NBC Brooklyn, Not The Only Vitagraph Studio To Go Television!
NBC Brooklyn, Not The Only Vitagraph Studio To Go Television!
In the photo above, we are seeing a 1956 broadcast of ‘The Lawrence Welk Show’, which made its national debut on July 2, 1955. It was initially produced at the Hollywood Palladium, but moved to the ABC studios at Prospect and Talmadge shortly afterwards. For 23 of its 27 years on the air, the show would originate there.
The property we know as the ABC Television Center at 4151 Prospect Avenue was built by Vitagraph nine years after their Brooklyn location was finished in 1906. This studio was built in 1915 and in 1927 was sold to Warner Brothers who used the new Vitagraph sound process both here and in Brooklyn while shooting ‘The Jazz Singer’.
In 1948, the property was sold to the newly formed American Broadcasting Company, and the film lot was transitioned into the new world of television as the ABC Television Center. ABC proceeded to place their new Los Angeles television station, KECA-TV (now KABC-TV) in the newly purchased lot a year later.
Construction on the studio lot to bring it to its current form took place in 1957. ABC still uses the Prospect facility as a network retransmission center for its programming. Many memorable television shows, including those produced for ABC, other networks or syndication, have been produced in the studios.
‘American Bandstand’ started recording there in 1964 (moving from Philadelphia). ABC’s longest running program, ‘General Hospital’, now in its fifty first year on the air, has been taped at this location since the mid-1980s after relocating from the Sunset Gower Studios in Hollywood. Many other classic television shows were also produced there including ‘The Lawrence Welk Show’, ‘Barney Miller’, ‘Fridays’, ‘Mr. Belvedere’, ‘Welcome Back Kotter’, ‘Benson’, and ‘Soap’. Barney Miller, Benson and Soap were also shot at Sunset Gower Studios.
The lot was renamed The Prospect Studios in 2002 and underwent a major renovation to position its facilities for the future and new technical innovation.
And one of the locations of only a few LIVE television western shows – “Marshall of Gunsight Pass”
I worked a few years of the UCP (Palsy) Telethon here, and spent time with that young Sweathog, Travolta when Kotter shot here. Also all the ABC years of Let’s Make A Deal, many years of the original Dating Game and Newlywed Game and a bunch of other game shows. This lot also housed ABC promo production where Ernie Anderson would grouse to the engineers before intoning for The Love Boat.
That’s one serious crane.