August 26, 1939…Major League Baseball Comes To Television

75 years ago today, the first professional baseball game was televised over NBC’s W2XBS in New York City. The game was between the Cincinnati Red and the Brooklyn Dodgers…the announcer was Red Barber.

Here’s an interesting side note. Realizing the significance of the broadcast, Barber asked NBC to memorialize the event with some sort of memento. A week later, NBC sent Barber a beautiful silver cigarette case with the date and event inscribed on the front. They also sent him the bill for $22.19.

In the photos, we see Barber doing the first ever pre game interview with Dodgers manager Leo Durocher. There were two cameras there. the one you see here on the third base side and one in the press box on the first base side. Barber called the game from the stands sitting by the this camera so he could get instructions from the truck via the cameraman.

Earlier In 1939, RCA designed and built the first mobile television production units ever. There were two telemobile trucks…one contained standard rack-mounted equipment for two cameras and the other housed a 159 megacycle, 300W transmitter with a hinged antenna mast on top of the unit.

Each unit was about the size and shape of a 25-passenger bus and weighed 10 tons. The total power required to operate both units was approximately 20KW. The signal was sent to the transmitter in the Empire State Building.

It must have been a challenge for the sports camera operator to frame a shot. RCA had three Iconoscope camera models…one for studio use and two for the field. The field cameras didn’t have viewfinders. The camera we see here looks like it may have a small eyepiece that would have probably been a metal tube from the front to the back of the unit. The other field model (with a rounded back) had a foldout wire frame viewfinder on the left side of the camera, similar to still photography cameras of the time.

Intercom equipment was new as well. The mic was a contraption that had a small curved horn for a mouthpiece and was worn on the chest which was borrowed from the telephone company. The headsets were borrowed from radio and it really was appropriate to call them “cans” because the round metal earpieces didn’t begin to approach the quality of today’s headsets. By the way, the Reds won that day.
Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

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Although not a product of the RCA Broadcast Electronics Division, this portable color mini camera, as it turns out, was developed by RCA’s Astro Electronics Division.

The Astro Electronics Division of RCA was formed in 1958 and was responsible for building SCORE…the world’s first communications satellite, five years before Telstar. Project SCORE (Signal Communications by Orbiting Relay Equipment) was launched on December 18, 1958, and placed the United States at an even technological par with the Soviet Union as a highly functional response to the Sputnik satellites.

It captured world attention by broadcasting a Christmas message via shortwave radio from President Dwight D. Eisenhower through an on-board tape recorder.

At the link above you can hear the message on a WBAI Radio newscast. The first transmitted message from space to Earth was:
“This is the President of the United States speaking. Through the marvels of scientific advance, my voice is coming to you from a satellite circling in outer space. My message is a simple one… through this unique means I convey to you and to all mankind, America’s wish for peace on Earth and goodwill toward men everywhere.”

This camera was developed in 1967 for use on the moon missions. It used three 25 mm vidicon tubes, the same electrostatic types used in the RCA TK-27 film chain cameras to reduce power consumption.

This caption, and the text blocks below are from a 1967
“RCA Engineer” magazine article. The photo caption reads: “An engineer at the RCA Astro-Electronics Division, Princeton N.J., exits from a space simulation chamber carrying the smallest compatible color television camera ever developed. Designed by RCA for use in space exploration and related aerospace ground support activities.”

Thanks to our friend Jay Ballard for pointing us in the right direction.
Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

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August 26 – August 29, 1968…Chicago Convention Riots

To go a bit deeper into a story I posted here earlier today on the NBC color mini cameras…here are some of the unforgettable images from that gathering 46 years ago this week. I watched this all live as a 17 year old. Where were you?

At the clip liked below, you can see Dan Rather’s manhandling as it was broadcast on CBS, but first let me comment on the embedded clip from NBC.

We start with John Chancellor on the floor reporting on the ejection of a delegate and at times, you can see Dan Rather on the right side of the screen trying to get to the action. At 3:30, things get more intense at uniformed police are brought in. At 4:30 we can see a CBS Norelco PCP 70 on the scene. At 5:00, Chancellor is joined by Edwin Newman and at 6:40 we can see the NBC color camera shooting them. At 7:00 we go outside the hall to the riots in the streets. All three networks were using Norelco PC 60s and 70s as stationary cameras.

By the way, this was not the first time television newsmen were in peril at the political conventions. John Chancellor was arrested in 1964 at the Republican conventions for blocking the aisle with an interview. At the 1:55 mark on this NBC tribute to him, you can see that footage. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TI1RW_9G7Q

Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

Coverage from inside and outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

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Ultra Rare! NBC’s Very First Mini Camera…1950

Although RCA and NBC engineers worked together on needed projects, NBC’s engineers were years ahead of RCA’s, in determining what new equipment was needed.

RCA did have a mini camera in development at the time, NBC had one too. The NBC version was the round one you see above and the RCA was the square one. I think both used Vidicon tubes. The first known use of the RCA “Walkie Looky” was at the 1952 political conventions.

