelous agency for whatever use the future may find with the full realization that every great and fundamental discovery of the past has been followed by use far beyond the vision of its creator.
The telecast was transmitted from Washington DC to New York, and New Jersey, and 200 miles away in an AT&T laboratory, 60 men watched the first talking images transmitted over phone lines between multiple cities. The New York Times was jubilant about the event, writing "It was fun as if a photograph had suddenly come to life and begun to talk, smile, nod its head and look this way and that..."
The broadcast, however, includes the earliest transmission of tasteless, inappropriate television, as comedian A. Dolan, appeared in black face and spoke with a stereotypical dialect. Unfortunately, this proved more prophetic than Hoover's speech about the future and direction of television programming.
Charles Francis Jenkins first began working with the transmission of "electric pictures in 1894." His pioneering work continued his entire career; however, he represents the incongruities of early broadcasts and competing systems. In the end, Jenkins mechanical method of television lost to electronic broadcasts, but he did establish the first television station, W3XK (located in Wheaton, Maryland) and accomplished the sell of several thousand television receivers along the east coast. He, like Philo Farnsworth, was gobbled up the the behemoth RCA in the early 1930s.
Not really an entry, just something eerie and hauntingly final about this clip, the last 2 minutes of the final analog broadcast in the United States. This final broadcast is from New York's WNBC, which began experimental broadcasting in 1928 (as W2XBS) and began commercial broadcasts July 1, 1941 with a baseball game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Philadelphia Phillies. The station covered news of the bombing at Pearl Harbor and the end of the World War II in 1945. The station changed call letters in 1954 to WRCA, then to WNBC in 1960.
The station signed off analog for the switch to digital broadcasting near midnight on June 12, 2009, but remained on air for a few weeks longer with specially televised informational programs explaining the switch from analog to digital, then signed off again for the very final time two weeks later. The two week extension made it the very last station across the country to broadcast in analog, and 81 years of history came to a close. WNBC, like some other stations across the country, created closing graphics to signify the switch.
The single greatest example of branding in television history, the NBC Peacock first premiered in 1956. It was the creation of graphic designer John J. Graham. It came to represent NBC as the "Peacock Network" with the slogan Proud as a Peacock and was introduced to signify the networks significant work toward the popularity of color television. NBC, owned by RCA, had a great stake in color television, and while CBS and ABC only dabbled with the new color medium, NBC produced the major milestones in colorcasts - no doubt to energize the public and produce sales of RCA color television receivers. The initial broadcasts of the new color logo was in 1956 and was simply a still. The animated logo of the peacock spreading its color feathers premiered in December of 1957. The color logo replaced NBC's chime logo, a 3 chord xylophone illustration with a three tone audio, which premiered in color in 1954.
NBC requested the new logo from Graham with the call to create something that excited viewers about color and encourage television sales, and one that clearly indicated color when even viewed in black and white. The logo's success changed the image of NBC, promoting superior, colorful programming and is still used by the network today. It is one of the greatest examples of corporate branding, ranking up there with the McDonald's "M" arches and Coca Cola.
In 1959, Graham also created the "snake logo," to be used at the end of a program broadcast on NBC, and periodically, the network attempted to phase out the peacock logo, but by 1980, the network fully embraced the classic trademark and its importance. It has continuously been used since.
1956 Pre-Peacock Logo & First Peacock Logo (Non-animated)
1957
1960s
1970s
1980s
1990s
The NBC Snake Logo
NBC's Unsuccessful, 1977 Attempt to Drop the Peacock Logo
RCA, the parent company to NBC, needed the perfect show to launch their new NTSC (a branch of the FCC) approved color system. Certainly, hits like Dragnet, Milton Berle's Texaco Star Theater, or Your Show of Shows could provide colorful excitement to the medium, RCA realized Kukla, Fran, and Ollie provided every element needed. It was a simple show, with very few objects and a small set that required very little camera movement. Also, being an afternoon telecast, this color experiment would survive the tough scrutiny that would come with bigger fare. And most importantly, the huge ratings promised the viewers and promotion needed to kick off their fresh campaign to excite viewers and advertisers about color programming.
