Senate Watergate Hearings Coverage in 1973: Day-by-Day Breakdown of Networks

[Mike Stroud]

One of the North Georgia postings in recent days by our friend bpatrick inquiring what network carried coverage of the Senate Watergate Hearings in the spring and summer of 1973 inspired me, via the Vanderbilt TV News Archive, to compile a listing of the days and the networks which alternated coverage. It reads as follows:

(All times Eastern)

Friday, May 18: both CBS and NBC--CBS (Nelson Benton & George Herman), 10 a.m. to 12:28 p.m. and 2 to 4:28 p.m.; NBC (Garrick Utley), 10 a.m. to 12:28 p.m. and 2 to 4:07 p.m.

Tuesday, May 22: NBC (Garrick Utley), 10 a.m. to 12:53 p.m.

Wednesday, May 23: both CBS and NBC--CBS (Nelson Benton & George Herman), 10 to 11:52 a.m. and 2 to 3:33 p.m.; NBC (Garrick Utley), 10 to 11:58 a.m. and 2 to 3:39 p.m.

Thursday, May 24: both CBS and NBC--CBS (Nelson Benton & George Herman), 10 a.m. to 12:58 p.m. and 2 to 5:14 p.m.; NBC (Garrick Utley), 10 a.m. to 12:53 p.m. and 2 to 5:20 p.m.

Tuesday, June 5: NBC (Edwin Newman), 10 to 11:58 a.m. and 2 to 4:40 p.m.

Wednesday, June 6: CBS (Nelson Benton & George Herman), 10 to 11:58 a.m. and 2 to 4:28 p.m.

Thursday, June 7: ABC (Frank Reynolds), 10 to 11:58 a.m. and 2 to 4:43 p.m.

Tuesday, June 12: NBC (Edwin Newman), 10 a.m. to 12:05 p.m. and 2 to 4:34 p.m.

Wednesday, June 13: CBS (Nelson Benton & George Herman), 10 a.m. to 12:28 p.m. and 2 to 4:28 p.m.

Thursday, June 14: ABC (Frank Reynolds), 10 a.m. to 12:09 p.m. and 2 to 5:26 p.m.

Monday, June 25: NBC (John Chancellor), 10 a.m. to 12:32 p.m. and 2 to 6:08 p.m.

Tuesday, June 26: NBC (John Chancellor), 10 a.m. to 12:05 p.m. and 2 to 5:37 p.m.

Wednesday, June 27: NBC (John Chancellor), 10 a.m. to 12:28 p.m. and 2 to 5:52 p.m.

Thursday, June 28: NBC (John Chancellor), 10 a.m. to 12:28 p.m. and 2 to 5:32 p.m.

Friday, June 29: NBC (John Chancellor), 10 a.m. to 12:01 p.m. and 2 to 5:58 p.m.

Tuesday, July 10: ABC (Frank Reynolds), 10 a.m. to 12:12 p.m. and 2 to 4:58 p.m.

Wednesday, July 11: NBC (John Chancellor), 10 a.m. to 12:33 p.m. and 2 to 4:58 p.m.

Thursday, July 12: CBS (Nelson Benton & George Herman), 10 to 11:58 a.m. and 2 to 4:58 p.m.

Friday, July 13: ABC (Frank Reynolds), 10 a.m. to 12:28 p.m. and 2 to 4 p.m.

Monday, July 16: NBC (anchor not given, if any), 10 to 11:42 a.m.

Although the hearings continued for about a week or so afterward, the Vanderbilt TV News Archive apparently stopped recording live daily coverage at this point, perhaps due to a lack of funds for the extra videotape required in addition to its main job of recording the network evening newscasts. It is also possible that ABC also provided coverage during the first week in May, but the VTNA either opted not to record it or (probably) could not afford to do all three networks. The listing proves that coverage was not spread equally among the networks as previously believed and that NBC did the most, due primarily to the testimony of John Dean in the last week of June.

To check it out yourself, just visit tvnews.vanderbilt.edu/tvn-month-select.pl?SID=20120711149627685&code=. The rest should be easy to find.

 

[Joseph_Gallant]

According to the TV listings pages of the Boston Globe for June 25th through 29th, 1973, ABC, CBS, and NBC all carried the hearings live all that week.

That was the week that "star witness", former White House Chief Of Staff John dean testified. He was the witness who made the phrase "A Cancer On The Presidency" famous.

