TFTP's Monochrome Monday: "Your Show of Shows" from NBC (early-1950s)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Shawm Kreitzman'
Length - 12:45

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

"Your Show of Shows" was one of the most celebrated comedy programs of the early-TV era. Airing on NBC from 1950-1954, it starred Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca, was produced by Max Liebman, and served as a training ground for performing arts talent such as Carl Reiner, Mel Brooks, and Neil Simon. It was one of the first comedy sketch programs, and as such it laid the ground for later shows like "Laugh-In" and "Saturday Night Live". Because it was the early-1950s, "Your Show of Shows" was a live program, and Coca and others associated with it have discussed how this was a vital ingredient in the show's comedy mix.

The clip above is a sketch about a husband and wife's bickering about the husband forgetting about the wife's birthday (Caesar and Coca often portrayed married couples). The sketch displays the duo's skill at executing a scene that has looping emotional arcs as the two characters spiral back and forth among being angry, put-upon, wounded, resentful, and tender as they trade places several times in terms of which is the victim and which is the perpetrator.

TFTP Late Night: "The Tonight Show" from NBC (Apr. 22, 1964)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Jake Ehrlich'
Length - 27:06

Existing footage from the first decade of Johnny Carson's tenure on "The Tonight Show" (from his start in late-1962 until the show moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1972) is very scarce now, due to the fact that NBC at the time routinely erased the recordings. So being able to see an excerpt as long as this one, especially in color (even if the color is compromised technically), is pretty rare.

The guest in this extended clip is attorney and author Jake Ehrlich Sr., who at the time of this 1964 episode had just come out with a legal book titled "A Reasonable Doubt". Johnny and Mr. Ehrlich engage in an extensive back and forth--with Ehrlich carrying the bulk of the conversation--about a variety of legal topics, with an emphasis on the Fifth Amendment. In the mid-1960s, "The Tonight Show" was still 90 minutes in length and the last segments of an episode were often taken up by an extended chat with an author; it's hard to imagine a late-night talk show these days doing so.

TFTP On This Day: "Password Plus" with David Letterman from NBC (May 31, 1979)

Posted to YouTube by user 'The Fun & Games Channel'
Length - 24:05

It Was 39 Years Ago Today: "Password Plus" was the second revival of the game show "Password"; the original had run on CBS from 1961-1967 and another run of the original game had appeared on ABC from 1971-1975. In this new revival, which aired on NBC from 1979-1982 and like all versions up to this point was hosted by Allen Ludden, the "plus" took the form of an extra element in which the individual passwords accumulated to become clues to an overall word or phrase that had to be guessed.

The episode above, which aired 39 years ago today on May 31, 1979, features David Letterman and Marion Ross of "Happy Days" as the celebrity contestants. (This copy of the episode is from a much later rerun on Game Show Network, and thus has packaging and interstitial elements from that broadcast.) Letterman, a few years prior to the launch of his "Late Night" program--and thus at a point in his career where he was having to do game-show guest appearances--is his regular grumpy and irascible self, but still engaging in the game at hand. Contestant Sally cruises through two "Alphabetics" bonus games (one with Letterman and one with Ross) to become the winningest "Password Plus" contestant ever to that point (five months into the show's run).

TFTP Signs-Off for the Week: Sign-Offs Through the Years - 1990 (WLBT/Jackson, MS)

Posted to YouTube by user 'jacky9br'
Length - 8:29

Each Friday afternoon, TFTP signs-off for the week with a classic station sign-off sequence for your enjoyment and to bid farewell until Monday...

And throughout 2018, we are featuring "Sign-Offs Through the Years", as we go year-by-year with each successive week.

As we enter the 1990s in "Sign-Offs Through the Years", here is is a somewhat longer sign-off sequence from Jackson, Mississippi, NBC affiliate WLBT. It begins with a few promos: for "Saturday Night Live" (which was in its 15th anniversary season) featuring guest host Rob Lowe and Dana Carvey in full church-lady dress; for the NBC Sports presentation of The Players Championship golf tourney; and for local WLBT 3 News. These are followed by two PSAs, for a women's shelter called New Life for Women and for the Special Olympics.

