September 13, 1947…The RCA Kinescope Machine Debuts

In association with Dumont, Kodak and RCA announced the developed a special film camera to shoot directly off a TV screen. This was the first “time shifting” technology to come to television. Nine years later, video tape would become the second.

Officially titled, the “Eastman Kodak Television Recording Camera”, a Kinescope recorder was basically a special 16mm film camera mounted in a large box aimed at a high quality monochrome video monitor. All things considered the Kinescope made high quality, and respectable TV recordings.

The Kinescope was quite the clever device. It’s film camera ran at a speed of 24 fps. Because the TV image repeated at 60 fields interlaced (30 fps) the film had to move intermittently between video frames and then be rock steady during exposure.

The pull-down period for the film frame was during the vertical interval of less than 2 mili seconds, which was something no mechanical contraption could do at the time.

Together, Dumont, RCA and Eastman Kodak found various ways around the problem by creating a novel shutter system that used an extra six frames of the 30 frame video signal to move the film. This action integrated the video half-images into what seemed like smooth 24 fps film pictures.

Of course, the kines were played back on air using film chains running at 24 fps, so the conversion to film was complete and seamless. Until videotape recorders made their debut, the Kinescope was the only way to transmit delayed television programs that were produced live.

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September 13, 1953…Marilyn Monroe’s First Television Appearance

In the Comment section below, you’ll see the gift Jack Benny gave Marilyn for appearing on his show. She was reluctant and didn’t really want to do it because on live television, to many things could go wrong, but the “gift” helped, as did the studio executives who saw this as a great promo for her new movie “Gentlemen Prefer Blonds” which went into general release in August of ’53.

This was the first show of Benny’s fourth season and having lost thirty percent of his audience in the third season, he was anxious to step up the guest star power. It worked and the ratings zoomed.  -Bobby Ellerbee

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vhQqJXJz-o

On September 13, 1953 The Jack Benny Show episode with Marilyn Monroe aired on CBS. I really enjoy this episode! Marilyn is such a sweetheart and did a great…

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September 13, 1990…”Law And Order” Debuts On NBC

Below is a tour or the set from the beloved Jerry Orbach.

“Law And Order” and “Gunsmoke” are tied for the honor of television’s longest running live action primetime series…both lasted 20 years, but “Gunsmoke” aired more episodes, so it still holds the record. FYI, “The Simpsons” is actually the winner with 28 seasons, and “South Park” also has 20 season, but those are animated. Doh!

“Law And Order” is the only show that was sold to three networks before it got to air. Initially, Fox ordered thirteen episodes based on the concept alone, with no pilot. Then-network head Barry Diller reversed the decision. Although he loved the idea, he didn’t believe it was a “Fox show”.

Dick Wolf then went to CBS, which ordered a pilot, “Everybody’s Favorite Bagman”, written by Wolf about corrupt city officials involved with the mob. The network liked the pilot but did not order it because there were no breakout stars.

In the summer of 1989, NBC’s top executives, Brandon Tartikoff and Warren Littlefield, screened the pilot and liked it; but they were concerned the intensity of the series could not be repeated week after week. However, by 1990, NBC executives had enough confidence that the innovative show could appeal to a wide audience that they ordered the series for a full season.

The rest as they say, is history…and a great one at that! This is my all time favorite show. Yours too? Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

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September 12, 1955…3K, NBC’s First Color Studio Inside 30 Rock Debuts

On this day (also a Monday), in 1955, Studio 3K debuted as NBC’s first “non-experimental“* in-house color facility. It was created by combining historic Studio 3H, television’s first home, and radio Studio 3F. The debut broadcast was of  “The Howdy Doody Show”, and 3K became Howdy’s premenant home, making it the first ever daily color broadcast. *In 1951, RCA/NBC equipped Studio 3K with experimental color equipment for a year’s worth of testing monitors, cameras and rack equipment and mostly closed circuit programs were done from 3H until The Colonial Theater was leased and became the home of all the color broadcasts, starting in March of 1953…so, technically, Studio 3H was the first live color studio inside 30 Rock.

Below is the detailed history of Studio 3H, how it came to be, and what it became. Did you know 3K was the home of the famous Kraft Kitchen? That is were all the Kraft commercials came from, and why the third floor always smelled great. Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee

Inside Studio 3H, 3rd floor level studio above and below, 4th floor level control room that you can see in the photo above.