Also, I believe ABC, CBS, and NBC all carried the hearings the first week, but after that, realizing that they'd go on for much of the Summer, agreed to rotate live coverage every third day, with the option for any network not assigned to cover that day's session to also broadcast live coverage if it was a "major name" witness (read: John Dean).

In addition, many PBS stations carried each day's session on tape that evening. Among them were WGBH-2 here in Boston and WENH-11 in New Hampshire. A small handful of PBS stations (among them WGBH's sister WGNX-44) carried live coverage of the hearings every day they were held.

 

[Joseph_Gallant]

Typo!

In my last post, meant to say WGBX!

 

[w9wi]

The second PBS station in Milwaukee (WMVT-36) also carried them on afternoon delay.

I'm pretty sure the recordings in Vanderbilt's archives were made off-air from the Nashville affiliates. Could be the local affiliates chose to stop carrying the hearings, leaving Vanderbilt nothing to record? -- I could maybe see the ABC station doing that -- but it doesn't seem like something the NBC & CBS stations here would have done...

 

[Joseph_Gallant]

It's possible that in the early years of Vanderbilt's taping of TV newscasts that all three network newscasts did not go head-to-head in Music City in the same time period.

For example, the ABC station in Nashville may have aired the network news at 5 P.M. CST/CST; while the CBS and NBC stations may have aired their respective network newscasts at 5:30 P.M. CST/CDT.

As long as the no more than two of the three network evening newscasts went head-to-head, Vanderbilt didn't need more than two VTR's.

 

[Mike Stroud]

The second PBS station in Milwaukee (WMVT-36) also carried them on afternoon delay.

I'm pretty sure the recordings in Vanderbilt's archives were made off-air from the Nashville affiliates. Could be the local affiliates chose to stop carrying the hearings, leaving Vanderbilt nothing to record? -- I could maybe see the ABC station doing that -- but it doesn't seem like something the NBC & CBS stations here would have done...

No, w9wi, the local affiliates would not have had a choice in the matter. WSM, WLAC, or WSIX would have faced serious consequences from their respective networks (and possibly the FCC) had any of them declined to air the network feed for the duration of the day. Contracts were pretty explicit about news coverage; that's how things worked back then. No, the situation simply was that the VTNA simply ran out of extra tape due to a lack of funds and had to cut back on recording. I don't know that for certain, of course, but I'm fairly sure that's the explanation you would get from the management of the Archive today.

 

[Mike Stroud]

According to the TV listings pages of the Boston Globe for June 25th through 29th, 1973, ABC, CBS, and NBC all carried the hearings live all that week.

That was the week that "star witness", former White House Chief Of Staff John dean testified. He was the witness who made the phrase "A Cancer On The Presidency" famous.

Also, I believe ABC, CBS, and NBC all carried the hearings the first week, but after that, realizing that they'd go on for much of the Summer, agreed to rotate live coverage every third day, with the option for any network not assigned to cover that day's session to also broadcast live coverage if it was a "major name" witness (read: John Dean).

In addition, many PBS stations carried each day's session on tape that evening. Among them were WGBH-2 here in Boston and WENH-11 in New Hampshire. A small handful of PBS stations (among them WGBH's sister WGNX-44) carried live coverage of the hearings every day they were held.

It's probably true, Joseph, that all three networks did carry the Dean testimony. Like I said in my original post, this is only a listing of the recordings made by the Vanderbilt TV News Archive. The VTNA was supported at the time primarily by foundation grants and donors and almost certainly did not have the resources (equipment or tape, or both) to record every single instance of network time devoted to Watergate, but try it did.

In fact, live coverage of a major news story was the only time the Archive made an exception to its policy (still largely in effect) of recording only newscasts. For instance, it has seldom recorded news magazines such as 60 Minutes, unless the subject matter was extraordinary and related to an ongoing event.

As far as can be determined, the Archive did not record the PBS recap shown in the evenings after each day's proceedings. These the VTNA would have regarded as superfluous and therefore a waste of valuable resources. The small group of PBS affiliates you make reference to as having carried live coverage were probably part of what was then called the Eastern Educational Television Network, a consortium of ETV stations along the Eastern seaboard (now known as American Public Television, today the largest non-station source of PBS programming). Nashville's PBS station, WDCN (now WNPT), would not have been broadcasting that feed, and therefore, the VTNA could not have recorded it.

 

[Mike Stroud]

It's possible that in the early years of Vanderbilt's taping of TV newscasts that all three network newscasts did not go head-to-head in Music City in the same time period.