A "Sanford & Son" promo slide precedes a very strange ownership/technical voiceover. After a title card with a personal dedication for the sign-off (something mischievous master control operators would sometimes slip in), a segment begins playing with special effects and the title "Purple Haze" with audio of the band Winger doing a cover of the Jimi Hendrix song of the same name. Midway through this clip, a brief ownership/technical voiceover is heard.

The sequence is capped off  by a very nice national anthem film that features local/regional images of Mississippi, including several shots of a rainbow-striped hot air balloon with the name of the state emblazoned on it.

TFTP Late Night: Early Clips from "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" from NBC (1962/1964)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Sir Raymond Bell' (top), 'Johnny Carson' (bottom)
Length - 0:34 (top), 1:11 (bottom)

As part of TFTP's continuing series of posts on the history and evolution of "The Tonight Show" (see here, here, here, and here), these two clips feature moments from the first couple of years of Johnny Carson's tenure as the show's host. There is very little footage that remains from these years, as NBC destroyed copies of pretty much all of the episodes from Carson's first decade as host.

The first (very brief) clip above is from a little over three months into Carson's stint, in about late-December of 1962, and relates to Johnny's best moments to that point as "Tonight Show" host. The second clip (from the official Carson Productions archive) is from a 1964 episode in which Zsa Zsa Gabor rips Johnny's pants off in a sketch that has Carson doing a now-questionable impression of a Charlie Chan-like character (with a joke about Zsa Zsa from a much later episode thrown in at the end).

TFTP Will Return After These Messages: Commercial Block from NBC (Sep. 22, 1967)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Gray Flannel Videos'
Length - 3:05

Every Wednesday, TFTP takes a break from regular programming to bring you a selection of classic commercials. We will return after these messages...

This block of commercials that aired on September 22, 1967, on NBC includes ads for Aerowax floor wax; Aero Shave shaving cream; Campbell's Chicken with Rice Soup, Chicken Noodle Soup, and Chicken & Stars Soup (with some ultra-Sixties animation); Sta-Puf fabric softener ("The Wrinkle Reducer"); and Sta-Flo Spray Starch. (Spelling "stay" without the "y" was very popular in the '60s.) At the very end, for just a couple of seconds, is the "snake" logo used by NBC throughout the 1960s--complete with the NBC chimes.

TFTP Game Shows: "Queen for a Day" from NBC (c. 1960)

Posted to YouTube by user 'NewQueenForADay'
Length - 8:50

"Queen for a Day" is a legendary program (airing from 1956-1964, and on radio before that) that seems of questionable taste to us now today. Four female housewife contestants each told the story of their circumstances, which were sometimes of impoverishment or affliction. Then audience response, measured by an applause meter, selected one of them as "Queen for a Day" (with accompanying prize package, of course).

Host Jack Bailey interviewed the women with a tone that was charmingly folksy but paternalistic and often patronizing. The set of clips above is from an episode with a circus theme, and the irony of the show's tendency to regularly have a circus atmosphere seems lost on those involved. The winner here gets a watch, a new washing machine and oven range, a record player, and a Spiegel catalog gift certificate.

TFTP Variety: "Jack Benny's Bag" from NBC (Nov. 16, 1968)

Posted to YouTube by user 'balsamwoods'
Length - 1:01:39

Jack Benny's long-running weekly sitcom (a continuation of his long-running radio program) ended in 1965, and for the remainder of his career until his death in 1974 Benny did occasional TV specials. The above program is one of the early such specials, with a theme lampooning youth counterculture of the late-1960s, entitled "Jack Benny's Bag".

Like a lot of old-line comedians, Benny was pretty clueless when it came to the counterculture he was lampooning. In most cases of mainstream TV treatment of counterculture, including here, some garish colors, some psychedelic imagery, some youth-oriented clothing, and some tossed-off slang was thought to do the job.

In "Jack Benny's Bag", though, the counterculture elements are mainly window-dressing. Benny himself wears either a tuxedo or a regular suit throughout most of the special, and there is little of substance regarding the counterculture. (The one sketch that does treat it is a groan-worthy parody of the film "The Graduate" where Benny-as-Benjamin-Braddock enters through an arch that is a large mock-up of Mrs. Robinson's famous leg.) A pair of hippies appears near the beginning to collect payment for painting Benny's house (he assumed given their values that they'd do for free); Benny's Maxwell car, in which he makes his first appearance, has been painted in psychedelic designs, as has the stage backdrop; and that's about it.