Thus, Kukla, Fran, and Ollie was chosen for this monumental television moment. It was one of the biggest hits in all of television in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Though a daytime show, its ratings were comparable to top primetime blockbusters like Texaco Star Theater with Milton Berle and Toast of the Town with Ed Sullivan. At its peak, the show received 18,000 letters a week. The show was, indeed, unique for a children's show. Both children and adults were fans of the show; and, among its many fans were Tallulah Bankhead, Orson Welles, Marlon Brando, Thornton Wilder, Lillian Gish and Adlai Stevenson. The large net of fans was due to the show's approach. The characters were given depth and continuity. In fact, much of the humor arose from knowing the history or the characters and episodes. It took a few shows for viewer to get hooked, but then...hooked they were.
RCA and NBC began heavy on-air promotion about the experimental colorcast to peak viewer and advertister interest. Interestingly, almost no one had color sets as the FCC was still a few months from officially declaring the NTSC (National Television System Committee) adopted system of color telecasting. The few that could view the experimental color system had close ties to RCA and NBC, such as advertisers and studio executives. While adults may have understood the concept, many kids did not - and understandably so!
The much publicized episode was a special event for the program. Filmed in a New York theater, and with the musical accompaniment of Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops, the Kukla, Fran, and Ollie cast and crew recreated a grander episode from June, St. George and the Dragon, based on the classic myth and its many incarnations. As children, excited from the long promotion and build-up to the telecast, gathered around the televisions, their wound-up anticipation deflated to disappointment. As documented in Larry Brody's book, Turning Points in Television:
NBC announced that August 30, 1953 was going to be its big day, bringing color to Kuklapolitan fans. Man, was I ready. My mother and sister and I sat down to watch the show, and lo and behold - we saw what we'd always seen: Kukla trying to solve the latest problem....oh yes, they also talked about the fact that they were in color and how exciting it was......for us, everything was black and white and various shades of gray. As it had always been. As it would always be until my family shelled out for a new RCA color TV set...To say I was disappointed is to understate the case. I was devastated. I was so upstet that I refused to watch Kukla, Fran, and Ollie again. At least until the next week.
Undoubtedly, confused kids across the nation were just as dismayed, but for NBC, the experiment worked. The increased interest in color jump started the process (again), and by January, 1954, all the loose ends were thread together and the industry (networks, manufacturers, and the FCC) began the slow, "spectacular" process of color. The first official color broadcast, after the FCC adopted the new system a few months later occurred on December 17, 1953 when NBC broadcast the first colorcast of the NBC "Chimes" logo (at 5:31:17 P.M.)
Notes: A rarity in live television, over 700 kinescope individual episodes are preserved in Chicago. Also of interest, the first color broadcast by a network was also Kukla, Fran, and Ollie - from a fall, 1949 episode that was used as an in-house test by RCA.
Ask people what they were doing the morning of November 22, 1963, and despite their varying responses, many would recall preparation for Thanksgiving the following week and convey a sense of excitement for the nearing holidays. The season was in the air.
Only days before, on November 18, Kennedy presided over the nation's first presidential turkey photo-op at the White House; thus, the first "pardon" for a turkey; thereby, he stated, "I do not plan to eat the bird." The press dubbed it "pardon" in papers the following morning.
This cool fall morning, mothers were plotting the grocery shopping, one of their last free days before children were out for the holidays. Arriving at work, certainly some men were whispering about the previous night's episode of Dr. Kildare, a cliff-hanging episode about a botched teenage abortion; or, for the gentleman, perhaps a mention of Hazel's charity benefit for poor children was better discussion.
At homes and in local restaurants, TV sets were tuned, many to CBS's As the World Turns as lunch time arrived, overhearing, probably drowning out, the characters' droning babble about upcoming Thanksgiving dinner. Whether near a television or busy shopping, working, or studying, events were unfolding that would forever change the world and the business of television news.
Just minutes into the live broadcast, Walter Cronkite interrupted the soap. As the World Turns' cast and crew, however, in New York, continued. They had no idea that Cronkite was about to make this announcement:
Here is a bulletin from CBS News. In Dallas, Texas, three shots were fired at President Kennedy's motorcade in downtown Dallas. The first reports say that President Kennedy has been seriously wounded by this shooting.