For example, the ABC station in Nashville may have aired the network news at 5 P.M. CST/CST; while the CBS and NBC stations may have aired their respective network newscasts at 5:30 P.M. CST/CDT.

As long as the three network evening newscasts didn't go head-to-head, Vanderbilt didn't need more than two VTR's.

Joseph, you are absolutely correct. For most of the period from the Archive's beginning in August 1968 until ABC discontinued the practice of feeding the news to affils at 6/5 Central in 1982, WSIX, which became WNGE in December 1973 and is now known as WKRN, carried the 5 p.m. Central version of the ABC Evening News and World News Tonight. WSM/WSMV (NBC) and WLAC/WTVF (CBS) do as they do now, clearing their respective networks at 5:30. So your theory makes perfect sense--VTNA did not see the need for three recording machines, then extremely expensive pieces of equipment for a non-broadcasting entity to possess. By 1982, when WNGE by necessity had to move to 5:30 p.m., the Archives had by then instituted color recording and upgraded everything, thanks to substantially larger outside support. It could more than afford a third machine.

 

[tvnut]

According to the TV listings pages of the Boston Globe for June 25th through 29th, 1973, ABC, CBS, and NBC all carried the hearings live all that week.

That was the week that "star witness", former White House Chief Of Staff John dean testified. He was the witness who made the phrase "A Cancer On The Presidency" famous.

Also, I believe ABC, CBS, and NBC all carried the hearings the first week, but after that, realizing that they'd go on for much of the Summer, agreed to rotate live coverage every third day, with the option for any network not assigned to cover that day's session to also broadcast live coverage if it was a "major name" witness (read: John Dean).

In addition, many PBS stations carried each day's session on tape that evening. Among them were WGBH-2 here in Boston and WENH-11 in New Hampshire. A small handful of PBS stations (among them WGBH's sister WGNX-44) carried live coverage of the hearings every day they were held.

You have a great memory. All three networks carried live coverage of the first week. Complaints from soap-opera viewers, and probably the networks' own sales departments, prompted the rotation system, with any network allowed to televise any day or witness besides their rotation day. John Dean's five days of testimony received three-network coverage; so did, if I recall correctly, John Erlichman and H.R. Haldeman.

Some network affiliates opted out after 4 p.m. Central, after the afternoon's "network time" was over. In my area, WMAQ-5 (NBC) did so in Chicago, while WTMJ-4 (NBC) in Milwaukee carried to conclusion most days.

The PBS evening coverage was provided by WETA's NPACT, the National Public Affairs Center for Television. It was hosted by Jim Lehrer, the first time most viewers saw him. He introduced the morning session, had a "halftime" segment, then introduced the afternoon session. Replays often lasted until the wee hours of the morning. WETA saved its Watergate videotapes and used them for an anniversary special in 1993.

 

[tvnut]

Some network affiliates opted out after 4 p.m. Central, after the afternoon's "network time" was over. In my area, WMAQ-5 (NBC) did so in Chicago, while WTMJ-4 (NBC) in Milwaukee carried to conclusion most days.

It's interesting that an O&O (WMAQ) would've been allowed to leave its network's coverage early.

That's what I thought every time I fiddled with the rabbit ears to pull in Channel 4.

 

[anotherguyTN]

I've brought this up before, but I can remember that the Watergate hearings really fouled up the schedules for game shows, especially ones with celebrity guests that would be on for the entire week. Where they would normally be on Monday through Friday, the hearings caused them to change guests in the middle of the week. I think that there were also jokes made about the schedules being screwed up on Match Game.

I've wondered if the Watergate hearings were a factor in some stations starting to get worse about pre-empting network daytime shows for syndicated programming.

 

[Ultimajock]

Some network affiliates opted out after 4 p.m. Central, after the afternoon's "network time" was over. In my area, WMAQ-5 (NBC) did so in Chicago, while WTMJ-4 (NBC) in Milwaukee carried to conclusion most days.

It's interesting that an O&O (WMAQ) would've been allowed to leave its network's coverage early.

...although, in WTMJ-TV's case, they were co-owned with the two biggest newspapers in Wisconsin, the Milwaukee Journal and the Milwaukee Sentinel, and consequently were expected to make whatever concessions to news coverage that they could. I am curious as to how many days the NBC Watergate Hearings coverage played havoc with WTMJ-TV's scheduled 90-minute airings of The Merv Griffin Show each weekday at 3:30 PM...

