DuMont Television Network
Encyclopedia
Television network
A television network is a telecommunications network for distribution of television program content, whereby a central operation provides programming to many television stations or pay TV providers. Until the mid-1980s, television programming in most countries of the world was dominated by a small...
s, rivalling NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
for the distinction of being first overall. It began operation in the United States in 1946. It was owned by DuMont Laboratories
DuMont Laboratories
DuMont Laboratories was an American television equipment manufacturer. The company was founded in 1931, by inventor Allen B. DuMont. Among the company's developments were long-lasting cathode ray tubes that would be used for television. Another product out of the lab was a DuMont invention, the...
, a television equipment and set manufacturer. The network was hindered by the prohibitive cost of broadcasting
Broadcasting
Broadcasting is the distribution of audio and video content to a dispersed audience via any audio visual medium. Receiving parties may include the general public or a relatively large subset of thereof...
, by Federal Communications Commission
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission is an independent agency of the United States government, created, Congressional statute , and with the majority of its commissioners appointed by the current President. The FCC works towards six goals in the areas of broadband, competition, the spectrum, the...
regulations which restricted the company's growth, and even by the company's partner, Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
. Despite several innovations in broadcasting and the creation of one of television's biggest stars of the 1950s, the network never found itself on solid financial ground. Forced to expand on UHF
Ultra high frequency
Ultra-High Frequency designates the ITU Radio frequency range of electromagnetic waves between 300 MHz and 3 GHz , also known as the decimetre band or decimetre wave as the wavelengths range from one to ten decimetres...
channels during an era when UHF was not profitable, DuMont ceased broadcasting in 1956.
DuMont's latter-day obscurity has prompted at least one notable TV historian to refer to it as the "Forgotten Network". A few popular DuMont programs, such as Cavalcade of Stars
The Jackie Gleason Show
The Jackie Gleason Show is the name of a series of popular American network television shows that starred Jackie Gleason, which ran from 1952 to 1970.-Cavalcade of Stars:...
and Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
winner Life Is Worth Living
Life is Worth Living
Life is Worth Living is an inspirational American television series which ran on the DuMont Television Network from February 12, 1952 to April 26, 1955, then on ABC until 1957.-Broadcast history:Hosted by Bishop Fulton J...
, appear in TV retrospective
Retrospective
Retrospective generally means to take a look back at events that already have taken place. For example, the term is used in medicine, describing a look back at a patient's medical history or lifestyle.-Music:...
s or are mentioned briefly in books about U.S. television history, but almost all the network's programming was destroyed in the 1970s.
Origins
Allen B. DuMont
Allen Balcom DuMont also spelled Du Mont, was an American scientist and inventor best known for improvements to the cathode ray tube in 1931 for use in television receivers. Seven years later he manufactured and sold the first commercially practical television set to the public...
. He and his staff were responsible for many early technical innovations, including the first consumer all-electronic television set in 1938. The company's television sets soon became the gold standard of the industry.
A few months after selling his first television set, DuMont opened an experimental television station in New York City, W2XWV. Unlike CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
and NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
, he continued experimental broadcasts throughout World War II. In 1944, W2XWV became WABD
WNYW
WNYW, virtual channel 5 , is the flagship television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in New York City. The station's transmitter is atop the Empire State Building and its studio facilities are located in the Yorkville section of Manhattan...
(after DuMont's initials), the third commercial television station in New York. On May 19, 1945, DuMont opened experimental W3XWT in Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
A minority shareholder in DuMont Laboratories was Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
, which had advanced $400,000 in 1939 for a 40% share in the company. Paramount had television interests of its own, having launched experimental stations in Los Angeles in 1939 and Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
in 1940, but DuMont's association with Paramount ultimately proved to be a mistake.
Soon after his experimental Washington station signed on, DuMont began experimental coaxial cable
Coaxial cable
Coaxial cable, or coax, has an inner conductor surrounded by a flexible, tubular insulating layer, surrounded by a tubular conducting shield. The term coaxial comes from the inner conductor and the outer shield sharing the same geometric axis...
hookups between his laboratories in Passaic, New Jersey
Passaic, New Jersey
Passaic is a city in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 69,781, maintaining its status as the 15th largest municipality in New Jersey with an increase of 1,920 residents from the 2000 Census population of 67,861...
