June 7: This Day in TV History

[Stanislav]

Just a few random TV related events that happened on June 7. Discuss or comment as you please……

1938: Television in the USSR moves beyond Moscow for the first time as trial telecasts begin in Leningrad.

1946: The BBC Television Service returns to the air after a nearly 7-year long hiatus due to World War II. Transmissions begin with the same Mickey Mouse cartoon that was unceremoniously interrupted when the plug was pulled on September 1, 1939.

1953: WGBI-TV, channel 22 (later WYOU-TV) goes on the air as Scranton, Pennsylvania’s second TV station.

1955: TV’s “Quiz Show Craze” begins as CBS premieres The $64,000 Question. Subsequent imitators would include NBC’s Twenty-One, the subject of a scandal that rocks the country and results in Congressional hearings.

1955: President Eisenhower’s commencement address at West Point is the first color telecast of a sitting President.

1976: David Brinkley joins John Chancellor as co-anchor of NBC Nightly News. The change is an attempt to be more competitive with CBS (and Walter Cronkite) and to hearken back to the two-anchor format of the old Huntley-Brinkley Report.

1990: Nickelodeon inaugurates its Nickelodeon Studios facility at Universal Studios Orlando. More than a mere attraction, it is a working production facility at which most 90’s live and tape productions (including What Would You Do?, Figure It Out, and Slime Time Live) are based. The cable channel eventually closes the facility in 2005 after a period of shifting priorities to filmed series and moving more and more production to its Burbank, California facility.

2002: Stargate SG-1 moves to The Sci-Fi Channel after a 5 season run on Showtime.

(Just a little featurette I hope to do as time permits…..don’t expect it every single day. It’s an entirely random selection based on a quick Net search, and is not meant to be comprehensive. So, don’t post nasty messages about “you forgot THIS” or “how could you not mention THAT?” Do so, and I’ll just take my keyboard and go home…..)

 

[BobRoss]

1990: Nickelodeon inaugurates its Nickelodeon Studios facility at Universal Studios Orlando. More than a mere attraction, it is a working production facility at which most 90’s live and tape productions (including What Would You Do?, Figure It Out, and Slime Time Live) are based. The cable channel eventually closes the facility in 2005 after a period of shifting priorities to filmed series and moving more and more production to its Burbank, California facility.

Being a child of the 80s and 90s, I remember fondly being practically addicted to Nickelodeon, and what a big deal it was when Nick Studios opened. It was so exciting when my family went to Florida a few years later and we went on the studio tour. We weren't fortunate enough to be in the studio audience for any shows, but I do recall seeing crews actively working on the floor... I believe they were setting up the chroma-keyed bonus rounds for Nick Arcade (where the winning team was "sent into" an actual video game).

After a short glimpse of the studios from the tour route, they would take you back downstairs to the "Game Lab" where a few lucky kids got to take part in some kind of wacky stunt, similar to the kind of crap you'd see on "Double Dare" or one of the other Nick game shows that were popular (and taped right there at Universal) at the time.

Next time I had a chance to see Nickelodeon Studios, it was several years later. Though I was no longer a kid who watched Nick, I wanted to see the tour again as young broadcaster -- remembering all the technical stuff I saw the first time, and hoping to get another look at it all, now that I'd have a better idea of what I was looking at. But by then, the actual studio tour was only a small fraction of what it was -- basically just a walk into the Game Lab, and nothing else. By my next visit to Universal, the building was still decorated in "Nick" logos but the tour was closed, the Slime Geyser was gone, and it was clear Nickelodeon Studios were no more.

I think it's pretty unfortunate that Nickelodeon has gone in a direction that made these studios useless to them. As a kid, I thought it was the greatest thing in the world to go there, knowing there was a chance I might see a show I know, actually being taped right before my eyes. It's too bad the kids of today won't get that opportunity.

 

[Stanislav]

Nickelodeon thrived in its golden years by being unique and having its own spirit, identity, culture, etc. It was what made them different from other kidvid that made them successful. But it looks to me like eventually they decided that they wanted to be "Disney Channel II" and thus started focusing more on animation, movies, and filmed sitcoms. I'm way past the demographics of either channel now, but when I happen to check out the two now and then, it looks like they have become virtually indistinguishable from each other -- only the bug in the corner of the screen lets you know what you're watching.

In reality, I can tell you (as an Orlando resident) that Nick Studios was more or less dead long before they finally pulled the plug. The last few years, pretty much the only major thing that was produced at the park was Slime Time Live, that bastardized wrap-around "game show" (really just stupid 30-second long stunts and bits involving the live audience) that only served to promote the other shows on the channel (especially those that aired during STL's time frame), and perhaps to provide a little temporary welfare to the production personnel who would soon be losing their jobs. I figure they had to provide some free swag or something to that audience to sit around in the hot sun for 4 hours while putting a grand total of maybe 8 minutes of actual "show" on the air between cartoons and commercials.