 

[Mike Stroud]

Friends, if it is the case that WMAQ, an NBC O&O, was allowed to depart coverage before the network feed ended in the late afternoon, then why did neither WTMJ in Milwaukee or WSM in Nashville, on which station the Vanderbilt recordings were obtained, do so? While I want to believe tvnut's story and am sure he remembers correctly, it just doesn't make sense given the nature of the business at the time and the FCC's much stronger hands on local station requirements to serve the public in addition to pursuing a profit (ostensibly the rationale for WMAQ going to local programming in late afternoon). Wouldn't NBC brass at 30 Rock in New York have raised hell about that, since the FCC eyes were probably strongest on network O&Os, which were after all, in the largest markets and affected a good percentage of the national audience? And if WMAQ could get away with it, why not the others: WNBC, KNBC, WKYC, and even the station where it mattered most, Washington's WRC? There's something to this that just doesn't add up, in my estimation.

 

[w9wi]

Was it necessarily seen as in the public interest for a station to pre-empt its childrens' programming in favor of Watergate coverage? (remember, at the time network affiliates often ran cartoons in late afternoon, and they were often interspersed with local hosts who imparted educational information between cartoons. Whether WTMJ participated I can't remember, and whether WMAQ and WSM did I have no idea.)

While I was way too young to remember, isn't it possible some in the Republican Party might not have considered broadcast of the Watergate hearings to be in the public interest?

On further thinking.. I seem to recall the broadcasts on WMVT-36 were *live*, not recorded. The station didn't normally sign on until prime time, I remember it being unusual to find both UHF stations on the air when I got home from school. Which makes it a bit more interesting that WTMJ would stick with the coverage all the way through, if another station was doing the same thing every day.

 

[anotherguyTN]

Concerning kid's shows being pre-empted for government hearings, something worse I can remember happening was during the Senate hearings for Clarence Thomas being nominated for the Supreme Court, when Anita Hill testified against him and made her accusations, part of which was on a Saturday morning, and pre-empted kid's shows on the big 3 networks. I wasn't married or a parent at the time but to me this was totally inexcusable.

 

[Mike Stroud]

Was it necessarily seen as in the public interest for a station to pre-empt its childrens' programming in favor of Watergate coverage? (remember, at the time network affiliates often ran cartoons in late afternoon, and they were often interspersed with local hosts who imparted educational information between cartoons. Whether WTMJ participated I can't remember, and whether WMAQ and WSM did I have no idea.)

While I was way too young to remember, isn't it possible some in the Republican Party might not have considered broadcast of the Watergate hearings to be in the public interest?

On further thinking.. I seem to recall the broadcasts on WMVT-36 were *live*, not recorded. The station didn't normally sign on until prime time, I remember it being unusual to find both UHF stations on the air when I got home from school. Which makes it a bit more interesting that WTMJ would stick with the coverage all the way through, if another station was doing the same thing every day.

WSM did carry the entire proceedings. The Vanderbilt Archives' holdings prove that. If you will notice, frequently the coverage lasted well into so-called "fringe" time, between 4:30 and 6:30 p.m. Eastern (3:30 to 5:30 to Central). If WSM wanted to opt out of coverage, it would have done so at 4:30/3:30, much like tvnut claims WMAQ did. Instead, you will notice on almost all the listings except one that the coverage ended in the midst of programming blocks, not on the half hours (think "We now return to our regular scheduled programming, already in progress"). Otherwise, the station(s) would have therefore had to cut off anchors and reporters in the midst of sentences, something that would have made viewers irate in the extreme, some of whom might be motivated enough to file complaints to the FCC against the station(s). Again, we must remember that the regulatory strength of the Feds was vastly stronger than is the case now--broadcasters weren't just concerned to please advertisers alone, but also a government that demanded news as an essential part of public service, and particularly in a situation like this that many Americans, regardless of political affiliation, regarded as a grave threat to the Republic.