, and his two stations. One of those hookups carried the announcement that the U.S. had dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki
Nagasaki
is the capital and the largest city of Nagasaki Prefecture on the island of Kyushu in Japan. Nagasaki was founded by the Portuguese in the second half of the 16th century on the site of a small fishing village, formerly part of Nishisonogi District...
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
on August 9, 1945. This was later considered to be the official beginning of the DuMont Network by both Thomas T. Goldsmith, the network's chief engineer and DuMont's best friend, and Dr. DuMont himself. Regular network service began on August 15, 1946, on WABD and W3XWT. In 1947, W3XWT became WTTG
WTTG
WTTG, channel 5, is an owned-and-operated television station of the Fox Broadcasting Company, located in the American capital city of Washington, D.C...
, named after Goldsmith. The pair were joined in 1949 by WDTV
KDKA-TV
KDKA-TV, channel 2, is an owned and operated television station of the CBS Television Network, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. KDKA-TV broadcasts from a transmitter located in the Perry North neighborhood of Pittsburgh, and its studios are located in downtown Pittsburgh at Gateway Center....
in Pittsburgh.
Although NBC was known to have station-to-station links as early as 1941, DuMont received its station licenses before NBC resumed in the postwar era their previous, sporadic network broadcasts.
ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
had just come into existence as a radio network in 1943 and would not enter network television until 1948, when it acquired a station in New York City. CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
would also wait until 1948 to begin network operations because it was waiting for the Federal Communications Commission to approve its color television system. Other companies — including Mutual
Mutual Broadcasting System
The Mutual Broadcasting System was an American radio network, in operation from 1934 to 1999. In the golden age of U.S. radio drama, MBS was best known as the original network home of The Lone Ranger and The Adventures of Superman and as the long-time radio residence of The Shadow...
, the Yankee Network
Yankee Network
For the radio network of the New York Yankees, see New York Yankees Radio Network.The Yankee Network was an American radio network. It was founded in 1930 by John Shepard III; in 1949, a controlling interest in the network was purchased by General Tire when Robert Shepard chairman of the network's...
, and Paramount itself — were interested in starting television networks, but would be prevented from successfully doing so by restrictive FCC regulations.
Programming
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
. Eventually, the network provided original programs which are still remembered fifty-plus years later.
The network also largely ignored the standard business model of 1950s television, in which one advertiser sponsored an entire show, enabling it to have complete control over its content. Instead, DuMont sold commercials
Television advertisement
A television advertisement or television commercial, often just commercial, advert, ad, or ad-film – is a span of television programming produced and paid for by an organization that conveys a message, typically one intended to market a product...
to many different advertisers, freeing producers of its shows from the veto power held by sole sponsors. This eventually became the standard model for U.S. television.
DuMont also holds another important place in American television history. WDTV's sign-on made it possible for stations in the Midwest to receive live network programming from stations on the East Coast, and vice versa. Before then, the networks relied on separate regional networks in the two time zones for live programming, and the West Coast received network programming from kinescope
Kinescope
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor...
s (films shot directly from live television screens) originating from the East Coast. On January 11, 1949, the coaxial cable linking East and Midwest (known in television circles as "the Golden Spike") was activated. The ceremony, hosted by DuMont and WDTV, was carried on all four networks. WGN
WGN-TV
WGN-TV, virtual channel 9 , is the CW-affiliated television station in Chicago, Illinois built, signed on, and owned by the Tribune Company. WGN-TV's studios and offices are located at 2501 W...
in Chicago and WABD in New York were able to share programs through a live coaxial cable feed when WDTV in Pittsburgh signed on, because the station completed the East Coast-to-Midwest chain, allowing stations in both regions to air the same program at the same time, which is still the standard for U.S. television. It would be another two years before the West Coast could get live programming, but this was the beginning of the modern era of network television.