NBC’s engineers also beat RCA to the punch with the first Image Orthicon turret camera…the NBC ND 8G cameras. Below you see Milton Berle staring into the lens of one. These were built in late 1945 and were the first cameras used in Studio 8G as early as May 9, 1946…several months before the first RCA TK30s arrived.

In fairness, RCA did have more developmental hoops to jump through, but in retrospect. I think there were a lot of things they could have done faster and better. Ampex ate their lunch on videotape, the TK60s and TK42s were a mess and Norelco and Ikegami were light years ahead with their color portable cameras. Even Marconi had a tiltable viewfinder on their version of the TK41. What took so long?
Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

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Eyes Of A Generation Camera Collection…Part 1 Of 3

A few have recently asked to see my camera collection again, so here are 13 of the 16 cameras I have up and on display here at my home. This is the Camera Room with 3 more spilling into the Florida Room which are not seen here. The 3 you don’t see are in Part 3 and include my RCA TK30 on it’s HF Panoram Dolly. a working Sony BVP 360 camera and chain and a Sony BVP 900. More details on the photos. Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

Oh yeah, to see the detailed history on most of these, go here.

https://eyesofageneration.com/camera-collection/

A few have recently asked to see my camera collection again, so here are 13 of the 16 cameras I have up and on display here at my home. This is the main camera room with 3 more spilling into the Florida room which are not seen here. The 3 you don’t see are include my RCA TK30 on it’s HF Panoram Dolly. a working Sony BVP 360 camera and chain and a Sony BVP 900. More details on the photos. Enjoy!

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Marilyn Monroe….’Person To Person’ April 8, 1955

At the clip above, we start with photographer Milton Green walking through the living room we see in the photos. While he’s walking toward the kitchen where Marilyn is waiting, he is talking live with Edward R. Murrow via the new Shur “Vagabond” wireless microphone.

The Vagabond was the first broadcast quality wireless mic and you can see Marilyn holding the unit in her hand before the CBS technician helps her put hide it under her clothes. What a great gig!

In the second photo, we see a truly rare sight. As she poses with the ‘Person To Person’ crew, there are two new RCA TK11/31s behind them. The rarity is the striped banding around the top. Usually, this was only done with the TK10 and TK30.

In case you don’t know, the banding is actually a very clever grayscale camera chart. Early on, the settings on the black and white cameras tended to drift and some “on the fly” adjustments were needed, but that required a test pattern or grayscale chart. As a quick fix, the CBS NY engineering department came up with these grey and white alternating bands and put them on all their cameras so that all you had to do for a quick alignment was shoot the camera next to you.

This worked well on the TK10s and TK30s because they didn’t have handles like the TK11/31. With the handles in the way, the shot was blocked and effectiveness of this arrangement was diminished. When the new TK11s arrived, they put the banding on but after a few months, stopped adding it, so only a few of the new TK11s were banded and actually, with the new updates onboard, drifting was not as much of a problem as it had been with the older TK10s and 30s.
Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

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Audrey Meadows…Her Television Debut With ‘Bob & Ray’

After appearing on the Broadway stage with Phil Silvers in ‘Top Banana’, Audrey and her friend Cloris Leachman each got a casting on NBC’s ‘Bob And Ray’ television show in 1951. At the link above, you’ll see her as Linda Lovely…a recurring role she played on the popular weekly show.

On September 20, 1952, ‘The Jackie Gleason Show’ debuted from CBS Studio 50, or what is now known as The Ed Sullivan Theater. Although Gleason had been doing Honeymooners sketches since late ’51 on Dumont’s ‘Cavalcade Of Stars’ show, Pert Kelton, who had played the part of Alice Kramden, was not a part of the show when it moved to CBS.

Kelton’s husband had been labeled a communist and, by association, she too had wound up on the dreaded “Black List”. A new Alice had to be found, and Meadows went for an audition. Gleason had seen her as Linda Lovely and thought she was good, but too glamorous. Meadows heard about this and a few days later auditioned again under another name but this time, with no makeup and a dressed down look. The rest, as they say, is history.

In this photo below, the production crew at Studio 50 runs over some basics with Meadows a few days before the CBS debut. Among those basics…which lens to look at. The taking lens on the RCA TK30 was the top center. Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

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‘I’ve Got A Secret’…The 1976 Primetime Fiasco

In 1976, CBS decided to revive this perennial favorite as a summer replacement in their primetime lineup, and if it did well, they would consider it for a longer run. Unfortunately, it was up against ABC’s wildly popular ‘Happy Days’, and only four episodes aired from June 15 till July 6, 1976. Not even a dead cat bounce in the ratings.

At the link is one of two pilot episodes shot 9 months before the June debut. Both pilots aired and only two other newer episodes were taped in Studio 43 at the CBS Broadcast Center in NY, which we see in this rare photo.

The host was Bill Cullen, who was a long time panelist on the show, and on the new panel was another veteran, Henry Morgan. Richard Dawson, Elaine Joyce and Pat Collins rounded out the rest of the panel. Enjoy and share! – Bobby Ellerbee

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