The “coffin camera” color tests that started in 3H in 1951 (below) with “Color Girl” Marie McNamara.

Me kissing the floor where 3H and 3F came together to make 3K, 2014.

A Brief History Of Television’s First Real Home…NBC’s Studio 3H

Above is a rare, digitally enhanced photo of the NBC Radio Master Control board from 1933…the year RCA and NBC moved into 30 Rockefeller Plaza.

In the beginning, Studio 33 was radio studio, just one of six medium sized spaces on the 3rd floor, which were about half the size of 3A and 3B. At the time, there were roughly 50 NBC studios in the building, but RCA had plans for 3H.

In late 1935, two years after Radio City opened, NBC Radio Studio 3H was converted to RCA Television Studio 3H and technically, would remain an RCA domain until 1939, at which time W2XBS and this studio were put under the control of NBC Television.

It was done under a blanket of secrecy. This mysterious new space was kept secret due to competitive developments for a year, while low key experimental broadcasts from 3H were done, but by early in 1936, RCA decided to go public with the news of their electronic television operations.

After the experimental public broadcasts were started with the three live Iconoscope cameras, RCA also took over a space on the 5th floor for film and called that new area Studio 5F, which was linked to the 3H control room.

Until 1951, 3H was used for experimental and regular programming, and was NBC’s only permanently equipped studio till radio studio 8G began television trials in 1946. Some of the earliest network shows from 3H were “The Kraft Music Hall,” “Television Scene Magazine,” “The Howdy Doody Show” and more. All these shows started out in 3H with the big Iconoscope cameras, and in April of 1948, 3H finally got the new RCA TK30s. The next month, 8G was converted to television.

In 1951, Howdy and the other shows done here moved out, and 3H would become the home of the experimental color tests after the Wardman Park color tests concluded in Washington. The Wardman color cameras were not installed in 3H, however the Washington color veterans were brought from there to continue color tests with the new “coffin cameras.” The joke was, these huge new umber gray cameras were big enough to bury a man in. These were the predecessor to the TK40s and this is the first appearance of the rounded top viewfinder. The color tests from 3H, and later, The Colonial Theater were broadcast over RCA’s experimental color station KE2XJV.

Variety like demonstration shows were done weekdays at 10, 2 and 4 and were staged with vivid colored wardrobes and sets. These shows were mostly for the engineers in New York and RCA’s Princeton labs who watched on closed circuit feeds. Not one to ever miss a marketing opportunity though, these shows were also fed to a half dozen custom built color receivers that were on display in the RCA Exhibition Hall in Rockefeller Plaza. In early ’53 these daily shows would move to The Colonial Theater which was where the new prototype TK40 cameras were beginning to be tested.

After the color tests left for the Colonial, 3H was still involved in color monitor tests, but even then, it stayed busy with regular 15 minute daily programs and live commercials coming from the studio with TK30s wheeled in from Studio 3B.

In the summer of 1955 3H was closed as construction crews took out the wall between 3H and 3F to create the first color studio inside Radio City. The new studio was to become 3K and with a double debut, both Studio 3K and Howdy Doody went to live color the afternoon of September 12, 1955.

Today, 3K is used by MSNBC and is the home to most of their hosts after 7PM, including Chris Hayes, and Lawrence O’Donnell. There is more on the photos, so click through! Enjoy, and there is more to come on 3H. -Bobby Ellerbee

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September 12, 1954…Brooklyn 1, NBC’s Second Color Studio Debuts

The full story is below, but at this link is a tour of Brooklyn 1 by Steve Allan, just after NBC’s first color spectacular “Satin & Spurs”, aired live from this new color studio September 12, 1954. Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee

A Rare And Detailed Look At NBC’s Brooklyn Studios…Part 1 of 2

For me, these new photos and information have cleared up a lot of confusion about these famous and historic film and television studios. I hope they will do the same for you.

Here are two annotated aerial views of the property and the recently discovered September 29, 1951 article from the Brooklyn Eagle that announces the sale of the Warner Brothers – Vitagraph property to NBC.

