This is the home of television’s living history…
It is television’s story, built one article at a time. In writing and posting each of these articles, first on our Facebook pages and then here, almost every story has bloomed to near perfection, thanks to the contributions of lost details, comments and firsthand reports from industry veterans who were there.
I created this site over 20 years ago simply to share the broadcast history I’d collected. I never imagined what it would become, and what would happen! The men and women who shaped American television, at every level, began reaching out above and beyond the Facebook commentaries to share. Even the families, from industry legends to crew members, shared their stories, photos, documents, and memories with me. Many have told me the same thing that I hear from network historians!
“You’re preserving the only institutional knowledge we have left.”
In the same way networks kept the videotapes tapes but erased the talent, skill, craftsmanship and even revenue those recorded shows represented…they have lost their histories too!
Eyes Of A Generation has always focused on preserving and curating television’s amazing history with accuracy, respect, and context, but now — we have, it seems also become a home for the institutional memory of ABC, NBC, and CBS.
SOON, IT IS MY INTENTION TO MAKE THE SAME KIND OF EFFORT FOR LOCAL STATIONS ACROSS AMERICA TO SHARE AND CELEBRATE THEIR HISTORYS! STAY TUNED!
This is television’s living history — created by the people who shaped it and safeguarded here, for those who come after.
Please take the time to read through the “Thank You Notes” below from some amazing people!
As Editor in Chief, I am assisted now by Dr. Jodie Peeler, Professor of Journalism at Newberry College, and author of the only biography ever of Dave Garroway, titled PEACE: The Wide, Wide World of Television’s Original Master Communicator. She had the cooperation of the Garroway children and what a great read is it.
Serving as our webmaster for over 11 years (and just for fun), David Donaldson of Gray Media. With his interest in our medium’s history and his participation in the industry, it is interesting to get his takes on some of the information we have been blessed enough to archive and curate.
Thank you! -Bobby Ellerbee
For more information on me, go here About – Eyes Of A Generation…Television’s Living History
Bobby Ellerbee’s Eyes of a Generation is the only truly comprehensive repository of television history that we have left—our history is disappearing quickly, along with many of the people who made it and the equipment they used to create it. I grew up loving Ernie Kovacs, Garraway at Large, and Your Show of Shows with Sid Caesar, and later I was one of millions watching Ed Sullivan from the living‑room rug at 8 p.m. on Sunday nights… never imagining I’d be directing that very show someday. That’s the magic of television.
I’m proud to be adding stories from my fifty years as a director and producer to your living museum, and new stories are coming soon, video too! It feels good to give something back to the medium that shaped my life.
Your friend, John Moffitt
Author – Not Necessarily a Memoir – Inside Stories from 50 years in Television
EDITIOR’S NOTE: I added the bold type to remind you who this amazing man is and on top of that, he’s produced and directed more specials for big comedians than George Carlin has bits! See for yourself! IMDB.com
Bill Johnson, NBCU Director Technical Operations, Project Management
Eyes of a Generation is more than just a website; it is a place where questions can be asked and where there is a knowledgeable community ready to share answers, experiences and insights.
At NBCUniversal in 30 Rockefeller Center, Eyes of a Generation is often one of our first stops when we are working on a project where we need to develop a deeper understanding of the history of the spaces we are working in. The site provides an incredible window into the people, productions, and technology that helped bring news and entertainment into American homes from these very facilities over the past century.
When we combine the information and stories found on Eyes of a Generation with our own internal resources and documentation, we can build a much richer picture of how our facilities were used and evolved over time. Most importantly, the stories of the people who worked here bring that history to life. They provide context and personal perspective that helps us understand not only what happened in these spaces, but what it was like to be here and be part of their workday.
For me, Eyes of a Generation is an invaluable historical resource and an important part of understanding and preserving the history of NBCUniversal at 30 Rockefeller Center and the people who made it such an important part of broadcasting and streaming history.