Guests abound, including Dick Clark, Lou Rawls, Phyllis Diller (who portrays Mrs. Robinson in the "Graduate" sketch), Dan Rowan and Dick Martin, Eddie Fisher, and Benny's own former supporting player Eddie "Rochester" Anderson. (Rochester appears with Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon as their "Odd Couple" characters in the special's cold opening.) Sponsored by Texaco, the special includes a few filmed commercials for that product, and a group of young girls in Texaco "Fire Chief" costumes appear with Benny in a couple of segments.

TFTP's Monochrome Monday: "All-Star Revue" from NBC (Feb. 14, 1953)

Posted to Internet Archive by user 'HappySwordsman'
Length - 56:57

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

In the fall of 1950, NBC launched a new variety show called "Four Star Revue"; the name derived from the four rotating hosts--Ed Wynn, Danny Thomas, Jack Carson, and Jimmy Durante. With the beginning of the show's second season in the fall of 1951--and an expanded roster of rotating hosts--the program's name was changed to "All-Star Revue". The episode above, hosted by singer Perry Como, is from the show's third season and originally aired on Valentine's Day, February 14, 1953.

The episode begins with a rather lengthy and elaborate musical number that has Como arriving at his office and being attended to by a large group of chorus girls, servants, deliverymen, even a shoeshine boy. The rest of the episode features comedy sketches with Joan Blondell, Ben Blue, and Patti Page; songs by Page ("How Much is That Doggie in the Window?"), Como ("You'll Never Walk Alone" from the play "Carousel"), and Page and Como duetting ("Side by Side"). There is also a very strange sketch near the middle in which Como and his kids tour an art museum in which the paintings all come to life and the figures in the paintings do short commercials for sponsor Pet Milk.

TFTP's Monochrome Monday: "The Bob Hope Chevy Show" from NBC (Oct. 21, 1956)

Posted to YouTube by user 'balsamwoods'
Length - 54:59

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

Here is one of the many Bob Hope specials that the legendary comedian did for decades on NBC, this one from fairly early in that stretch, on October 21, 1956. This one is pretty standard for Hope's output in the earlier years of his TV career--he comes out and does a monologue, then several comedy sketches with guest stars fill out the hour.

The first guest star, who comes out at the tail end of the monologue, is British actress Diana Dors (a pretty obscure figure now). Dors banters with Hope before the two of them mount a two-part sketch. In the first part, Dors plays a doting wife to Hope's lord of the manor in a portrayal of a British couple; part two reverses the roles in an American portrayal with Hope becoming the doting one to Dors' spoiled wife. Next up is New York Yankees star pitcher Don Larsen, fresh off of his perfect game in the 1956 World Series. He too banters with Hope before they engage in a less-ambitious playact in which Larsen "re-enacts" his historic pitching performance with Hope as a hapless batter.

The "Hollywood Deb-Stars", a group of debutantes, are announced by Hope alongside guest James Cagney, prior to Cagney singing a musical number. Lastly, Hope joins the foursome from "I Love Lucy" (Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, and William Frawley) in a final lengthy sketch that scrambles the male roles from that top-ranking sitcom.

TFTP Late Night: "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson" premiere episode (audio only) from NBC (Oct. 1, 1962)

Posted to YouTube by user 'TheNlsnn'
Length - 3:00

In the past few months, TFTP has featured a lot of items related to the early years of "The Tonight Show": the premiere episode of "The Tonight Show" with first host Steve Allen, the final episode of "The Tonight Show" with second host Jack Paar, and a Jerry Lewis-hosted episode of "The Tonight Show" from the interim between Paar and Johnny Carson. Today, we have an audio-only clip of the first few minutes of Carson's first episode from Oct. 1, 1962. (This is another case where only the audio survives, not the entire episode.)

There had been an interim of several months between the final Paar episode (in March of 1962) and this first Carson episode (due to Carson needing to complete his contract as host of the ABC game show "Who Do You Trust?")--an interim that Carson refers to in his comments in this clip. The person Carson is conversing with in the first part of the clip is comic Groucho Marx, who had come on first to introduce Carson in his first episode as host of "The Tonight Show". Carson, in addition to commenting on the publicity build-up resulting from the months-long interim, also summarizes in perfect Carson form his reaction to the pressure of the high-profile gig.

