TFTP's Monochrome Monday: Longines Watch Commercials (Apr. 11 & 14, 1952)

Posted to YouTube by user 'MattTheSaiyan'
Length - 1:54 (top), 1:42 (bottom)

Commercials in the 1950s were much longer than we are used to now (and have been used to for decades). Because of the prevalence of single-sponsorship in the first years of TV, a commercial break of one- to two-minutes in length, around the same length as today, would have just one commercial, rather than four or more.

Here are a couple of these lengthier commercials for Longines watches from the same week in April 1952. The two commercials provide a study in contrasts in terms of the different styles of commercials in this era. The first includes on on-camera spokesman David Ross who describes the use of Longines watches for timekeeping by a variety of different sporting associations. Most likely presented as a live commercial during a live program, it includes Ross' testimonial which is presented partially with him visible on screen and partially as voiceover as we see slides of the sporting association logos and a carousel of Longines watches.

The second commercial, which appeared in the program "Longines Chronoscope", a public affairs interview program, has no on-screen spokesman, only voiceover narration on images of another carousel of watches. (Although possibly also live, this one is more likely to have been filmed in advance, a common practice even in these earliest years.) Longines was clearly going for a prestige image with these ads--as well as with the choice of a public affairs program for which to serve as a sponsor.

TFTP's Monochrome Monday: "Texaco Star Theater" from NBC (Spring 1949)

Posted to YouTube by user 'TheShootingstar31'

TFTP's Monochrome Monday brings you a classic black & white TV program every Monday morning to kick off the week.

This week's inaugural Monochrome Monday goes back to the beginning of commercial TV with a 1949 episode of one of the earliest TV classics, Milton Berle's "Texaco Star Theater". This was the first blockbuster TV series, the popularity of which helped to establish the very medium as a viable form of home entertainment (and gained Berle his famous moniker "Mr. Television").

This episode (from spring of 1949, less than a year into the show's run) features the customary opening and closing jingles sung by the "men of Texaco"; Berle's introductory monologue dressed as an ancient Roman; a fantastic acrobatic trio; Chinese-American movie star Keye Luke (with whom Berle engages in some unfortunate--but for the time, characteristic--stereotyped ethnic humor); a song by Ethel Merman, followed by a sketch with her and Berle as early motorists; tap dancer Teddy Hale; and a show-closing extended series of performances by several different singers and composers highlighting popular standards of the day.

It's a great specimen of the classic variety show of the early TV era--a blend of comedy and music (but also with things like acrobats and tap dancers in the mix), the single sponsor's ads worked into the program itself (as well as its title), the somewhat rough-edged feel of a live weekly TV program, and a broad and boisterous style that played well on the small screens of early television sets.