Bill Johnson
Margo Precht Speciale, Producer, Sunday Best: The Untold Story of Ed Sullivan
Carrying the Ed Sullivan name means holding a piece of television history in my hands. As his granddaughter, I feel a responsibility to keep his legacy alive and share the stories that made his show so special.
While producing Sunday Best: The Untold Story of Ed Sullivan, Bobby’s site connected me with former crew members and fans. Their memories and insight gave me direct access to the people who truly cared about the show, which made the documentary’s storytelling much stronger.
This site captures what early television felt like through the eyes of the people who helped create it. Anyone curious about TV history can learn so much here. It paints a clear picture of that era straight through the lens of its cameras.
Bobby has poured his heart into preserving this history for older and newer generations alike. His collection of rare photos, stories, and background details is deeply researched and thoughtfully put together. Thank you, Bobby, for working so hard to keep our shared past alive.
Dr. Charles N. Davis, Dean of Henry W. Grady College of Journalism, University of Georgia
Eyes Of A Generation is much, much more than the world’s greatest repository of television’s technological history – it is a lens through which the visitor can relive the emergence of the medium. Through a seemingly endless supply of imagery, stories and multimedia, the site is like a day spent at a wonderful museum, all from the comfort of your browser. An amazing contribution to broadcast history. Each visit reveals more and more.
Jay Kernis, Producer, CBS Sunday Morning
“I started in radio in 1969 at the age of 17. After years at NPR, I was hired at CBS News in 1987 with no television experience, meaning I learned how to produce TV news at the Broadcast Center in New York City. I’m now at CBS for a second time, at a moment when young people say they no longer watch much TV, when there are those who predict what was big-camera news will be done via cell phones, when some predict AI and robots will somehow take over production in studio and in the field. What Eyes of A Generation clearly demonstrates is that the most meaningful television comes from people who have dedicated their lives to the most innovative ways to tell stories, and who triumphed over challenging budgets, nearsighted executives, and terrifying deadlines. Eyes of A Generation is a monument to the creativity, collaboration, and community of our industry.
John Pinto, Chief Cameraman, Saturday Night Live – NBC New York
Great job, Bobby. You’ve captured the history, excitement, and the people of our glorious business. Thank you for including me in all your great work. You are our “Keeper of the Flame.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Mr. Pinto has been there since before Day 1, back when it was called NBC’s SATURDAY NIGHT and he is still there…behind the camera on the crane! Where else?
Ron Simon, Curator, The Paley Center for Media
I remember talking to the late John Frankenheimer, one of television’s greatest directors of the live era. He emphasized how important his cameramen and the technology were to his success.
Here at the Paley Center in New York and Los Angeles, we have preserved the programming. I am so pleased that Bobby Ellerbee has created the website, The Eyes of a Generation, to preserve and celebrate a missing chapter from television history: the immense contribution of the TV camera to the industry and our culture.
With resonant photographs and evocative testimony, Bobby has brought that crucial technology back to glorious life. We understand in image and word why the camera was indeed the eye for many of our country’s most creative individuals. The Eyes of a Generation is a must for anyone interested in history of media and storytelling.
Dr. James L. Baughman, University of Wisconsin-Madison
A rich visual montage, reminding us how wonderfully cumbersome the first generations of television were. For visitors of a certain age, this fascinating site will bring back many fond memories. But you don’t have to remember Bishop Sheen or The Honeymooners to learn from Eyes of a Generation. It charmingly captures not just the earliest television cameras, but the dedicated crews, cramped sets and expansive performers and events of our past…this is true television history.
Dr. James L. Baughman
Professor, School of Journalism and Mass Communication
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Author, Same Time, Same Station: Creating American Television, 1948-1961.
Author, Television’s Guardians: The FCC and the Politics of Programming, 1958-67
Author, Henry R. Luce and the Rise of the Modern American News Media
Author, The Republic of Mass Culture: Journalism, Broadcasting, and Filmmaking in America since 1941
Gady Reinhold, Technical Supervisor, CBS Broadcast Center (Ret.)