News of the bulletin spread quickly. On some broadcasts, as stations continued to interrupt programming, viewers could actually hear other reporters and news staff reverberating the same questions reverberating around them, "the President was shot? He was shot?" The entire nation, from reporters, network executives, to politicians, housewives, businessmen, college and school kids, were all hearing reports at the same time, all seeking answers in dazed disbelief. For the first time, the news televised the process of receiving live incoming information of paramount breaking news. TV stations, local and network, showed reporters on phones conveying the latest bits of incoming news live, to anchors and the audiences simultaneously. TV anchormen had little time for composure, and the emotional nation was truly one body, one entity, one organism, collectively hearing, seeing, and weeping from one disturbing revelation after another.
By the time Walter Cronkite verified the rumors of Kennedy's death officially, the audience had heard the speculation of the President's passing for an half-hour as journalists surmised, "the reports we have is that the President is dead, but this is unconfirmed" and "we have been told that the president has received his last rites." At 2:30 pm eastern, as a stoic but visibly shaken Cronkite reported, "from Dallas, Texas, the flash, apparently official, President Kennedy died at 1 pm central standard time, 2 o'clock eastern standard time, some 38 minutes ago," People had gathered around television sets across the nation, ultimately totalling 180 million. The instantaneous collective-conscious of the United States was born.
Together, the nation sat transfixed to the tube as the tragedy unfolded. The initial reports were of a man and a woman assassin team seen firing at the President from the underpass; then, a witness claimed a black man fired 3 shots from a top floor building. From the outset, it was reported and confirmed that a secret serviceman guarding Kennedy was killed, and it was reported that Vice President Johnson had been wounded in the arm. Soon their reports of a single 25 year-old gunman was changed to a 30 year-old man, his physical description, and his name, Lee Harvey Oswald. The audience feared for the lives of government officials, including Governor Connelly, whom had been seriously injured. Bit by bit, more questions arose than were answered. The nation feared the worse. Were there others? Was another nation involved? Was the United States soon at war with Russia, or Cuba? Did the assailant act alone?
ABC was first with news footage of Kennedy in Texas earlier that morning. The viewers saw an enthusiastic Kennedy, waving to crowds numbering in the thousands. As other networks began broadcasting live telecasts from Texas and Washington, crews and reporters scrambled to shed light on the rapid fire succession of the day's events. As TV Guide documented, The TV screens:
...showed the smiling President, alive and vibrant, moving through a sea of outstretched hands which wanted only to touch him. ABC was to follow this later with an interview with James C. Hagerty, in which the onetime Eisenhower Presidential press secretary, now a broadcasting executive, illuminated the nature of the security problem.
"This is the President's way of saying thank you to the people," Hagerty declared, referring to the scenes at the airport. "How can you stop it? I don't think you want to stop it . . . It's rather difficult, while guarding the President, to argue that you can't shake hands with the American people or ride in an open car where the people can see you. . .
American's witnessed via television each gruesome and macabre moment, from the motorcade ride to Parkland Hospital to the President's casket being removed from the hospital, Mrs. Kennedy by his side. At first, the earliest reports seemed more like radio coverage than television news; but, as the tragedy unfolded, television journalism found its voice - and image - and the two elements began working in conjunction with each other. No longer two components struggling to function, but now each working harmoniously together. As the afternoon darkened into night, all regular television programming had subsided. For the next three days, every station held diligent vigil with the shattered country, as TV journalism improvised a new, pioneering method for broadcasting the news.
For the 1958-59 television season, Desilu Studios trotted out a new, hour-long anthology, The Westinghouse-Desilu Playhouse for CBS. While the majority of productions were only moderate successes, several productions pulled in spectacular ratings. Those top-rated shows were "The Lucille Ball-Desi Arnaz Show", the Twilight Zone pilot (The Time Element) and this surprise 2-part production based on a true-crime novel by Elliot Ness, The Untouchables.
Many industry insiders were shocked that Desilu was tackling such adult and violent fare. Arnaz had stated publicly that his studio would never put anything but family programming on the air. Nonetheless, the studio believed in the project; and desperately needed improved programming for Desilu Playhouse, and bankrolled production on the Desilu lot with star Robert Stack, film-noir director Phil Karlson, producer Quinn-Martin and cinematographer Charles Straumer.
The first show aired April 20, 1959. The script told the story of Elliot Ness, the FBI treasury man who pursued Chicago mob man Al Capone at the height of prohibition. Violent and dark, the show was grounded by a voice-over by radio's Walter Winchell. The Untouchables destroyed the competition in the ratings; and,the week-long buzz about the first hour brought increased interest, and the April 28 conclusion climbed even higher in the weekly ratings.