I had always thought that NBC bought the entire Warner Brothers holdings in Brooklyn…the studios and property that WB had bought from Vitagraph Studios. This is not the case. As it turns out, the big white building was retained by WB, but they sold the property on the other side of 14th Street to NBC. This will not surprise you but Wikipedia and other wiki sites have a lot of wrong information on this.

The white Vitagraph building was built in 1906. Vitagraph was bought by Warner Brothers April 22, 1925. What we now know as NBC Brooklyn Studio 1 was built by WB in 1936 and was first used by NBC September 12, 1954. Studio II, the smaller studio was built new from the ground up by NBC and went into service in the fall of 1956.

All of this sheds new light on a bigger picture…a big color picture! As I compare notes on dates and locations, it is dawning on me that with the broadcast of ‘Satin And Spurs’ on September 12, 1954, NBC Brooklyn Studio I, became NBC’s second ever color facility. That is a fact I have never seen documented anywhere before, even in NBC’s press releases of the time.

It’s interesting to note that this property was bought about the same time RCA/NBC took over The Colonial Theater. That was NBC’s first real color facility and after transforming it from a movie theater to a color television studio, the first live broadcast was done from The Colonial on November 8, 1952 with a one time only broadcast of ‘Your Show Of Shows’ with the color burst removed, but viewed in color via closed at RCA Labs in Princeton.

I suspect the three year gap between when NBC bought the property and it’s first use was due in large part to a wait and see attitude regarding the NTSC color system court battles with CBS and the FCC. When CBS testified before Congress in March 1953 that it had no further plans for its own color system, the path was open for the NTSC to submit its petition for FCC approval in July 1953, which was granted in December. I think that is when NBC finally began the serious work of transforming Studio I from a film sound stage into the world’s largest color television studio.

Now that we’ve seen the outside and made some new discoveries, we’ll move to the inside of these two studios tomorrow with some great pictures. Thanks to Glenn Mack for the aerial views, Dave Miller for the Brooklyn Eagle article and to many NBC veterans that helped with this including Joel Spector, Dennis Degan, Jan Kassoff, Frank Gaeta, Russell Ross and more. Enjoy and SHARE! -Bobby Ellerbee

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September 10, 1955…”Gunsmoke” Debuts With John Wayne Intro

According to “The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows”, John Wayne was the first choice to play Marshal Matt Dillon, but he declined because he did not want to commit to a weekly TV series. He did, however, recommend his friend James Arness for the role, and gave the on-camera introduction in the pilot, which is included here.

According to a TV Guide article, 26 actors screen-tested for the role of Matt Dillon. William Conrad (voice of radio’s Matt Dillon) was one, but didn’t look the part. Raymond Burr sounded great, but according to producer-director Charles Marquis Warren: “he was too big; when he stood up his chair stood up with him” (Burr later lost considerable weight to play Perry Mason).

John Pickard almost made it, but did poorly in a love scene with Kitty. Warren and producer Norman MacDonnell denied that they even considered John Wayne, but their choice for Marshall Dillon, James Arness, looked and sounded a lot like Wayne. When Arness was reluctant to take the role, Wayne persuaded him and even agreed to introduce the first episode.

‘Gunsmoke’ was created by writer John Meston and producer Norman MacDonnell as a radio series that premiered on CBS in 1952. Many of the early television episodes are adaptations of Meston’s radio scripts. The radio series ran for more than 400 episodes and lasted until 1961.

The gunfight between Matt Dillon and an unknown gunman that opened every episode was shot on the same main street as that used in High Noon (1952). During one filming of this gunfight, as a joke on everyone else, James Arness let the gunman win.

During WWII, James Arness was assigned to the 3rd Infantry Division and took part in the invasion of Anzio where he was severely wounded in the leg and foot by machine-gun fire. He lost part of his foot and the wound plagued him the rest of his life. The injury made it difficult for him to walk for extended stretches, so, when shooting movies or TV shows, any scenes that required extensive walking would be shot early in the morning, before his feet and knees started giving out.

At 20 years and 635 episodes, ‘Gunsmoke’ is one of the longest-running American prime-time drama television series. It was originally produced for the CBS Television Network by Filmcrafters at the Producers Studio (now the Raleigh Studio). Around 1960, CBS took over production and moved it to KTLA Studios, then owned by Paramount Pictures. Around 1963 production was moved to CBS Studio Center, formerly Republic Studios, where it remained for the rest of the show’s run.