It has been 60 years since I started working for CBS at its New York Broadcast Center. I spent 53 years working as a videotape librarian, videotape scheduler, Operation Sheet executive, Program Control Translator, Air Control Supervisor, Associate Director and a director of corporate sales and marketing videos. I saw it all; from 2” tape through servers, B&W to color to HD, film to tape. AT&T Long Lines to satellites to fiber. All that I have seen and much more can be found in Bobby Ellerbee’s Eyes Of A Generation. It is one of the most important sites, if not the most important, regarding the history of broadcast technology from equipment to facilities to network operations.
Max A. Schindler – Emmy TV Legend
I spent 46 years producing and directing news for NBC. I started in the “gee whiz” days, when we were dealing with the constantly changing technology and thinking “gee whiz, look what we can do now”. I came to NBC News in 1961 when President Kennedy came to office, and I directed the pool television coverage of his return to Washington from Dallas, the night of November 22, 1963.
Other assignments put me in the eye of history many times in the ’60, ’70’ and ’80s, from the “I Have A Dream” speech to Watergate and much more, but for over 20 years, I also had the pleasure of directing “Meet The Press”. All this is a prelude to say how much I appreciate the effort Eyes Of A Generation makes in preserving not only the “gee whiz” parts, but the moving, entertaining and informative parts of television’s history.
Here, what television accomplished through the years is being preserved as a “living history”, like no other place or resource that I am aware of. With rare photos, video and long forgotten, but important stories on the industry and its proud accomplishments, those remembrances are called to life with the comments of so many like me, that were there. This is an invaluable window to the past achievements of television, and worth the attention of all those who value our media, past, present and future.
https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/max-schindler?chapter=2&clip=65941
Jim Hergenrather, Historian, CBS Television City
When it comes to the history of something that captured your imagination as a child, nothing means more to you than to be able to reach out and touch those things that were present and a part of that history when it took place. Bobby has lovingly dedicated himself to not only preserving this part of television history but allowing us to reach out and touch it as well. It’s a remarkable collection of images, stories and reporting. Thank you, Bobby, for your dedication to keeping our history intact.
Richard Carter, TONIGHT SHOW With Jimmy Fallon
Having spent 45 years of my professional life behind the camera, including 33 years with NBC, I truly appreciate Bobby Ellerbee’s “Eyes of a Generation.”
Television is a very hands-on business, and much of what we used over the decades was never formally documented in one place. Bobby has made it possible to preserve not only the equipment and technology, but also the people, places, and working methods that shaped television’s development. His enthusiasm and persistence in tracking down the stories and details of television’s past are truly remarkable!
Richard Carter
(Cameraman: Late Night with Conan O’Brien, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, & The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon)
Mike Conway, Indiana University – Author “The Origins Of Television News In America”
Bobby Ellerbee’s “Eyes of a Generation” project is one of the most important resources for American television history. His genuine love for television, combined with all his experience and connections, has brought us an indispensable resource for digging into the medium’s history.
Mike Clark, VP Sony Pictures Television (Ret.)
My television career began in 1968 at WCNY in Syracuse, where I was still in high school and lucky enough to learn the craft hands‑on with live programming and those wonderful old Marconi cameras. After college, I worked at WCNY and later WTVT in Tampa—two invaluable training grounds that prepared me for the leap to Los Angeles and 25‑year run heading the on‑air promotion unit for Columbia Pictures Television, later Sony Pictures Television, producing campaigns for Seinfeld, Married With Children, The King of Queens, and nearly every syndicated series in the library – an extraordinary front‑row seat to the evolution of television.
Eyes Of A Generation is an oasis for my lifelong passion: a place that preserves and celebrates the tools, studios, and innovators who built the broadcast industry from wires and tubes to high‑definition. If you love television history, this site is your gateway to the century of electronic storytelling that shaped our world.
David Hazinski, NBC News – Chair, Broadcast Journalism UGA (Ret.)