The first broadcasts came from DuMont's 515 Madison Avenue headquarters, but it soon found additional space, including a fully functioning theater, in the New York branch of Wanamaker's
Wanamaker's
Wanamaker's department store was the first department store in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and one of the first department stores in the United States. At its zenith in the early 20th century, there were two major Wanamaker department stores, one in Philadelphia and one in New York City at Broadway...
department store at Ninth Street and Broadway. Still later, a lease on the Adelphi Theatre on 54th Street
54th Street (Manhattan)
54th Street is a two-mile-long, one-way street traveling west to east across Midtown Manhattan.-West Side Highway:*The route begins at the West Side Highway . Opposite the intersection is the New York Passenger Ship Terminal and the Hudson River...
and the Ambassador Theatre on West 49th Street gave the network a site for variety shows, and in 1954, the lavish DuMont Tele-Centre opened in the former Jacob Ruppert
Jacob Ruppert
Jacob Ruppert, Jr. , sometimes referred to as Jake Ruppert, was a National Guard colonel; a U.S. Representative from New York; and brewery owner, who went on to own the New York Yankees...
's Central Opera House at 205 East 67th Street.
DuMont was the first television network to broadcast a film production for television: Talk Fast, Mister, produced by RKO in 1944. DuMont also aired the first television situation comedy
Situation comedy
A situation comedy, often shortened to sitcom, is a genre of comedy that features characters sharing the same common environment, such as a home or workplace, accompanied with jokes as part of the dialogue...
, Mary Kay and Johnny
Mary Kay and Johnny
Mary Kay and Johnny is the first situation comedy broadcast on network television in the United States. Starring real-life married couple Mary Kay Stearns and Johnny Stearns, the series is the first program to show a couple sharing a bed, and the first television series to show a woman's pregnancy...
, as well as the first network-televised soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
, Faraway Hill
Faraway Hill
Faraway Hill is the first soap opera broadcast on an American television network, running on the DuMont Television Network.-Broadcast history:...
. Cavalcade of Stars, a variety show
Variety show
A variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is an entertainment made up of a variety of acts, especially musical performances and sketch comedy, and normally introduced by a compère or host. Other types of acts include magic, animal and circus acts, acrobatics, juggling...
hosted by Jackie Gleason
Jackie Gleason
Jackie Gleason was an American comedian, actor and musician. He was known for his brash visual and verbal comedy style, especially by his character Ralph Kramden on The Honeymooners, a situation-comedy television series. His most noted film roles were as Minnesota Fats in the drama film The...
, was the birthplace of The Honeymooners
The Honeymooners
The Honeymooners is an American situation comedy television show, based on a recurring 1951–'55 sketch of the same name. It originally aired on the DuMont network's Cavalcade of Stars and subsequently on the CBS network's The Jackie Gleason Show hosted by Jackie Gleason, and filmed before a live...
(Gleason took his variety show to CBS in 1952 but filmed the Classic 39 Honeymooners episodes at DuMont's Adelphi Theater studio in 1955-56). Bishop Fulton J. Sheen
Fulton J. Sheen
Servant of God Fulton John Sheen, born Peter John Sheen was an American archbishop of the Catholic Church known for his preaching and especially his work on television and radio...
's devotional program
Religious broadcasting
Religious broadcasting refers to broadcasting by religious organizations, usually with a religious message. Many religious organizations have long recorded content such as sermons and lectures, and have moved into distributing content on their Internet websites.While this article emphasises...
