Mel Allen…Columbia University Football, 1946

In 1946, CBS Television began telecasting the home games at Columbia University. CBS Radio sportscaster, and the then voice of the NY Yankees, Mel Allen was chosen to be the host. This photo was taken at Columbia’s Baker Filed on October 5, 1946. A few days later, he would be calling his first World Series game.

The camera is an RCA Orthicon model with a CBS custom made gun sight viewfinder. Although the camera did have a ground glass optical VF, like the Iconoscope cameras, this VF alternative saved the day as seeing the camera viewfinder in bright light was hard, but with long shots like this and a fixed focal length lens, framing was more important.

Allen started his career as the public address announcer for Alabama Crimson Tide football games. In 1933, when the sports director of Birmingham’s radio station WBRC asked Alabama coach Frank Thomas to recommend a new play-by-play announcer, he suggested Allen. His first broadcast was Alabama’s home opener that year, against the Tulane Green Wave.

Allen graduated from the University of Alabama School of Law in 1937. Shortly after graduating, Allen took a train to New York City for a week’s vacation. While in New York, just as a lark, he auditioned for a staff announcer’s position at the CBS Radio Network.

CBS executives already knew of Allen; the network’s top sportscaster, Ted Husing, had heard many of his Crimson Tide broadcasts. He was hired at $45 a week. The rest, as they say “is history”.

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