You can’t talk about the Liberty Bell without talking about the American Revolution, and vice versa. They are woven into the same fabric. This site about TV cameras is really about the history of television and the society it portrayed. The site doesn’t just show you cameras; it shows you what they captured and how they did it. They are emblems of another age, and we can see that age through them here, as clearly as the audiences saw their stars through them.
The Museum of Broadcast Technology
The sentiments expressed here are the sum of the feelings and emotions of the entire Museum of Broadcast Technology family:
Looking back only a few decades, as the roaring twenties witnessed the birth and rapid expansion of commercial Radio Broadcasting, forward-looking experimenters, scientists, engineers and their companies were already dreaming, dabbling, developing and deploying the first prototype Television systems: We can recall a few: Rosing, Baird, Jenkins, Tyhani, Sanabria, Farnsworth, Lubcke, Blumlein, Zworykin, Kell, and many other contributors – All were dedicated problem solvers whose names are now sadly relegated to the dustbin of history.
Therein lies the reason for Bobby Ellerbee’s extraordinary passion:
As Electronic Television moved from the laboratory to the appliance store, the post-war era of the 1950s witnessed the same explosive growth for TV as Radio had enjoyed some thirty years earlier…. No other technology before or since has had a room and a dinner named for it.
We sat in the TV room, with that TV dinner on our TV tray, all watching TV, electronically enthralled if not mesmerized.
In 2026, the brilliant folks who made early TV technology and programs happen, both nationally and in so many local cities and towns, are simply “signing off !”
Bobby has made it his mission with EYES OF A GENERATION to capture the memories, the lore, the images, and even the heady zeitgeist of the times when TV was young, and so were we all.
Our museum was created to help preserve the technical tools used to create television from the 1940s forward…
Bobby has created EOAG to preserve the people, passions and production skills of the Television industry. His many contributors of stories, pictures and anecdotes have made this multi-decade history of Television vibrant and compelling.
The entire family at the MBT extend our thanks and best wishes to Bobby and his team for their efforts and great successes in keeping the spirit and soul of Television alive for The Eyes of the Generation yet to be born.
Well done Sir Bobby! From the 2026 MBT Crew:
Tom, Henry, Paul, Peter, Marc, Jay, Dave, Carlo, George, Chuck and Cheryl.
Jon Olson, Technical Director, NBC Burbank (Ret.)
Wow! What a lane of memories you’ve displayed on your website. I was with NBC in Burbank for 33 years. When I retired in 2001, I had spent 23 years as the West Cost Technical Director for NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw. You have done a wonderful job in documenting television’s history. Now future generations will get an intensive “behind-the-scenes” look at what television was like in our era.
Randy West, Network Game show, Talk, Variety, Award show Announcer, Author
From Philo Farnsworth’s first breakthroughs to today, thousands of people helped shape American television — yet much of that history, like so much programming, has been erased or forgotten. One person, Bobby Ellerbee, has spent years gathering, documenting, and preserving the details of those innovations, creating the only comprehensive resource that captures the true institutional memory of the industry.
Eyes of a Generation is the only resource of its kind where both those who lived a part of that history, and those who have interest in the 100 years of broadcasting that it covers can relive and learn about the industry’s advancements, large and small. No other repository of information comes close in its scope or its graphic illustration of the countless threads that combine to form the rich tapestry of the combined business and art of television. While many who participated in and witnessed the significant achievements in engineering and programming may be gone, this site speaks for them in depth, with clarity and in living color.
As a career broadcaster with over a half-century behind microphones and in front of cameras at all four broadcast networks, and as an author, as well as a guest in classrooms, on panels and at conventions, I know the value of Bobby’s vast collection, firsthand. When redevelopment plans for Television City threatened its landmark legacy, the research available through Eyes of a Generation helped me present a compelling case that led to a major redesign. Later, when the revised project went before the Los Angeles City Council, that same history supported a unanimous approval. It continues to guide my work on From Television City in Hollywood: Behind the Scenes at the Great TV Factory.