Slated to be canceled in 1967 due to low ratings, CBS president William Paley reversed the decision. He moved the show from Saturdays to Mondays (cancelling Gilligan’s Island in the process), placing it back in the Nielsen’s Top Ten. Paley and his wife were both big fans of the show. -Bobby Ellerbee

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September 9, 1926…RCA Creates NBC: A History Lesson

In the beginning, there was David Sarnoff. By 1919, Sarnoff was the commercial manager of American Marconi in New York. That same year, British Marconi had made an offer to General Electric to buy the worldwide rights to their Alexanderson Alternator technology which was vital for transatlantic communication.

The prospect of a foreign company controlling international communications set off alarm bells in Washington and the government approached GE with a counter offer. If GE would place the Alternator in a new subsidiary company, they would be allowed to operate the international wireless circuits for both government and commercial traffic.

To sweeten the deal, the Navy agreed to turn over all the wireless patents it received through their wartime research. Who could refuse? The new GE subsidiary company was named the Radio Corporation of America and at the helm was Owen Young as Chairman, Ernst Alexanderson as Chief Engineer and David Sarnoff as General Manager.

Within months, AT&T, Westinghouse and a big customer of international wireless services, United Fruit Company bought up all the RCA shares. By 1921, things had gotten interesting on another front…radio stations. 28 sprang up that year including the Westinghouse owned WJZ in New Jersey.

With the July 2, 1921 World Heavyweight Championship fight between America’s Jack Dempsey and France’s George Carpentier looming, the nation was anxious for a speedy way to know the details and outcome. David Sarnoff decided RCA should broadcast the fight on WJZ. It was a radio first; a publicity coup for RCA and Westinghouse, and sold lots of radios!

With Westinghouse in a good mood, Sarnoff convinced them to allow RCA to take over WJZ, and later that month, RCA built and installed a powerful new transmitter for their first station atop Aeolian Hall in New York. By the end of 1922, 430 more radio station licenses had been granted and Sarnoff was paying attention, but had a different train of thought.

To him, it seemed the bigger opportunity was not in owning local stations, but in creating a national network. In a memo to Chairman Owen Young, Sarnoff said that RCA should provide “a national broadcasting company” that would entertain a nation with high quality programs of news, sports and music. The plans for The National Broadcasting Company were in place now, but it would take a few more years.

Part of RCA’s original corporate mandate was to issue and collect licensing fees from those manufacturing wireless radio equipment. That meant everyone; including one of RCA’s major shareholders… AT&T. Even though they would be rewarded by their stock ownership, AT&T began to chafe at the bit and in early 1923, began manufacturing receivers without paying the license fees to RCA. On top of that, they had also refused to allow RCA to lease phone lines to begin a network for WJZ. RCA’s only alternative was to use telegraph lines which had very poor voice quality. In the summer of ’24, there were some anti-Semitic remarks aimed at Sarnoff by AT&T head Walter Gilbert, and things got pretty heated, but that actually worked to RCA’s advantage.

After that embarrassing flap, AT&T’s management began to discuss getting out of the radio business, and in July of 1926, AT&T agreed to sell WEAF to RCA. The sale came with the stipulation that from then on, they would rent AT&T lines, which is what Sarnoff wanted all along.

The Beginning of NBC, September 9, 1926…NBC Was Incorporated By RCA The incorporation process was the first step on a long and profitable road for RCA’s new broadcast division.

The nation’s first major broadcasting network came to life on November 15, 1926, with a gala four-hour radio program originating from the ballroom of the original Waldorf-Astoria Hotel at 5th Avenue and 34th Street, which is now the Empire State Building’s location.
After NBC was created, their two stations became the centers of their two semi-independent networks…NBC Blue, based on WJZ, and NBC Red, based on WEAF, each with its respective links to stations in other cities. RCA became the network’s sole owner January 1, 1930, when former partners General Electric and Westinghouse were bought out.

