I cannot believe I did not know about this until today. In August, The Paley Center for Media posted a short clip from a very old television play titled “The Streets of New York” and Ron Simon, the Center’s Television and Radio curator, has written a wonderful discussion about both the program and the clip itself. Why am I mentally kicking myself for not having seeing it earlier? Because “The Streets of New York” was broadcast on Thursday, August 31st, 1939 and is the earliest television footage known to exist.

(more…)

I’ve long been intrigued by the story behind the first pilot episode filmed for Star Trek. As any good Star Trek fan knows, NBC passed on this pilot — which starred Jeffrey Hunter and was produced by Desilu — but ordered a second, this one with William Shatner, and picked up the series for the 1966-1967 season. The original pilot was later edited into a two-part episode called “The Menagerie” which aired as part of Star Trek’s first season. I am not aware of any definitive history of “The Cage,” just plenty of stories told and retold over the years, but here’s a comprehensive analysis by TrekWeb’s Bill Williams of the various versions that have been released on Laserdisc, VHS and DVD. And Memory Alpha, the Star Trek Wiki, also has some information.

(more…)

Kraft Television Theatre premiered on May 7th, 1947. Because it was broadcast year-round there were no true seasons, no hiatuses or summer breaks. Furthermore, anniversary shows were shown during May. So I’m saying Season Two began on May 5th, 1948 and ended on April 27th, 1949. The series was pre-empted on Wednesday, June 23rd, 1948 for convention reports and the Louis-Walcott fight.

Only three complete episodes exist at the four big television archives, two at the Library of Congress and one at UCLA’s Film & Television Archive. Excerpts from another episode, broadcast as part of the sixth anniversary show, are held by both institutions.

(more…)

The Honeymooners — Ralph, Alice, Ed and Trixie — are one of television’s most beloved foursomes. Although The Honeymooners the sitcom only ran for one season from 1955-1956 (the “Classic 39″ episodes), sketches featuring the characters date back to 1951 when they were part of DuMont’s Cavalcade of Stars. When Jackie Gleason jumped to CBS in 1952 with The Jackie Gleason Show, the Honeymooners came with him and sketches were broadcast from 1952 to 1955 and then again from 1956 to 1957. Plus, there were more sketches (many of which were remakes of earlier ones) broadcast during the 1960s in color.

Sketches from the 1952-1959 version of The Jackie Gleason Show (Art Carney left in 1957 and the Honeymooners sketches were dropped) were uncovered in 1984 by Ron Simon, curator for the Museum of Broadcasting (then the Museum of Television & Radio and now the Paley Center for Media) and immediately — and understandably — dubbed “lost episodes” by the media. (Based on the terminology I’ve been using these would be missing, not lost).

(more…)

You can read more about the CBS Television Quiz in my Television Programs in 1941 article. In short, the hour-long quiz show premiered on Wednesday, July 2nd, 1941 (the day after commercial broadcasting officially began) and ran from 8:30-9:30PM. Gil Fates served as host and Frances Buss as scorekeeper. It was moved around two during its run and cut down to 55 minutes and later 50 minutes. It’s unlikely any footage from the series exists, given that it was broadcast before it became possible to record live television. Pictures could exist, however, and I’d love to see any.

(more…)

A total of 15 episodes of this half-hour documentary series were broadcast by NBC between November of 1947 and March of 1948. How many stations they aired on is unknown. They were seen in New York City over station WNBT and possible over WRGB in Schenectady, WPTZ in Philadelphia and WNBW in Washington, D.C. According to a November 3rd, 1947 article in The New York Times, Eye Witness was intended to “promote video by explaining the medium.” The premiere telecast was from the station’s transmitter at the top of the Empire State Building with Dr. C. B. Jolliffee (RCA Laboratories Executive Vice President) as guest.

The article noted that the November 13th broadcast would visit NBC’s Studio 3-H at the RCA Building and the November 20th broadcast would come from a mobile pick-up. Another broadcast, date unknown, was from the RCA Exhibition Hall. Ben Grauer was announcer and host for the series, which was directed by Garry Simpson. Dr. Vladimir K. Zworykin was the guest on the February 25th, 1948 episode, which UCLA has in its collection. No other episodes are known to exist.

(more…)

This panel discussion, featuring actual teenagers critiquing a new book each week, was broadcast by ABC from August 13th, 1948 to October 29th, 1948. It ran on Fridays from 7:30-8PM. I believe it was moderated by Margaret C. Scoggin. A total of 12 episodes were broadcast before the series. Beginning November 5th, a fifteen-minute program called Tales of the Red Caboose ran from 7:30-7:45PM with a fifteen-minute film filling out the rest of the half-hour.

Next to nothing is known about Teen-Age Book Club, not the names of the books covered or the names of the teenagers participating. Was there a regular panel that appeared each week? The guests listed in the following status guide come from The New York Times and may reflect writers and editors appearing each week and not the teenage reviewers. None of the episodes are known to exist, unfortunately, so there’s no way of knowing how each episode played out.

(more…)

Many of the e-mails I receive are from people asking where they can find their favorite obscure television show on VHS or DVD. I get so many of these e-mails, in fact, that for the most part I’ve had to stop replying to them. The simple fact is most of the shows I write about here at Television Obscurities aren’t available commercially on DVD and probably never will. (A few were given VHS releases in decades past but are now long out of print.) Still, the fact that a certain show isn’t out on DVD doesn’t mean the episodes are lost.

A distinction should be made between television programs that are lost, missing and unavailable. I’ll attempt to lay out just what that means in the following paragraphs.

(more…)