Just a few random TV related events that happened on March 31. Discuss or comment as you please……
1916: Actress and voice artist Lucille Bliss (Crusader Rabbit, The Smurfs, Invader ZIM) is born in New York City. (She is turning 93 this year, residing in an assisted-living facility, yet still doing occasional freelance voice-over work!)
1934: Actress/singer Shirley Jones (The Partridge Family) is born in Charleroi, Pennsylvania.
1957: The first TV version of “Cinderella,” starring 21-year-old Julie Andrews, airs in color on CBS.
1967: ABC airs the final episode of The Nurses.
1968: Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea ends its run on ABC.
1969: The CBS Morning News with Joseph Benti expands to 60 minutes, becoming the first regularly scheduled hour-long newscast on U.S. network TV.
1975: 31 million viewers tune in to CBS to watch the final (635th) episode of Gunsmoke. The finale currently ranks 13th on the list of most-watched U.S. TV broadcasts of all time.
1989: WNHT (channel 21, Concord, New Hampshire) goes dark after just 5 years on the air. Starting life as a low-budget independent, WNHT had become a CBS affiliate in February 1988. The move was part of an overall effort to eventually establish all major networks in the area, and perhaps break off Manchester-Concord as a separate TV market (which, at the time, would have ranked in the top 100 markets by itself). Alas, low ratings and a balance sheet heavily in the red leads to the station pulling the plug at Midnight this day. (Exactly Midnight, as a matter of fact – the signal unceremoniously goes dark right in the middle of The Pat Sajak Show.) The channel would be reactivated in 1995 as WNBU, and is currently ION affiliate WPXG (a satellite of Boston’s WBPX).
1992: Dateline NBC debuts on NBC.
1994: Madonna appears on The Late Show with David Letterman and makes headlines with a profanity-laced interview (including 13 F-bombs) in which she smokes a cigar, tries to get Letterman to smell her underwear, asks Dave if he has ever urinated in the shower, and refuses to leave the set when her segment is over. It is said to be the most heavily “bleeped” (censored) network talk show appearance in TV history.
1997: Teletubbies premieres on BBC1.
(Just a little featurette I hope to do as time permits. 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…..)
1916: Actress and voice artist Lucille Bliss (Crusader Rabbit, The Smurfs, Invader ZIM) is born in New York City. (She is turning 93 this year, residing in an assisted-living facility, yet still doing occasional freelance voice-over work!)
1934: Actress/singer Shirley Jones (The Partridge Family) is born in Charleroi, Pennsylvania.
1957: The first TV version of “Cinderella,” starring 21-year-old Julie Andrews, airs in color on CBS.
1967: ABC airs the final episode of The Nurses.
1968: Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea ends its run on ABC.
1969: The CBS Morning News with Joseph Benti expands to 60 minutes, becoming the first regularly scheduled hour-long newscast on U.S. network TV.
1975: 31 million viewers tune in to CBS to watch the final (635th) episode of Gunsmoke. The finale currently ranks 13th on the list of most-watched U.S. TV broadcasts of all time.
1989: WNHT (channel 21, Concord, New Hampshire) goes dark after just 5 years on the air. Starting life as a low-budget independent, WNHT had become a CBS affiliate in February 1988. The move was part of an overall effort to eventually establish all major networks in the area, and perhaps break off Manchester-Concord as a separate TV market (which, at the time, would have ranked in the top 100 markets by itself). Alas, low ratings and a balance sheet heavily in the red leads to the station pulling the plug at Midnight this day. (Exactly Midnight, as a matter of fact – the signal unceremoniously goes dark right in the middle of The Pat Sajak Show.) The channel would be reactivated in 1995 as WNBU, and is currently ION affiliate WPXG (a satellite of Boston’s WBPX).
1992: Dateline NBC debuts on NBC.
1994: Madonna appears on The Late Show with David Letterman and makes headlines with a profanity-laced interview (including 13 F-bombs) in which she smokes a cigar, tries to get Letterman to smell her underwear, asks Dave if he has ever urinated in the shower, and refuses to leave the set when her segment is over. It is said to be the most heavily “bleeped” (censored) network talk show appearance in TV history.
1997: Teletubbies premieres on BBC1.
(Just a little featurette I hope to do as time permits. 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…..)