With the huge success and critical acclaim brought great controversy. Italian-American's were incensed by the mob stereotype - even Frank Sinatra protested. Others were outraged over the excessive violence, and much debate followed the telecasts about the increasing violence on television.
The show won Westinghouse-Desilu Playhouse Emmy awards for director, cinematography, and art direction. The Untouchables is the pioneer of modern day crime dramas featuring gratuitous and graphic violence, a hot topic that continues today. Robert Stack would later win an Emmy for the role.
Ironically, The Untouchables also began the downfall of Desilu Playhouse. When Desi Arnaz sold the show to ABC for $3 million, CBS was livid, and for the upcoming season, vengefully moved the Westinghouse-Desilu Playhouse to the Friday night graveyard time slot, and soon after, reduced production to bi-weekly before canceling the anthology in spring of 1960.
The Untouchables ran on ABC for four seasons and 118 episodes, giving Desilu studio and ABC its most profitable show and hit. It also paved the way for Desilu to branch out into drama programming, which led to Star Trek and Mission Impossible. Desilu released the 2-hour pilot as a theatrical film after it spring 1959 TV success.
Desilu Playhouse credits for Untouchables, and Opening for 1959-1963 ABC run.....
Sources: Desilu: The Story of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, written by Coyne Steven Sanders and Tom Gilbert
There was little warning. The unhappy board members at Apple were insistent that the whole thing be killed without airing, thinking it best to forget the $800,000 spent producing the one minute commercial. Directed by Ridley Scott, the young director had just wrapped his futuristic epic Blade Runner and was teamed with advertising group Chiat/Day.
The concept was appropriate if risky. The new year brought a resurgence in George Orwell's classic novel 1984. Big Brother was on everyone's mind, but could it sell computers?
The atmosphere of the ad was dark and ominous. As a theater of mind controlled citizens stare and chant at Big Brother on a large screen, a lone runner in red gallops through the corridor, ultimately slinging a sledge hammer to the screen, destoying it. It aired just once on national television, during the Super Bowl, as a afterthought to burn the commercial while still getting some use from it; but, it began an institution. Commercials played during the Super Bowl have become as important to viewers as the game. The commercial put Apple on the map as well as creative director Lee Clow, who was responsible for this and the later Energizer Bunny and Taco Bell chihuahua campaigns.
In the early run of ABC's surprise hit limited series game show, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, a contestant named John Carpenter became the first millionaire winner and, with his wit and intelligence, kept the country talking about Regis Philbin's new show for weeks to come. The week of Carpenter's million dollar win, Millionaire took the top 8 slots of the Top Ten shows in the nation.
The basic set-up for the game show was to correctly answer 12 consecutive questions of increasing difficulty. A wrong answer meant walking away with a much smaller win, if anything. And, along the way, each contestant received 3 lifelines to help them out with tough questions. To the audiences surprise, John Carpenter got all the way to the final question without using any lifelines. The question was, "Who was the only U.S. President to appear on Rowan and Martin's Laugh-in?" When Regis Philbin asked him the question, John decided to call his father for the "phone-a-friend" lifeline. Instead of asking his father for help, he told him "Um...I don't really need your help. I just wanted to let you know that I'm going to win the million dollars."
This was a brilliant, humorous move by Carpenter, and Regis handed out his first million dollar check. The national excitement brought Who Wants to Be A Millionaire back for another limited run, then a slot on the regular schedule. ABC found the show to be the perfect vehicle to precede new and faltering shows to jump start their ratings, and before long the network saturated their schedule with Millionaire. This over-exposure led to a premature demise of the show, and it was cancelled from network primetime in less than 3 years (June, 2002)
In the earliest days of television development, Philo Farnsworth was a man with a mission. The earliest broadcasts were not being sent into American homes, but generally, from room to room, or building to building. Very little attention was being paid to Farnsworth's work, as most of the focus in the industry was on silent films and radio.
In 1926, however, Farnsworth looped a segment from a Mary Pickford - Douglas Fairbanks silent classic, The Taming of the Shrew. Simply a loop of Ms. Pickford combing her hair, this repeat performance over a span of many weeks proved genius. Farnsworth repeated the loop, improving the image quality with each passing day.
