W2XBS Schedule, Week of June 25th, 1939
Here’s the schedule for NBC’s experimental station WX2BS in New York City for the week starting Sunday, June 25th, 1939, straight from television listings printed in The New York Times. It was a relatively slow week, with no sporting events and only a few films. But there was a play, “Moonshine,” and a melodrama called “The Donovan Affair” as well as lots of variety and a few demonstrations. One was how to take care of infant; another was how to swim, live from the Astoria pool. Plus, Ray Giles hosted something called “How to Sleep.” That would be interesting to see, I think.
Tuesday, June 27th, 1939 [1]
12:00-1:00PM – Variety.
8:30-9:30PM – Play: Moonshine; Also Melissa Mason, Comedy Dancer; the Philharmonicas; Walter Dare Wahl, Comedy Acrobat; Charles Barber’s Musical Hillbillies.Wednesday, June 28th, 1939 [2]
12:00-1:15PM – Care of Infants Demonstration; Films; How to Sleep-Ray Giles; News.
4:00-5:00PM – Police and Board of Education Dramatized Safety Lesson.Thursday, June 29th, 1939 [3]
12:00-1:15PM- Hat Show; Skiing Film; Interview; News.
8:30-9:30PM – Melodrama: The Donovan Affair.Friday, June 30th, 1939 [4]
4:00-5:00PM – Learn to Swim Program, from Astoria Pool.
8:30-9:30PM – Allen Prescott; Television Explorers: Sir Hubert Wilkens, Vilhjalmur Stefannson, Lowell Thomas, Major J. Allen Dunn, Harrison Foreman.Satuday, July 1st, 1939 [5]
12:00-1:00PM – Texas Jim Robertson; Films; Betty Allen, Songs; News.
3:30-4:00PM – Canadian Northwest Police Program, From World’s Fair.
Works Cited:
2 “Today on the Radio.” New York Times. 28 Jun. 1939: 33.
3 “Today on the Radio.” New York Times. 29 Jun. 1939: 32.
4 “Today on the Radio.” New York Times. 30 Jun. 1939: 23.
5 “Today on the Radio.” New York Times. 1 Jul. 1939: 29.
Related:
September 12th, 2009 at 4:41AM
I’ll bet at that point the programming was created and scheduled more with the larger World’s Fair audience in mind (for the TVs on display at the RCA-NBC pavilion) than the TVs in home use in New York.