TFTP News: "58 After... News" (newsbreak) from KSCH/Stockton, CA (Oct. 20, 1986)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Chuck's New Classic TV Clubhouse'

Here's a classic "newsbreak" of the kind that used to appear constantly in the afternoon and evening hours on local stations and networks alike. This mid-1980s example--from independent station KSCH (now KQCA) in Stockton, California--is an especially pedestrian one in that it doesn't even include any reported material or over-the-shoulder graphics (other than the station logo)--just the newsreader reading the news. Apparently, KSCH (channel 58) did such a newsbreak on a regular basis at 58 minutes after the hour (or 2 minutes before the top of the hour), thus the title "58 After... News".

This kind of newsbreak, while still used occasionally, is one of the features of television from the past that has been made obsolete by newer forms of learning about the news. Now, online headlines, Facebook feeds, and 24-hour cable news have taken the place of such TV news summaries. But in 1986 (and more so in the years prior to that) this was one of the only ways to get a quick update of what was happening locally, nationally, or internationally.

TFTP News: KGO News (San Francisco) (Feb. 8, 1965)

Here's a news clip from San Francisco's ABC affiliate KGO-TV from February 8, 1965. Black-and-white video (as opposed to film) clips from the '60s are always interesting because they give us a great glimpse of what TV actually looked like in terms of its visual texture in this period. Watch closely and you can see the switchovers between video sources as the image shifts between newscaster Bob Dunn in the studio and videotaped/filmed story segments (look for the horizontal rolling interference).

The content here is especially interesting, as it includes a lot of reporting and updates on the evolving situation in Vietnam, a conflict that was very much still escalating and still entering the American conscience and consciousness in early-1965. Other reports concern the space program and racial integration (the latter reported from Atlanta by a young Peter Jennings, later the longtime ABC Nightly News anchor). The local commercial for a car dealership that appears midway through is fascinating as well, as it shows the relative simplicity and primitiveness of local ad spots in this period. A straight-ahead pitch delivered by a salesman who is simply sitting at a desk in the studio, followed by a slide with the business name and address, the spot seems ridiculously simple-minded to us now (even for a local commercial).

TFTP Flow: WDAZ News Update w/ promos (1985)

This is a flow clip with a news update from 1985 that hits close to home for TFTP; the station, WDAZ (Grand Forks, ND), is right in our backyard. The clip begins with an ABC network promo for "David Hartman: The Future is Now", an ABC News special about space travel featuring then-host of "Good Morning America" David Hartman (you can read more about it here). The news update follows, with Kathryn Bursch reading the news. This news update is in a form commonly found over the years: simply an anchor or newsreader in a head shot looking into the camera with no graphics, no B-roll footage, and no other accoutrements, reading news for 30 seconds.

The update is followed by the beginning of an ad spot--I think for the sponsor mentioned at the beginning of the news update--but then abruptly cuts to the end of an ad spot for Kingsford charcoal, followed by a network promo for "Beyond the Poseidon Adventure." This is likely due to one of the major reasons that flow clips like this have survived for us to watch them now: This was probably the transition point in the video tape recording of two programs, one of which had the WDAZ news update after the end of the program being recorded, the next program which started with the Kingsford ad and promo before the beginning of the program.

TFTP Flow: CBS Newsbreak w/ commercials (September 1980)

One of the fascinating (at least to this blogger) forms of television that will be featured on a regular basis here on TFTP is what I am labelling "flow" clips. "Flow" is a concept from academic television studies in which the content of TV is analyzed not as specific programs or episodes of shows but as a "flow" of material that is neverending and which consists of a variety of different kinds of material: the segments of a TV program, yes, but also program promos, commercials (of course), station and network IDs, public service announcements, news updates (or "newsbreaks"), and a plethora of other, usually short bits that are sometimes referred to as "interstitials" (because they come in between the programs or program segments).

This inaugural "flow" clip is from CBS in September 1980 and centers on a newsbreak that, among other things, discusses the latest projections for the 1980 presidential election. (Carter was ahead!) Commercials include Ragu Pizza Quick, Hush Puppies shoes, Lysol, and Mars candy bars, followed by a couple of program promos (including one for the "Tim Conway Show"). This kind of a flow clip is a great "time capsule" of the time it's from, as we get a look at the consumer products, network TV programming, network promotional strategies, and (when a newsbreak is present) current events of the period. These flow clips will be a regular feature here on Television from the Past!