That real stroke of genius, however, was inviting the Hollywood superstars Pickford and Douglas to see his invention. A mild media frenzy ensued as the married couple traveled from Hollywood to New York to witness his invention. Unfortunately, by the time the couple arrived, Farnsworth's last minute tinkering with his invention reduced the image quality. As the stars arrived, Farnsworth manically attempted to correct his error. Pickford and Douglas were not impressed. But the real story was the excitement created of combining top stars with his new invention, television. It was a publicity coup and exactly what televsion needed to move forward.
In the fall of 1947, the television schedule consisted of a quiz show, a western movie, three hours of sports, a newsreel, and not much more. The few homes and bars with television were lucky to get even 2 hours of programming a night, and the networks were lucky if the 20,000 sets in the city could capture an audience of 50,000. Television was beginning to look more like a pipe dream. If television was to survive, it needed a hit show.
Just days after Christmas, Howdy Doody would arrive; and, thanks to a savage blizzard in New England, by mid-day Saturday, December 27, 1947, the entire city and east coast was blanketed with several feet of snow. In New York City, theaters, clubs, and restaurants closed. Travel was nearly impossible, and many in the city, still bristling with Christmas spirit, found the opportunity to tune into television.
At the NBC studio, problems were mounting as well. The snow storm made it difficult for the cast and crew. Buffalo Bob Smith almost didn't make it to the 5 pm air time. Howdy Doody, the puppet, didn't make it the studio at all. In a desperate attempt to put a show on the air, much time was spent on various entertainment for children while building up to the arrival of Howdy Doody. By the show's end, Buffalo Bob had become the voice of the puppet refusing to come out of the desk drawer. And the puppet never did show that first episode.
In many ways, the tension caused by the snowstorm added additional layers and excitement to the show, and certainly increased its audience. Howdy Doody was the talk of the town without even making an appearance. Variety raved and the high viewership continued until 1960. The network's program schedule ballooned after the premiere of Howdy Doody. The 1948-49 season brought over 120 different television shows to the schedule.
For a full account of this story, I recommend the book Please Stand By: A Prehistory of Television by Michael Ritchie
Show someone a photo of Wally Cox, and ask why he is famous? Most television fans would respond that he was the bird-watching boyfriend of Elly Mae Clampett, or the nervous guy from Here's Lucy, or perhaps the computer geek from the classic Twilight Zone episode "From Agnes with Love." An even more savvy television viewer might recall that he was the voice of Underdog. The role that made him famous, however, was that of endearing, yet unassertive Robinson Peepers, from the long-forgotten tv show Mr. Peepers.
Mr. Peepers was broadcast live, never to be seen again. The poor kinescope films have never transitioned into reruns, and many of those grainy 16mm films (shot on film from a special television screen at the time of broadcast) are lost. From 1952 -1955, Mr. Peepers was a critical favorite. A television show known as much for its soft comedic approach and as its madcap comedy. It's regular cast included Marion Lorne (Aunt Clara from Bewitched) and Tony Randall (The Odd Couple)and Patricia Benoit as Nancy Remington.
Mr. Peepers and Nancy were in a developing relationship that culminated in marriage on the May 22, 1954 broadcast. While Mr. Peepers was never a ratings bonanza for NBC, the spring of 1954 brought renewed interest and nationwide excitement when Mr. Peepers finally proposed to his long-time love interest Nancy. Newspapers and magazines hyped the event, and the nation stood still for Mr. Peepers, for this one night at least, and gathered around their sets to watch the kindred spirits wed. TV Guide gave the bride and groom the cover that week. While I Love Lucy first created the continuing arc story concept and event television, Mr. Peepers certainly signified that continuing storylines could culminate in high ratings and national interest. The success of the wedding episode of Mr. Peepers became a pop culture phenomenon and kept the mildly rated show on for another full season, and furthered the burgeoning idea of "water cooler" television.
At the end of the 1951-52 television season, I Love Lucy had skyrocketed to the top of the ratings chart. In just its first season, 39 hilarious episodes were broadcast, each building on an audience that was breaking records. Like all other television shows, each broadcast was "watch it or miss it." Even filmed syndicated shows were limited to one run each. But in late spring, 1952, all of this was about to change.
As I Love Lucy ended the first season, it prepared to leave the air, like all network shows, for the summer. In Lucy's time slot, My Little Margie would run until the new fall season. It appeared, however, that the nations top show would not return in the fall, as Lucille Ball discovered she was pregnant.