Bobby’s humility in his accomplishment belies the value of the gift he has created and continues to refine for those who share his passion for television’s glorious history. Mine is just one voice in the large chorus of deserved praise for Eyes of a Generation, as it will, no doubt, continue to celebrate broadcasting for generations to come.
Dicky Howett, Author, “Television Innovations – 50 Technological Developments”
As an author, and lifelong student of television history, I consider The Eyes Of A Generation a unique and remarkable resource. All those with an interest in TV’s history, whether casual or serious can learn here, and be entertained by this image rich tapestry that tells the story of television’s past through its cameras. Although personal reminiscences are of course valuable, I personally consider photographic evidence extremely important, as although the camera can sometimes lie, it doesn’t usually suffer from memory loss or confusion. The Eyes Of A Generation has a wealth of photographic “gold,” and future books and programs on the subject of television will certainly benefit from the memories preserved here.
Jan Kasoff, Lead Cameraman, NBC New York (Ret.)
As a retired NBC network television cameraman, I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoy your website and to compliment you on all that you’re doing to preserve television history. In fact it was one of my friends, John Pinto, who is still doing Saturday Night Live, my old show, who steered me to your website as we’re both TV history buffs. I started in 1967 and grew up with the RCA TK-41s in my early days at NBC. I retired in 2001 after 36 years behind the NBC cameras, with 26 of them at SNL. I’ve seen a lot of TV history, and it’s great to see so much of it here and so well done. Bravo!
Charles “Cappy” Cappleman, CBS Chief of West Coast BO&E
In January 1954, I was hired at CBS Television City in Hollywood and worked there for the next 50 years, retiring in July 2004 as Executive Vice President in charge of West Coast Operations and Engineering.
I lived through the times most of the photos on this site so well depict, and was fortunate to be in a position to help develop the equipment and the production techniques of that era, many of which are still in use today.
Although many of my colleagues from those days are gone, fortunately the accomplishments and innovations from that time live on in these pages. I am most sincere in my appreciation for the effort Mr. Ellerbee has put into creating this historic site, for now, rather than lose this valuable television history, Eyes Of A Generation is a living archive of television’s proud past, and with so much information now available here on line, it can be viewed by students of all ages worldwide and hopefully contribute to an even prouder future.
This site is excellent, outstanding and greatly appreciated by our industry and the people, past and present that make television such a valued and important part of American culture.
Charles “Cappy” Cappleman
Executive VP Broadcast Operations & Engineering, West Coast
Joel Spector, 50 Year NBC Audio Pro (Ret.)
Eyes of a Generation lives up to its name – and then some. I’ve been in professional broadcasting since 1965, when I spent the first of two summers as a Vacation Relief audio editor at NBC Radio in New York. That was many years after visiting as many TV and Radio studios as possible along with my best friend. Those two summers turned into a 50-year career with NBC TV as well as free-lance audio gigs. Bobby has carefully documented the history of these facilities, as well as the many pioneers of engineering and production who put the programs on the air. I was also privileged to contribute to the EOAG detailed history of the NBC Studios in New York. The site is invaluable to newcomers and veterans alike.
Texas Broadcast Museum, Chuck Conrad
The Texas Broadcast Museum proudly recommends Bobby Ellerbee’s Eyes of a Generation as one of the most valuable resources for understanding the history of television broadcasting. The site goes far beyond pictures of old cameras, documenting the people, studios, networks, engineering practices, and equipment that built early television. Its extraordinary photography and deeply researched histories provide context no display case can offer, preserving thousands of rare production images and detailed accounts of how the technology of broadcasting evolved.
Bobby’s passion for preservation is genuine, and his work has become an indispensable virtual museum in its own right. He has followed our story for years, even documenting our opening in 2016, and his dedication has created an archive that grows more valuable with time. We rely on Eyes of a Generation, we trust it, and we are grateful for Bobby Ellerbee’s commitment to keeping this remarkable chapter of American broadcasting alive. In our view, it isn’t just a website—it is a living archive of the people, technology, and history that brought television to life.
Chuck Conrad, Texas Broadcast Museum