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DuMont Ending Date

T

The King Bee

I have heard several "drop dead dates" for the DuMont Televisoion Network during 1956. I know that they began shedding programming and stopped writing affiliation contracts in late 1955.

But, what was the date when all programming feeds (including "Captain Video") ceased, affiliates were released from clearance obligations, and the O&O stations re-formed into what became Metromedia and, over time, morphed into the core stations of today's Fox Television Network?
 
The King Bee said:
I have heard several "drop dead dates" for the DuMont Televisoion Network during 1956. I know that they began shedding programming and stopped writing affiliation contracts in late 1955.

But, what was the date when all programming feeds (including "Captain Video") ceased, affiliates were released from clearance obligations, and the O&O stations re-formed into what became Metromedia and, over time, morphed into the core stations of today's Fox Television Network?
Click to expand...

There are two key dates that I have seen for the demise of the network. (1) 9/23/55, when DuMont basically ceased operating as what we would consider a "network" (that is, no longer broadcasting any regularly scheduled programming), though thereafter still feeding an occasional sporting event (maybe because of contractual agreements they couldn't get out of, or?). (2) 8/6/56, when the last of these occasional feeds went out. So, it was a two-stage demise, really.
 
dhett said:
The Wikipedia article on the DuMont Television Network is well-sourced and painstakingly researched - I highly recommend it. (No, I didn't write it.)

According to that article, the last DuMont broadcast was a boxing match on August 6, 1956.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DuMont_Television_Network
Click to expand...

VERY interesting reading !!!!!!!!!!

Going to Metromedia, I am actually somewhat surprised they didn't become a full fledged network in their own right, at least in the 70s anyway. Reading the Wikipedia article about Metromedia, it sure did seem they were "one step below" being a network. I am surprised at reading just how big a company there really were. Metromedia Records ??? Ah Bobby Sherman LOL ;D

Even though Soupy Sales has claimed over the years that Metromedia was, well cheap. Metromedia did have money. A great example was Metromedia's Bob McAllister's Wonderama. Ah Metromedia spent money on that one. Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, ABBA, The Bay City Rollers, the cast of Wiz, Penny Marshall & Cindy Williams made appearances there and I am sure they cost Metromedia a pretty penny.

But going back to DuMont...I get the idea that DuMont ( the network ) didn't really go out of business instead they just got out of the network TV game, changed their direction and their name..to Metromedia.
 
mleach said:
But going back to DuMont...I get the idea that DuMont ( the network ) didn't really go out of business instead they just got out of the network TV game, changed their direction and their name..to Metromedia.
Click to expand...

Keep in mind that there was a VERY significant change of ownership along the way from DuMont to Metromedia, though. The remaining DuMont O&O stations - just WABD and WTTG at the end - stayed with DuMont for a few years after the end of the network under the name "Metropolitan Broadcasting," but the key event was in 1958, when Allen DuMont sold his interests in Metropolitan to John Kluge, who already owned WNEW(AM) in New York. (The Wikipedia entry on Metromedia claims Kluge already owned WNEW-FM at that point, but I'm pretty sure it came along later in 1958.)

It was Kluge who built Metromedia from the foundation of the former DuMont O&Os, but at least to my mind "Metromedia" as we knew it in the glory years of the seventies and early eighties was much more the creation of Kluge, post-DuMont, than it was a continuation of DuMont's own efforts. The heart of Metromedia, after all, was KTTV in Los Angeles, which wasn't a DuMont O&O.

To put it another way - Kluge would have built Metromedia into more or less its final form whether or not he'd been able to buy the two DuMont stations. If he didn't get WABD, he'd have gotten WNTA channel 13 a few years later, and probably at a better price...and he'd have ended up with a UHF station in Washington down the road if WTTG hadn't been there.

But the line of succession from Metromedia to Fox is much, much clearer: Uncle Rupert absolutely needed the Metromedia stations to form the initial strong core of Fox in the mid-eighties - they put him into six of the top 10 markets on day one, and there was no other set of stations available then (and arguably since) that could have done that so smoothly. To this day, five of the Fox O&Os in top-10 markets are ex-Metromedia stations. (The discrepancy is Dallas, where Fox traded up from channel 33 to channel 4 in the New World deal.)
 
A note on DuMont's eventual demise..Captain Video was aired at 5PM Tuesday March 1, 1955 at 5PM on both WEWS-5 and WXEL-8 in Cleveland..The Next day, 5 and 8 switched affiliations-5 to ABC/DuMont and 8 to CBS..Channel 5 only showed Captain Video about a month before DuMont cancelled it April 1, 1955. I would guess the only other DuMont show 5 aired was Boxing..Many of the other DuMont Shows were either canceled, changed networks or were about to be..


Cleveland Classic Media from October 22, 2007..

http://clevelandclassicmedia.blogspot.com/2007/10/first-big-tv-affiliate-swap-in.html
 
Then there's this comprehensive DuMont historical by Clarke Ingram:

http://www.dumonthistory.tv/

Name sound familiar? No, not DuMont, you should already know that
name if you're reading this thread. Ingram? Clarke, not Dan. (If you
don't know who Dan is then you shouldn't be allowed on this board. ;))

Clarke Ingram is a long-time DJ and PD, with a large chunk of time in the
Pittsburgh market, also WHTZ Newark/New York (say the city names real
fast), 93.7 KRQ......Q Tucson, and KZZP Mesa, KZZP-FM Mesa/Phoenix.
 
i look it up in newspaper archives in 1958 dumont monday night boxing was on wttg tv washington wabd tv new york city wpch tv wilmington delaware and i dont know the other station all are listed as dumont stations
 
Interesting. The Salisbury (MD) Times for Monday, July 21, 1958, does list WTTG 5 Washington DC and WPFH 12 Wilmington DE as DuMont affiliates and the TV schedule for that night shows that channels 5 and 12 have Boxing at 9:30 PM. The listing is then duplicated for ch 12 at 9:30. The listings for 10 PM and 10:30 PM show Boxing listed for ch 5, but not for ch 12. Ch 12 shows no other programming until 11 PM when Joe Pyne's program began (listed as Joy Pyne), while ch 5 shows nothing else until 11:15 PM.

My only guess is that the newspaper misidentified the stations as DuMont, as there was no DuMont network in 1958. After all, they misidentified Pyne. Also, by 1958, channel 12's call sign should have already been WVUE, having been changed following Storer Broadcasting's purchase of the station in March 1957. (Source: http://www.fybush.com/site-030925.html)

The paper lists the station as WPFH, a DuMont affiliate, as late as August 3, 1959, so I'm going with the misidentification angle.
 
dhett said:
The paper lists the station as WPFH, a DuMont affiliate, as late as August 3, 1959, so I'm going with the misidentification angle.
Click to expand...

Both WPFH and WTTG were listed as DuMont affiliates until August 3, but on August 4, the paper no longer listed WPFH, and WTTG was listed without an affiliation.
 
Seems like somebody in Salisbury was having as bad a year in '59 as the Yankees, or somebody FINALLY said something. ;D Good detective work, oburn and dhett.

ixnay
 
Hey Ralphie boy, its time for 'Captain Video' and his video rangers!!!! it was Ed Norton's favorite TV show...
"Helmut ON, OH Captain Video!!!
 
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