TFTP Flow: "ABC Sunday Night Movie" opening credits w/ commercial break from WLS/Chicago (1980)

Posted to YouTube by user 'The Museum of Classic Chicago Television'
Length - 5:57

Television "flow"  -  an unbroken sequence of various on-air elements such as program segments, news breaks, commercials, program promos, PSAs, station IDs, bumpers, and other interstitials, which can be analyzed to understand what viewers of the past experienced when watching TV.

This flow sequence is from a 1980 broadcast of the 1973 film "The Sting" starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford; the film was aired on ABC, with this particular flow coming from ABC Chicago affiliate WLS. It begins with a WLS "Eyewitness News" bumper before launching into the "ABC Sunday Night Movie" intro. This is followed by a commercial break featuring ads for Kellogg's Graham Crackos cereal, Dr. Pepper (one of the David Naughton "Be a Pepper" spots from this era), Johnson's disposable diapers, and Allstate Insurance. It closes with the opening credits and first minute or so of "The Sting".

TFTP's Monochrome Monday: "Arthur Godfrey Time" from CBS (Jan. 1958)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Panonni 9'
Length - 14:27

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

Arthur Godfrey, although an obscure figure to most people now, was a superstar of network radio and early television throughout the 1940s and 1950s. He was a folksy, informal figure (evident in this clip) who pioneered the deployment of these qualities in a broadcasting career that spanned forty years between the early-1930s and the early-1970s. At his peak in the mid-1950s he had three different TV programs--"Arthur Godfrey and Friends" (a weekly prime-time variety show), "Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts" (a talent-competition show), and "Arthur Godfrey Time" (a weekday morning talk show).

"Arthur Godfrey Time" started as a radio program, before beginning its eight-year run on the CBS weekday morning TV schedule between 1951 and 1959. (It ended on radio, too, airing until 1972 on CBS radio on weekday mornings.) Airing usually between about 10:30 and 11:30 am each weekday, the program ran for thirty, sixty, and ninety minutes at different times. As with many programs during this era, commercials were integrated into the program itself, which we see here with the short opening ad spot for Glamorene and with Godfrey's later demonstration of the carpet cleaning qualities of the same product.

This is the opening portion of an "Arthur Godfrey Time" episode from early (probably January) 1958, at a time when the program ran for a full hour. Guests include actress Faye Emerson, playwright/composer Meredith Willson (of "Music Man" fame), singer Tommy Hunter, and Carmen Quinn. All of the guests are seated in panel fashion in chairs on either side of Godfrey at the start of the program, and the banter and conversation (which also includes the show's band) seems familiar to us because many morning talk shows (such as "Live with Kelly & Ryan" and "The View") still use it. The conversation on this particular morning is dominated by Willson's smash Broadway hit "The Music Man" that had recently opened, in which Emerson had been a minor investor, and for which Quinn badly wanted to get tickets.

TFTP Signs-Off for the Week: Station Sign-Off from WPIX/New York (1979)

Posted to YouTube by user 'tapthatt2012'
Length - 5:03

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

WPIX in New York City was for many years--from its 1948 inception into the mid-1990s--one of the most high-profile independent TV stations in the nation. (It has since been New York's affiliate for, first, The WB, then The CW.) It was also one of the first cable "superstations" when that concept took hold in the late-1970s--right around the time of this station sign-off.

Beginning with a copyright statement, the sign-off sequence continues with the technical/ownership voiceover on a slide of the station's late-1970s/early-1980s "11 Alive" logo. The national anthem film follows, in this case consisting simply of a close-up of the stars and stripes fluttering in the wind. (A couple of minutes of black are after that, which then cuts to color bars.)

TFTP Cable: Commercial/Promo Block from Nickelodeon (1983)

Posted to YouTube by user 'JustinInAtlanta'
Length - 6:13

The cable kids' channel Nickelodeon went on the air in 1979, so this commercial/promo block from 1983 is from fairly early in the network's history. It's early enough that the longtime Nick branding with its signature orange color was yet to be implemented (that didn't happen until the following year, 1984). The logo and branding seen here, with the large silver ball underlying the multi-colored "Nickelodeon" wordmark, was known as the "pinball" logo.

There are some great nuggets of vintage Nickelodeon here: The billboard for "coming up next" programs "Third Eye", "Livewire", and "Tomorrow People"; the ads for ViewMaster's line of glowsticks (who knew?), the Simon electronic game, and Stratego board game; the promos for "You Can't Do That on Television" (Nick's flagship program in the early-1980s), Leonard Nimoy-hosted "Standby...Lights! Camera! Action!", and "Reggie Jackson's World of Sports"; and the spot for the "Great Nickelodeon Sweepstakes".

TFTP Local Weather Round-Up! WBAL/Baltimore (1959), KAKE/Wichita (1974), WAGA/Atlanta (1982)

Posted by YouTube users 'EyeLikeTooWatch' (top), 'Troy Diggs' (middle), 'radioman1968' (bottom)

Here is the inaugural TFTP Local Weather Round-Up, a periodic feature in which we will round up a few clips of weathercasts from local TV stations. Typically, the Local Weather Round-Up will consist of three clips, one from the 1950s or 60s, one from the 1970s, and one from the 1980s.