TFTP On This Day: "Scrabble" from NBC (Apr. 5, 1993)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Digifangsn'
Length - 21:20

It Was 25 Years Ago Today: Scrabble the board game has been a family favorite for decades. "Scrabble" the TV game show, while not quite matching up to that record, did have a healthy, two-part run on NBC, first from 1984 to 1990, then for a brief time in 1993. The episode above, which aired 25 years ago today on April 5, 1993, is from the short second run of "Scrabble".

The host for both runs was game-show mainstay Chuck Woolery. Woolery brought his easygoing and amiable demeanor to a game that did not really have the easiest gameplay. "Scrabble" the game show has only a passing similarity to Scrabble the board game, and that similarity is mainly cosmetic. Contestants are shown words with one letter completed on a Scrabble-like board, words which they then have to guess based on other letters that they can choose from to fill in the word.

This gameplay--apart from being somewhat convoluted--is completely different from what one does when playing the board game Scrabble, which involves a player taking an assortment of letters and creating words from them. Nonetheless, contestant Jean, who cleans up on all of her opponents in this episode, seems to have gotten the hang of it.

TFTP's Monochrome March, On This Day: "The Tonight Show" w/ Jack Paar - audio only (Mar. 29, 1962)

Posted to YouTube by user 'epaddon'
Length - 1:14:44

College basketball has March Madness. TFTP: Television from the Past has Monochrome March! 

For the entire month of March, TFTP brings you posts featuring monochrome programs and clips in glorious black-and-white!

It Was 56 Years Ago Today: We finish Monochrome March today with an item that is not a monochrome program per se, but the audio from a monochrome program--Jack Paar's final episode as host of the "Tonight Show", which aired 56 years ago today on March 29, 1962.

Many programs from the earliest period of TV history do not survive, but there are others for which the full program does not survive but the audio track does survive--and this last Paar "Tonight Show" episode is one of those. The program's audio above accompanies still images that attempt to illustrate what is going on in the audio track. Perhaps unsurprisingly given Paar's reputation, he spends a good chunk of this final episode settling scores, including with columnists Walter Winchell and Dorothy Kilgallen and those who criticized his visits to Cuba during his "Tonight Show" run (which took place as that country was undergoing revolution). Of course, a farewell show being what it is, there are plenty of testimonials to Paar as well, including from the likes of Richard Nixon, Robert Kennedy, Billy Graham, George Burns, Jack Benny, and Bob Hope.

Paar had been "Tonight Show" host for almost five years by March of 1962, having started in July of 1957 (succeeding first "Tonight" host Steve Allen). Paar's tenure on the "Tonight Show" had been famously rocky, and included a walkout of the show for several days in 1960 as a result of a dispute with NBC about censorship of jokes. (He quips in the monologue of this episode that the NBC legal department was having a luau to celebrate his leaving the program.) Paar was leaving at this particular time to launch a prime-time variety show on NBC that started in the fall of 1962. That program ran until 1965, and for a few years after Paar made an occasional TV special, but then he appeared on TV infrequently for the remainder of his life, which lasted until 2004.

TFTP's Monochrome March: Network Promo from NBC (Mar. 21, 1958)

Posted to YouTube by user 'obsgia'
Length - 1:12

College basketball has March Madness. TFTP: Television from the Past has Monochrome March! 

For the entire month of March, TFTP brings you posts featuring monochrome programs and clips in glorious black-and-white!

Here is another monochrome network promo from the late-1950s, this one from NBC on March 21, 1958 (not 1957 as the YouTube title suggests). TFTP analyzed some of the qualities of 1950s program promos here, in a previous post on a promo from the late-1950s, and the above promo certainly has the same qualities (and limitations).

The above promo, which promotes that evening's prime-time line-up, comes during an episode of the NBC daytime game show "Treasure Hunt". It highlights three programs from the Friday night line-up: "Truth and Consquences" with guest star Lou Costello; "M-Squad" starring Lee Marvin; and "The Thin Man", the TV series adaptation of the movie series by the same name. The promotion for the three programs is held together by a puzzle-piece theme (evident in the promotional art and the voiceover).