 

[Tim from Springfield IL]

From Wikipedia:

1975: "Sony introduces the Betamax videocassette recorder for sale to the public."

Some more June 7 birthdays:

1917: Dean Martin (born born Dino Paul Crocetti)

1943: "Good Morning, Mrs. Cleaver!" Ken Osmond (best known as Eddie Haskell on "Leave it to Beaver") is born in Glendale, CA.

1946: Jenny Jones (best known for her infamous talk show from 1991-2003) is born as Janina Stranski.

1955: William Forsythe (has guest starred on TV series including "CHIPs," "Hill Street Blues," and "Las Vegas"

1960: Bill Prady--TV writer and producer (who began as a writer for the Muppets) who has worked on shows including "Married with Children," "Dream On," "Star Trek: Voyager," "Dharma and Greg," and "Gilmore Girls."

 

[mleach]

Just a few random TV related events that happened on June 7. Discuss or comment as you please……


1990: Nickelodeon inaugurates its Nickelodeon Studios facility at Universal Studios Orlando. More than a mere attraction, it is a working production facility at which most 90’s live and tape productions (including What Would You Do?, Figure It Out, and Slime Time Live) are based. The cable channel eventually closes the facility in 2005 after a period of shifting priorities to filmed series and moving more and more production to its Burbank, California facility.

I wonder if at least some of this ( the closing of their Orlando's production center ) was due to Nickelodeon getting involved with the many theme parks around the country like what they did at Minnesota's Mall of America by taking over "Camp Snoopy" and turning that into ALL Nickelodeon plus Nick I believe has a section at many of the Cedar Fair parks too like Virginia's Kings Dominion and North Carolina's Carowinds. Now maybe there isn't much in terms of Nick TV shows being done at say Carowinds or Ohio's Kings Island but for those who want to "see and experience" Nickelodeon they could go elsewhere other than Orlando.

In this area at least I give Disney credit, at least they didn't take over amusement parks around the country and more/less kept their parks as a place where one has to actually travel to so they could spend time and of course money while they are the guest, unlike say Six Flags who went on that spending spree some years back by taking over parks in questionable areas like Buffalo Cleveland and New Orleans or parks that were located in some strange places..like in the center of downtown Denver. Look at Six Flags now.

 

[radioman148]

>>1975: "Sony introduces the Betamax videocassette recorder for sale to the public.">>

I still contend that betamax was technically a better system than VHS, but for whatever reason VHS was more widely adopted.

 

[Stanislav]

>>1975: "Sony introduces the Betamax videocassette recorder for sale to the public.">>

I still contend that betamax was technically a better system than VHS, but for whatever reason VHS was more widely adopted.

Primarily because JVC licensed the VHS system so that many manufacturers could make them and compete, while Sony kept Beta as a proprietary system. There were simply far more choices out there for VHS -- if you wanted Beta, you were limited to what few models Sony offered; if you went VHS, you had many different brands to choose from, with more competition on both price and features. Plus VHS adopted better features (like extended recording times/speeds) earlier. All in all, this was a case of Sony being technology-smart and marketing-dumb.

 

[radioman148]

>>1975: "Sony introduces the Betamax videocassette recorder for sale to the public.">>

I still contend that betamax was technically a better system than VHS, but for whatever reason VHS was more widely adopted.

Primarily because JVC licensed the VHS system so that many manufacturers could make them and compete, while Sony kept Beta as a proprietary system. There were simply far more choices out there for VHS -- if you wanted Beta, you were limited to what few models Sony offered; if you went VHS, you had many different brands to choose from, with more competition on both price and features. Plus VHS adopted better features (like extended recording times/speeds) earlier. All in all, this was a case of Sony being technology-smart and marketing-dumb.

Yeah I guess so, but I had both machines and I always preferred Beta.

 

[Stanislav]

>>1975: "Sony introduces the Betamax videocassette recorder for sale to the public.">>

I still contend that betamax was technically a better system than VHS, but for whatever reason VHS was more widely adopted.

Primarily because JVC licensed the VHS system so that many manufacturers could make them and compete, while Sony kept Beta as a proprietary system. There were simply far more choices out there for VHS -- if you wanted Beta, you were limited to what few models Sony offered; if you went VHS, you had many different brands to choose from, with more competition on both price and features. Plus VHS adopted better features (like extended recording times/speeds) earlier. All in all, this was a case of Sony being technology-smart and marketing-dumb.

Yeah I guess so, but I had both machines and I always preferred Beta.

Oh, I'm not disputing the superiority of Beta at all -- it was the better system. But the average consumer saw VHS as "good enough" for their needs, cheaper, more options, etc., while it was the more discriminating videophiles who gravitated to Beta.

 

[Tim from Springfield IL]

1964: Actress Judie Aronson, whose TV guest appearances include "Sledge Hammer!" and "Beverly Hills 90210" is born in LA.

 

[daryll]

In 1979, Gannett announced it's purchase of Combined Communications Corporation. It was the largest media merger to date.