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Macy's Thanksgiving Parade on TV - got a history?

How long has NBC (and CBS) televised this parade I've grown up with? When did the Peacock and the Eye start showing it in color? Commentators? Production techniques? Just curious.

Happy Thanksgiving from ixnay!
 
Seems like a lot of the same discussions/questions keep appearing every year.
Peter J. Wiggins did an excellent report about this very item last year on the "classic TV board". Here is a link to that page:

http://www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,20365.0.html

Same with the TV theme song thread, this one keeps popping up. The last time was when "that other" board was starting and one of the former moderators here set up a poll to find out the answer.

I wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving also!
 
This is the first time in a long time that I've actually watched much of the parades since my 3 year old daughter is old enough now to be interested in it. I noticed that CBS is apparently now only carries Macy's parade in NYC, but they just call it the "Thanksgiving Day Parade". I guess NBC has the exclusive rights to use the Macy's name, especially now that they're pretty much a national chain.

Something that I always thought was odd with CBS's coverage of Thanksgiving parades in the 80's and early 90's was how they would use people from their daytime and prime time soaps as hosts. If this is supposed to be a family oriented event, why would they want to use people from their least family oriented shows to host? At least now it looks like they've gone to using their morning show people like NBC, which is better.
 
anotherguy said:
This is the first time in a long time that I've actually watched much of the parades since my 3 year old daughter is old enough now to be interested in it. I noticed that CBS is apparently now only carries Macy's parade in NYC, but they just call it the "Thanksgiving Day Parade". I guess NBC has the exclusive rights to use the Macy's name, especially now that they're pretty much a national chain.

CBS should go back to carrying multiple parades. Three hours of Macy's is about two hours too much. Between too many commercials and promos for CBS' shows, they only carry about an hour of actual parade anyhow. I don't know if they did it this year, but for the last couple of years, CBS was getting as bad as NBC with the Broadway show stuff as well. I don't even bother to watch anymore. I'll wait for the Rose Parade.

Something that I always thought was odd with CBS's coverage of Thanksgiving parades in the 80's and early 90's was how they would use people from their daytime and prime time soaps as hosts. If this is supposed to be a family oriented event, why would they want to use people from their least family oriented shows to host? At least now it looks like they've gone to using their morning show people like NBC, which is better.

They use whoever's based in New York. I believe most of the soaps were taped in NYC back then (are they still?). No reason to fly people in from LA for this one program.
 
KeithE4 said:
I believe most of the soaps were taped in NYC back then (are they still?).

'Back then (from 1980s on)', yes, more were taped in NYC:

NYC--
All My Children, One Life to Live, Ryan's Hope, Loving/The City, As the World Turns, Guiding Light, Search for Tomorrow, Edge of Night, The Doctors, Another World, Texas

L.A.--
Days of our Lives, Santa Barbara, Generations, Young & the Restless, Bold & the Beautiful, Capitol, General Hospital, Port Charles

Here's the current rundown:

NYC--
All My Children, One Life to Live, As the World Turns, Guiding Light

L.A.--
Days of our Lives, Passions, Young & the Restless, Bold & the Beautiful, General Hospital

The pendulum swung L.A.'s way, unfortunately, when that-excuse-for-a-soap debuted on NBC in 1999 in the slot that should still belong to Another World.
 
KeithE4 said:
anotherguy said:
This is the first time in a long time that I've actually watched much of the parades since my 3 year old daughter is old enough now to be interested in it. I noticed that CBS is apparently now only carries Macy's parade in NYC, but they just call it the "Thanksgiving Day Parade". I guess NBC has the exclusive rights to use the Macy's name, especially now that they're pretty much a national chain.

CBS should go back to carrying multiple parades. Three hours of Macy's is about two hours too much. Between too many commercials and promos for CBS' shows, they only carry about an hour of actual parade anyhow. I don't know if they did it this year, but for the last couple of years, CBS was getting as bad as NBC with the Broadway show stuff as well. I don't even bother to watch anymore. I'll wait for the Rose Parade.

Yes, there was too much Broadway stuff on both CBS and NBC, which I hate, but with it being in New York you have to figure that's going to happen. Also, I've never figured why that it's necessary for all the big four networks and also HGTV (I think) carry the Rose Parade.

Something that I always thought was odd with CBS's coverage of Thanksgiving parades in the 80's and early 90's was how they would use people from their daytime and prime time soaps as hosts. If this is supposed to be a family oriented event, why would they want to use people from their least family oriented shows to host? At least now it looks like they've gone to using their morning show people like NBC, which is better.

They use whoever's based in New York. I believe most of the soaps were taped in NYC back then (are they still?). No reason to fly people in from LA for this one program.

If you look at the thread Maine-i-ac posted a link to at http://www.radio-info.com/smf/index.php/topic,20365.0.html it has a post with a list of how the parades were covered from 1939 until 2002. During the times that Dallas and Knots Landing were on in the 80's until 1990, it was nothing unusual for some of their cast members to be hosting the parades on CBS. Also according to the list was that from 1976 to 1981 the CBS parades were hosted by William Conrad. ??? I had forgotten about that. That may not be quite as weird, but he's not exactly someone you'd think of doing this sort of thing either. Later in the 90's it appears CBS used people from their sitcoms and other dramas, and they switched to using morning show and sports people only in the last few years, which makes more sense to me.

NBC appears to have used Lorne Greene and Betty White for most of the 60's and early 70's, and then Ed McMahon (with occasional co-hosts) in the late 70's until 1981, and then they switched to people from the Today show and game shows until 1989. Since then it's always been people from the Today show.
 
anotherguy said:
Yes, there was too much Broadway stuff on both CBS and NBC, which I hate, but with it being in New York you have to figure that's going to happen. Also, I've never figured why that it's necessary for all the big four networks and also HGTV (I think) carry the Rose Parade.

Univision had the ToR Parade last year too in Spanish language. Cohosting UNIV's coverage was Karla Martinez, who also cohosts Despierta America, and who also at the time hosted the since discontinued teen-oriented Saturday infotainment show Control.

ixnay
 
anotherguy, I think Conrad anchored the CBS show from a living room set complete with lit up fireplace, as he took the viewer from NYC to Philly to Detroit to Toronto to the taped (in September) Liliukolani (sp) parade in Hawaii.

ixnay
 
ixnay said:
anotherguy, I think Conrad anchored the CBS show from a living room set complete with lit up fireplace, as he took the viewer from NYC to Philly to Detroit to Toronto to the taped (in September) Liliukolani (sp) parade in Hawaii.

Wasn't the Toronto coverage taped from earlier, too? I think CBS carried selected segments from Toronto's Santa Claus Parade, which was always presnted several days before the Macy's parade (this year, it was on Sunday 11/19).
 
azumanga said:
ixnay said:
anotherguy, I think Conrad anchored the CBS show from a living room set complete with lit up fireplace, as he took the viewer from NYC to Philly to Detroit to Toronto to the taped (in September) Liliukolani (sp) parade in Hawaii.

Wasn't the Toronto coverage taped from earlier, too? I think CBS carried selected segments from Toronto's Santa Claus Parade, which was always presnted several days before the Macy's parade (this year, it was on Sunday 11/19).

Yes, I think so. Forgot to mention it. I was in the middle of dressing for church.

ixnay
 
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