TFTP's Monochrome March: "The Tonight Show" w/ guest host Jerry Lewis from NBC (Jul. 2, 1962)

Posted to YouTube by user 'givethechanceakid'
Length - 18:26

College basketball has March Madness. TFTP: Television from the Past has Monochrome March! 

For the entire month of March, TFTP brings you posts featuring monochrome programs and clips in glorious black-and-white!

After Jack Paar left the "Tonight Show" in early-1962, there was an interim period of several months before new host Johnny Carson could begin due to previous contractual commitments Carson had. During this period, guest hosts filled in using the Paar "Tonight Show" set and personnel, including sidekick Hugh Downs and bandleader Skitch Henderson. The clip above is from one of those interim episodes, from July of 1962, hosted by comic Jerry Lewis.

"The Tonight Show" was ninety minutes long in those days and was much more freewheeling and loose in structure--tendencies that are loudly on display in this Lewis-hosted episode. Large chunks of the episode are devoted to Lewis and Downs playing memory games, an avocation of Lewis's. The first part of the clip above shows Lewis guessing the items (written on a chalkboard) that had been compiled from audience suggestions in the previous segment. Then, Lewis recites items from a list he had put into a sealed envelope.

Lewis finally introduces a guest, fellow comic Jack Carter, and the two engage in frantic banter and horseplay before settling down into what at least resembles an interview. (It's not long before this breaks out again into horseplay and antics.) The general melee of this clip and the episode it came from represents perhaps Lewis's lack of commitment to the program, as a transient guest host, or perhaps Lewis was just unable to contain himself, but this episode represents a high point in the lack of structure in early television.

TFTP's Monochrome March: "Ding Dong School" from NBC (1953)

Posted to Internet Archive by user 'Robin_1990'
Length - 29:33

College basketball has March Madness. TFTP: Television from the Past has Monochrome March! 

For the entire month of March, TFTP brings you posts featuring monochrome programs and clips in glorious black-and-white!

"Ding Dong School" was an early children's program that laid the groundwork for later programs such as "Romper Room", "Sesame Street", and especially "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood". Airing on NBC from 1952 to 1956, "Ding Dong School" was hosted by the matronly Frances Horwich (referred to on-screen as "Miss Frances"). Horwich was an educator who would later become NBC's head of children's programming.

This 1953 episode seems typical of the series. For its entirety, Horwich sits on a stool in front of a neutral backdrop and for each segment (including commercials) interacts with objects of various kinds that are wheeled in and out on carts. Miss Frances methodically blows bubbles from a bubble pipe, reads a storybook with a crib full of baby dolls by her side, makes commercial pitches for Kix cereal, the show's sponsor, and makes animal shapes out of a folded handkerchief.

Throughout Horwich maintains a presentational style the likes of which would later become the hallmark of Fred Rogers on his program--and for which Horwich in "Ding Dong School" serves as a precursor and perhaps an inspiration. First, she addresses the TV camera as if it is the child viewer; she looks directly into the camera as if making eye contact with a child and speaks to it as if conversing with a child. Also, her tone of voice is soothing and mellifluent, very easy on the ears. This style of address and her style of program is one that clearly had some influence on later kids' TV, and in this way "Ding Dong School" is a pioneer of children's programming.

TFTP's Monochrome March: "The Steve Allen Show" from NBC (Jul. 1, 1956)

Posted to YouTube by user 'balsamwoods'
Length - 58:23

College basketball has March Madness. TFTP: Television from the Past has Monochrome March! 

For the entire month of March, TFTP brings you posts featuring monochrome programs and clips in glorious black-and-white!

This episode of "The Steve Allen Show" is the famous one where Elvis Presley, in one of his first appearances on national television, was forced to sing "Hound Dog" to a hound dog. Steve Allen was famous for denigrating and ridiculing rock music. His disregard for rock--right up until the end of his life in 2000--became a real blind spot for him, as his attempts to (he thought) expose the ridiculousness of the form instead made him look ridiculous. This was the context in which he made Presley serenade the hound dog in this episode.