Many believe that NBC created the first radio network but that is not exactly the case. RCA’s old partner AT&T had the first radio network and their first network radio broadcast was January 4, 1923 between WEAF in NYC and WNAC in Boston. -Bobby Ellerbee

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September 7, 1957…NBC Debuts The Animated Living Color Peacock

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug9ndBnWi9A
At the link is the original version. This animated film clip rolled at NBC for the first time at the start of “Your Hit Parade” which originated from The Ziegfeld Theater, and the voice belongs to legendary NBC announcer Ben Grauer. The animation was done by Electra Film Labs in New York City. The man who designed the peacock is John J. Graham. Below is a rare set of photos and the story of John Graham’s development of most of NBC’s dramatic logos, including “The Snake”. Enjoy and share!

http://big13.com/NBC%20Peacock/NBCPeacock1.htm

First, a huge thanks to our friend Mike Clark and his great “Big 13” website for this amazing, rare and unique story on the peacock and it’s creator, John Graham. At the link, you will see one of a kind images of the original artwork that Mike got from Graham’s son, Bruce.

With the help of our mutual friend David Schwartz, one of television’s top historians, Mike lays out the complete behind the scenes story like you will never see anywhere else. This is a “must see” effort and even includes the development of the NBC Snake logo, the first 1954 color chimes logo, the ‘Laramie Peacock’ animation and much more.

I’ve pulled out a few of the historic peacock photos because today is the 57th anniversary of that animations use at the top of ‘Your Hit Parade’, but you’ll want to see rest! Thanks to Mike Clark for this great effort and for letting us see it. More on the photos. Enjoy and please share this! – Bobby Ellerbee

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An Inside Look At The Final CBS Color Test…October 20, 1951

Thanks to Tom Buckley for this wonderful IBEW Newsletter article from January of ’52, that gives us intimate details of that last test broadcast of the CBS Field Sequential Color System.

The article not only names everybody on the 12 man crew, but in just three pages, gives us a great overview of the system’s history, and the details of how CBS came to fold the tent on this work. A “must read” for anyone interested in television’s color wars. Enjoy and Share! -Bobby Ellerbee

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September 5, 1949…NBC Studio 8H Make Its Television Debut

On this day in 1949, NBC’s famous Studio 8H made it’s television debut, as did “The Voice Of Firestone” radio program in a special simulcast. Every Monday night since 1928, the show had been heard on radio, but in the ’49 season, it also came to television.

The show was covered as a “remote” as 8H was still a radio studio, and had no television capacity. Three RCA TK30s were rolled in, along with portable CCUs and a switcher, and connected by cable to master control on the 5th floor.

In the video linked here, you can see one of the shows from that season with a special twist. At the :17 second mark, you can see an one of the RCA TK30s remote cameras push into the background. The cameraman is our friend Frank Merklein, as the stage camera was his usual position on Firestone. He liked shooting the oboe player and did so weekly. That oboe player later had his own hit show on NBC…it was Mitch Miller. For music lovers, at 2:15, one of the most passionate passages in opera erupts in this presentation of “Pagliacci”. Enjoy! -Bobby Ellerbee

By the way, there had been earlier TV remotes from 8H, but those we occasional broadcasts of “Toscannini & The NBC Symphony” concerts and were not regularly scheduled. Firestone was the first regularly scheduled broadcast from here. There was an earlier televised show called “The Voice Of Firestone Televues”, but that was only a Firestone sponsored show, and was a series of travelogues and short films in 1943. The real ‘Voice Of Firestone” was a one hour weekly music show that often featured operatic fare.

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September 4, 1951…America’s First Coast To Coast TV Broadcast

65 years ago today, the first live transcontinental television signals were transmitted from San Francisco to New York, as President Harry S. Truman’s opening speech before the Japanese Peace Conference was broadcast across the nation.

This was the debut of AT&T’s new route of long lines and state-of-the-art microwave technology, with the microwave transmission covering about a quarter of the route west of Denver. The historic broadcast was picked up by 87 stations in 47 cities on all 4 TV networks. (ABC, CBS, Dumont, NBC).

Part of the speech can be seen here.

This is was the configuration of the new coast-to-coast AT&T broadcast net for television. There was a total of 109 operating TV stations serving 64 markets. There were 40 one station markets, 10 two station markets 10 three station markets, and 4 four station markets. At the time, only 63 cities were connected to the AT&T net to receive live television broadcasts. Enjoy and share! -Bobby Ellerbee

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