Remember The Overmyer/United Network?
Remember The Overmyer/United Network?
This photo from Maureen Carney is a rare one! Here’s Bill Dana, best known as Jose Jimenez hosting the flagship show called ‘The Las Vegas Show’. Beginning May 1, 1967, the two hour late night show from the Hotel Hacienda hit the air on 106 stations. The network was created to be a forth network with eight hours of programming a day and had UPI as a partner supplying news, but after only a month, the cost of the leased transmission lines from Ma Bell became too much and it folded like an accordion. The network was founded by self-made millionaire Daniel H. Overmyer and was originally named after him, but before the network even went on the air, Overmyer was forced to sell a majority share to investors, although he remained the largest shareholder the new orginization was renamed The United Network.
[…] footage from The Las Vegas Show is known to exist. Print advertisements and promotional photographs appear to be the only surviving evidence that the series, and the United Network, ever […]
Another wealthy man, John MacArthur, acquired one of the United Network’s mobile units, and brought it to his Colonnades Beach Hotel in Palm Beach, Florida, where it was used to tape this game show on-site: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJ4SA5dxOZU
Check out the tiny cue cards, Bill Dana must have had very good vision.
I rememer that KHJ-TV (now KCAL) was the LA affiliate. Dana’s show looked first class. He was very good on “The Las Vegas Show”.
Just to mention–Lewron provided production services to Overmyer. Ultimately, they wound up suing to get paid. Now I’m wondering if the TK-41s were part of the 1966 ABC order. Here’s a link to the Overmyer v Lewron decision: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/401/689/323752/
Here’s a list I found with episodes and guests. It’s as complete as I’ve ever found and matches up by date for some of the TV Guide listings I had.
http://ctva.biz/US/MusicVariety/LasVegasShow.htm
WLWI in Indianapolis played the shows Wednesday through Sunday at 1 a.m. Their primary affiliation was with ABC.
It’s too bad UniNet did such a quick foldup since the initial reviews for the “Las Vegas Show” were pretty good, and Variety reported the owners threw in the towel despite “a flurry of new advertising orders for the summer.” Also, they left their employees out in the cold, literally stranded after their credit cards were cut, some of them couldn’t even ante up bus fare to leave town. And that got even worse when the Friday paychecks didn’t arrive, including those for Bill Dana and the exec producer. BTW, the June lease for the AT&T lines would come to $400,000.
I believe ATT was charging much higher rates for these special ‘ad hoc’ sorts of networks than rates the Big 3 paid. That would include occasional live programming from NET (PBS) and regional sports networks. Perhaps someone with knowledge of the actual tariffs can weigh in.
United Network faced another big problem if it went ahead with full-time programming. Most of the stations airing the “Las Vegas Show” were CBS affiliates (since CBS didn’t program against “Tonight” at that time). There would be no way they would leave the Eye network for something unproven on a full-time basis.
Overmyer had plans to telecast games from the Continental Football League, UPI provided news, and a Bible cartoon at the beginning. It seems the investors were willing to take a tax writeoff instead when things fell apart. Either way it wasn’t very well thought out.