In a landmark decision, producer and series creater Jess Oppenheimer decided to write her pregnancy into the show. This created a number of problems, the most significant was that Lucy would not be able to film enough episodes for the season's full run. Suddenly it dawned on Oppenheimer that Lucy existed on film, as it was not produced live as other television shows of the era. Those beautiful black and white prints and high production values were about to come in very handy. Oppenheimer realized he could pad out the season with re-broadcast of some of the first season shows, particularly the earlier ones that many fans had missed.
Several techniques are employed, including the cast creating new footage as a "flashback" technique, and other times the rerun being introduced by the announcer Roy Rowan as an audience requested repeat. Even the flashback technique is influential, creating a device used in many television shows to come (probably the most monumental being The Dick Van Dyke Show).
On October 20, 1952, just 6 episodes into the new second season, I Love Lucy reran "The Quiz Show", the fifth episode from Season 1. Ultimately, 9 episodes were rerun during the 1952-53 season. The remarkable popularity of these repeat broadcasts changed the way the entire industry viewed programming. It was no longer a one shot deal. In fact, the popularity of re-running I Love Lucy on CBS broadcasts kept the show out of syndication until the the fall of 1967! CBS purchased the show from Desilu in 1957 and reran the show exclusively on CBS until it was offered to local stations via syndication. CBS finally replaced I Love Lucy reruns with, of course, The Lucy Show, which was nearing its primetime run (1962-1968.)
Original Closing I Love Lucy credits
Original I Love Lucy Closing Credits and Opening Credits for 2nd Season Premiere, 1952
Burt Reynold's star power in the 1970s placed him atop the movie star heap, amid the greatest Hollywood icons like Gary Cooper and Clark Gable. Reynolds, 37 at the release of his second blockbuster, White Lightning, was at his physical peak. The man could not take a bad picture.
Reynolds exuded a macho, brooding, white hot sexuality -
far removed from the current day, over-shaved, pretty boy star - and playfulness that kept him at the top of the box office for over a decade. White Lightning, his follow-up to 1972's breakthrough film, Deliverance, is the quintessential Reynolds movie. This is the movie that all the other car chase and road films of the 70s eumulate. His string of blockbusters include Gator, Smokey and the Bandit, The Longest Yard, The End, Cannonball Run, and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. Besides the intensity of Reynold's performance, this action movie features an excellent plot and direction. The haunting opening scene of the death of Gator's brother grabs the viewer from the first second, and Reynold's grip on the viewer never loosens until the end. With this film, Reynold's became a superstar and a national sex symbol. Audiences flocked to see and hear his infectious laugh for the next 10 years, and he still holds the record for longest run as the top box office draw in history.
This journal, a sketchbook exploring the significant events and icons of television history, is a draft and research tool for a project by Greg Howell. The goal is to offer a new and unique spin on the documentation of the history of television and its impact on modern culture.
Many entries are simply "water cooler" television, a collection of individual telecasts that had the U.S. population and media talking, often prior to the broadcast and definitely the following days, weeks, and even months. Other entries are larger moments that changed and influenced monumental historical events - and impacted the culture at large as well as influenced the direction of television.
This project intends to explore individual television broadcasts, those events that are tied to a very specific date and time. It is not a broad review of television shows or networks. The only exception is the documentation and discussion of television icons, those people, entities, or symbols that had a long-lasting impact on popular culture, some of which are often forgotten or nameless by newer generations, but whose influence is still apparent.
Frenetic, surreal, careless, and grotesque...these are just a few words to describe The Pinky Lee Show. Critics of children's television in the early 1950's were alarmed, and while parents and children welcomed Pinky Lee into their living rooms, it is hard to imagine that anyone would allow the checkered, silly clown through their front doors. This was not the gentle sophistication of Kukla, Fran, and Ollie, but crass production geared toward selling children's products.
The show itself was heavily adlibbed, and the super-kinetic pace kept children's attention; but, the lack of studied scripting allowed questionable content to air live across the nation, and in the prime schedule spot just prior to The Howdy Doody Show. Divided into short, fast-take segments, the show featured sketches, audience interaction, and music. One episode featured a children's song promoting playing with scissors, while another performance featured a ditty about girls hearing wedding bells. Intermingled with this was Pinky Lee's lap sitting with the kids and rapid-fire product placement, such as the Miss Sweet Sue Doll and Pinky Lee's own merchandise, such as Pinky Lee shoelaces and the Pinky doll.