Local weather reports are fascinating to watch now, due in part to the folksy charm that many of them exhibit, in part to the variety of techniques that were used over the years by different stations, and due to the way in which weathercasting technology evolved in the decades between the 1950s and 1980s.

Clip #1 above is from April 12, 1959, on station WBAL/Baltimore. The single-sponsor method of sponsorship, common in the early days of TV, is evident in this clip from the ways in which Luby's Chevrolet is integrated so closely into the weathercast, which utilizes entirely a chalkboard method of weather presentation. Clip #2 is from KAKE/Wichita in 1974. Apart from being in color, the main difference here is a slightly more sophisticated presentation of the weather, largely using a suitably seventies-ish round board with several layers that are progressively revealed (the last couple seemingly utilizing chroma-key). Use of weather radar has begun in this mid-1970s era as well. Finally, the third and final clip--from WAGA/Atlanta from April 3, 1982--is from a time when chroma-key technology has been fully embraced as the chief (although not exclusive) weathercasting technique (as it remains today). (Gotta love those rotating sections of weather map!)

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 Signs-Off for the Week: Station Sign-Off from WKBW/Buffalo, NY (1982)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Retrontario'
Length - 4:29

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

TV stations located near the U.S./Canadian border--such as WKBW from Buffalo, New York, featured here--serve a Canadian audience as well as an American one. And so their sign-off sequences sometimes featured the Canadian national anthem, "O Canada!", in addition to "The Star-Spangled Banner". This sign-off sequence starts with a brief religious message and a statement of the Television Code, followed by the technical voiceover on a slide of WKBW's transmitter towers. The two national anthems come after that (followed in this clip, with almost a minute's worth of black).

TFTP On This Day: "Go" from NBC (Oct. 5, 1983)

Posted to YouTube by user 'excuseyou77'
Length - 21:58

It Was 34 Years Ago Today: Having premiered on Monday, Oct. 3, 1983, this episode of the game show "Go"--which aired 34 years ago today--is only the third episode of the series. Kevin O'Connell (before and after "Go" a longtime weatherman) hosted with game-show master Bob Stewart producing--and both would be out of a job by January of 1984 when the show was cancelled.

Two five-person teams (with one celebrity on each team) competed in a game that resembled the one where two people alternate in giving one-word each in a sentence meant to be a clue for guessing a word. (If this sounds a bit elaborate and incomprehensible, it is, and additional rules added on top of this may be one reason why the show only lasted four months.) In "Go", four of the team members gave clues in chain fashion while the fifth was the guesser. In essence, "Go" was a ridiculously overcomplicated (and much faster-paced) version of "Password".

The celebrities in this episode are Richard Kline, then at the height of his fame as a cast member of "Three's Company", and actress Elaine Joyce, by 1983 near the end of her remarkable decade-plus run as a go-to game-show celebrity guest (she appeared on everything from "Tattletales" and "Match Game" to "Super Password" and later versions of "What's My Line" and "I've Got a Secret").

TFTP's Monochrome Monday: Program Promos from CBS (Oct. 29, 1960)

Posted to YouTube by user 'Pannoni 9'
Length - 4:04

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

This block of black-and-white program promos is from Saturday, October 29, 1960, and includes promos for specials, regular programs, and broadcasts related to the presidential election (between Democrat John F. Kennedy and Republican Richard Nixon) that would take place about a week later.

The first promo is for CBS's election night coverage and touts the network's track record covering the past few elections dating back to 1952. This is followed by regular program promos for "Lassie", "Dennis the Menace", and "The Jack Benny Program". Another election-related promo features Walter Cronkite, who had not yet taken over as the network's evening news anchor but was already a top CBS news personality; he previews an interview program with past presidential nominee Thomas Dewey. Finally, Danny Kaye presents a comical promo for his first TV special, "An Hour with Danny Kaye", which aired the following evening on October 30.

TFTP Signs-On for October: Launch Day Sign-On from WTIC/Hartford, CT (Sep. 21, 1957)

Posted to YouTube by user 'robatsea2009'
Length - 4:37

TFTP marks the beginning of each new month with a classic station sign-on sequence to "sign-on" for the month....

Throughout the late-1940s, 1950s, and even into the 1960s, a new TV station's launch day sign-on was always a special event not just for the station but for the community in which the station was being established. Here we have the launch day sign-on for Hartford, Connecticut, station WTIC, which at its September 1957 launch was an independent station not affiliated with a network (it would become a CBS affiliate the following year).

As with most station launch sign-ons, this one seems to be taking place not in the early morning but rather in the evening, as there is reference to the broadcast of a station launch ceremony that most likely took place in prime time. After a few seconds of test pattern, the sign-on begins with the camera tilting up the WTIC transmitter tower while the opening ownership and technical voiceover is announced. This is followed by a national anthem film before cutting to the station's studio where the president of the Traveler's Broadcasting Service Group, WTIC's owner, gave a brief introductory speech, followed by a priest offering an invocation for the ceremony to follow.