Allen's prime-time variety show had premiered just a month before this July 1956 episode. He had been host of NBC's "Tonight" since 1954 (the premiere episode of which was featured on TFTP recently), and he did double duty on "Tonight" and this Sunday night variety show until he left "Tonight" in 1957. The Sunday night show competed with the "Ed Sullivan Show" and this booking of Presley was undoubtedly an attempt to score an early ratings victory. (Presley, of course, would soon after make an even more famous appearance on Sullivan's program.)

The episode above begins with a bit between Allen and fellow variety host Milton Berle before going on to a musical number of the song "Picnic", a humorous sit-down interview with then-newcomer Andy Griffith, a viking-themed number by Allen show regulars Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, and a bit by Allen (of questionable taste to us now) where he lampoons an Indian yogi. Allen and guest Imogene Coca play a married couple in a sketch that sends up the "realism" seen in recent Hollywood movies, and finally three-quarters of the way through the episode Elvis makes his appearance.

Presley, after a brief introductory chat with Allen, gamely and in good humor performs "Hound Dog" to the hound dog, wearing a tuxedo to boot. Presley returns, along with Griffith and Coca and host Allen, in a show-closing musical comedy sketch that sends up country and western music.

TFTP Late Night: "The Jack Paar Tonight Show" from NBC (Sep. 21, 1960)

Posted to YouTube by user 'therealdrfilm'
Length - 18:46

For this second "TFTP Late Night" post, after the inaugural "Late Night" post featuring Steve Allen's "Tonight Show", we have the second "Tonight Show" host, Jack Paar. Paar became "Tonight Show" host in 1957 and remained until mid-1962. Paar had a sometimes rocky tenure as host that included a famous walk-out for a period of several days in 1960 in protest over NBC's censoring of a joke about a water closet.

This clip is from later that same year, Sept. 21, 1960. By this time, the title of the program had shifted from "Tonight Starring Jack Paar" to "The Jack Paar Tonight Show". The clip begins with comic Charley Weaver doing a somewhat indecipherable bit with the show's orchestra. Then Paar converses with stand-up comic Shelly Berman (in an unusual seating arrangement in which Berman sits to Paar's left at the desk, which was also used by Johnny Carson in his earliest "Tonight Show" years). Weaver, actress Hermione Gingold, and Paar sidekick (pre-"Today Show", pre-"20/20") Hugh Downs all join the conversation pell-mell, offering a good example of the more freewheeling format of early late-night talk shows (and especially of Paar's "Tonight Show").

Although this clip is in black and white, Paar supposedly had started just a few days before this episode to tape his program in color. Unfortunately, this means we are deprived of knowing the color of the seemingly random fez hat Paar is wearing.

TFTP's Monochrome Monday: Promo for Daytime Line-Up from NBC (1956)

Posted to YouTube by user 'MattTheSaiyan'
Length - 1:00

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

Network program promos don't get much more bare bones than this 1956 NBC daytime promo (unless they're strictly slides with announcer voiceover). The first half of this minute-long promo is a rather crude stationary drawing of two women with a voiceover of two women chatting with each other about TV. One of them is suggesting to the other viewing the morning line-up of shows on NBC. The voiceover conversation between the two continues into the second half of the promo as slides appear of the three shows under discussion, before ending with a slide that lists all three programs.

The three programs promoted are (1) "Home" with Arlene Francis, which had moved to a new timeslot; (2) game show "The Price is Right" with Bill Cullen ("that one with the bidding for prizes and all that" as described by one of the women); and (3) "Truth and Consequences" with Bob Barker.

TFTP On This Day: "Today" from NBC (Feb. 22, 1982)

Posted to YouTube by user 'AmpexQuad'
Length - 3:21

It Was 36 Years Ago Today: This brief clip from the "Today" show--from 36 years ago today, on February 22, 1982--was from very early in Bryant Gumbel's tenure as "Today" host. He'd become Jane Pauley's co-host (replacing Tom Brokaw, who'd been promoted to "NBC Nightly News" anchor) only about a month-and-a-half earlier, on January 4, 1982. (Pauley was in her sixth year hosting, having started in 1976.)

Pauley recounts some information about how men's hair and whiskers grow faster in the spring, following up on a comment about how she'd had a sneak preview of spring on a trip south a few days before. Weatherman and sidekick Willard Scott participates as well, and he seems tickled by the fact that spring might make his toupee'd head grow hair faster. Taken from old Ampex quad video tape, the footage repeats twice, the second time without any sound.