Now, as for your argument that the need to inform the public must be balanced against the FCC's mandate that children's needs be attended to, by 1973 things had changed dramatically in that regard. Local kiddie shows had largely left afternoon schedules by this point, having either moved to Saturdays only or dropped altogether. Cartoons were still running on many stations, to be sure, but they were almost entirely unhosted, off a film chain. Most of the other schedule filler between the end of network daytime and the evening news was reruns of family-friendly 1960s-era sitcoms such as Bewitched, Gilligan's Island, and, of course, The Andy Griffith Show (RIP). Even with that taken into consideration, public officials (the FCC included) and "do-gooder" activists were heavily promoting the afternoon shows on PBS stations for especially younger children to watch, instead of what they considered visual "junk food" that most commercial stations offered in those timeslots (the only alternatives back then were movies and Merv Griffin or Mike Douglas' adult-oriented talkfests). So your case is not really that strong for a station to cut the network connection in order to go to the regular afternoon fare--in any case, it wouldn't be losing all that much money anyway if it stayed with network coverage, as the late afternoons were often the lowest-rated dayparts and brought in the least advertising, perhaps only a small fraction of prime time. Further, all of this is the primary reason the networks agreed to rotate coverage for at least part of the time, to lessen the impact of lost ad revenues on both the networks and local stations.

As for your comment that Republicans would not have found network coverage of the proceedings to serve the public, that's nothing more than a case of reading into history our present-day political animosities. Sure, Nixon and the Administration didn't like it. Sure, the Republicans in Congress would have done everything they could to prevent it. But if the atmosphere that prevails now on Capitol Hill and in the White House had carried the day then, there would have been no Watergate hearings to start with. Besides, network news departments had a much stronger firewall than today against pressure from their employers and the Government to curtail news reporting unfavorable to a particular party (that has pretty much gone by the wayside now, swept away by the triumph of cable news and the Internet and the fiercely competitive media world). If the FCC had become aware of such attempts at censorship, it would have strongly warned the networks and broadcasters not to comply, for fear of violating things like the Fairness Doctrine, which was abolished in 1987. From another perspective, it would have amounted to political suicide for a Republican legislator to come out publicly against the networks carrying the hearings (While this may sound overly political, Vice-President Agnew and Press Secretary Ron Ziegler had already cried wolf far too many times against supposed ideological bias and slanted reporting on the networks' part; many Americans, even conservatives, had tuned them out by this time). Whatever we think about the matter today, the consensus among broadcasters, the public, and even advertisers was that broadcasting the proceedings took precedence over all political and economic considerations. We were, in other words, a far less cynical, more respectful society than is even possible nowadays.

Let me throw it out to others: what are your memories, if any, of how your local station handled the Watergate hearings (no PBS, please, since we've established its part in things)?

 

[johnnya2k6]

The PBS evening coverage was provided by WETA's NPACT, the National Public Affairs Center for Television. It was hosted by Jim Lehrer, the first time most viewers saw him. He introduced the morning session, had a "halftime" segment, then introduced the afternoon session. Replays often lasted until the wee hours of the morning. WETA saved its Watergate videotapes and used them for an anniversary special in 1993.

Lehrer's co-anchor was Robert MacNeil, a former NBC News correspondent who has also done some work for PBS. That pairing led to the creation of what is now the "PBS Newshour" in 1975 (don't need to go through the show's evolution).

In Alaska and Hawaii, I think the hearings were on a one- to two-day delay.

 

[Mario500]

Was it necessarily seen as in the public interest for a station to pre-empt its childrens' programming in favor of Watergate coverage? (remember, at the time network affiliates often ran cartoons in late afternoon, and they were often interspersed with local hosts who imparted educational information between cartoons. Whether WTMJ participated I can't remember, and whether WMAQ and WSM did I have no idea.)

I would not call cartoons in general children's programming just as I would not call live-action programs adults' programming.

Concerning kid's shows being pre-empted for government hearings, something worse I can remember happening was during the Senate hearings for Clarence Thomas being nominated for the Supreme Court, when Anita Hill testified against him and made her accusations, part of which was on a Saturday morning, and pre-empted kid's shows on the big 3 networks. I wasn't married or a parent at the time but to me this was totally inexcusable.

I would not generally call the Saturday morning programs at the time (or any other time) kids' shows. They may have appealed to advertisers, but the programs most likely appealed to others beyond the demographics targeted by advertisers.

 

[Joseph_Gallant]

JohnnyA2K6:

Could the "pool" feed of John Dean's testimony have been put up on a satellite for downlink by Alaskan and Hawaiian TV stations, given how big a news story it was??

 

[Ultimajock]

Could the "pool" feed of John Dean's testimony have been put up on a satellite for downlink by Alaskan and Hawaiian TV stations, given how big a news story it was??

...exactly what satellite abilities would Alaskan and Hawaiian affiliates have had at that point?...