Life Is Worth Living
Life is Worth Living
Life is Worth Living is an inspirational American television series which ran on the DuMont Television Network from February 12, 1952 to April 26, 1955, then on ABC until 1957.-Broadcast history:Hosted by Bishop Fulton J...
went up against Milton Berle
Milton Berle
Milton Berlinger , better known as Milton Berle, was an American comedian and actor. As the manic host of NBC's Texaco Star Theater , in 1948 he was the first major star of U.S. television and as such became known as Uncle Miltie and Mr...
in many cities, and was the first show to compete successfully in the ratings against "Mr. Television". In 1952, Sheen won an Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for "Most Outstanding Personality". The network's other notable programs include:
- Ted Mack's The Original Amateur Hour, which began on radio in the 1930s under original host Edward BowesEdward BowesEdward Bowes was an American radio personality of the 1930s and 40s whose Major Bowes' Amateur Hour was the best-known amateur talent show in radio during its eighteen-year run on NBC Radio and CBS Radio.-Early life and radio career:Bowes made his first business success in real estate, until the...
- The Morey Amsterdam ShowThe Morey Amsterdam ShowThe Morey Amsterdam Show is an American sitcom which ran from 1948-1949 on CBS Television and 1949-1950 on the DuMont Television Network , for a total of 71 episodes.-Synopsis:...
, a comedy/variety show hosted by Morey AmsterdamMorey AmsterdamMorey Amsterdam was an American television actor and comedian, best known for the role of Buddy Sorrell on The Dick Van Dyke Show in the early 1960s.-Early life:...
, which started on CBS before moving to DuMont in 1949 - Captain Video and His Video Rangers, a hugely popular kids' science fictionScience fictionScience fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
series - The Arthur Murray PartyThe Arthur Murray PartyThe Arthur Murray Party is an American television variety show which ran from July 1950 until September 1960. The show was hosted by famous dancers Arthur and Kathryn Murray, and was basically one long advertisement for their chain of dance studios...
, a dance program - Down You GoDown You GoDown You Go is an American television game show originally broadcast on the DuMont Television Network. The Emmy Award-nominated series ran from 1951–1956 as a prime time series hosted by Dr. Bergen Evans...
, a popular panel show - Rocky King, Inside DetectiveRocky King, Inside DetectiveRocky King, Inside Detective was an American television series broadcast on the now-defunct DuMont Television Network from 1950 to 1954. It was one of DuMont's most popular programs. It was a live crime series set in New York City....
, a private eye series starring Roscoe KarnsRoscoe KarnsRoscoe Karns was an American actor. He appeared in nearly 150 films between 1915 and 1964.He played the title role in the popular DuMont Television Network series Rocky King, Inside Detective from 1950 to 1954... - The PlainclothesmanThe PlainclothesmanThe Plainclothesman was an early American television program broadcast on the now defunct DuMont Television Network.-Broadcast history:The series ran from 1949 to 1954. It was a detective show starring Ken Lynch, whose character was known only as "The Lieutenant"...
, a camera's-eye-view detective series - Live coverage of boxingBoxingBoxing, also called pugilism, is a combat sport in which two people fight each other using their fists. Boxing is supervised by a referee over a series of between one to three minute intervals called rounds...
and professional wrestlingProfessional wrestlingProfessional wrestling is a mode of spectacle, combining athletics and theatrical performance.Roland Barthes, "The World of Wrestling", Mythologies, 1957 It takes the form of events, held by touring companies, which mimic a title match combat sport...
, the latter featuring matches staged by the Capitol Wrestling Corporation, the predecessor to World Wrestling EntertainmentWorld Wrestling EntertainmentWorld Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. is an American publicly traded, privately controlled entertainment company dealing primarily in professional wrestling, with major revenue sources also coming from film, music, product licensing, and direct product sales... - The Johns Hopkins Science ReviewThe Johns Hopkins Science ReviewThe Johns Hopkins Science Review is a critically acclaimed television series sponsored by Johns Hopkins University which aired on the now-defunct DuMont Television Network.-Broadcast history:...
, a Peabody Award winning education program - Cash and CarryCash and Carry (TV series)Cash and Carry is an American television game show hosted by Dennis James that ran on the then-both affiliates of the DuMont Television Network from June 20, 1946 to July 1, 1947...
, the first network-televised game showGame showA game show is a type of radio or television program in which members of the public, television personalities or celebrities, sometimes as part of a team, play a game which involves answering questions or solving puzzles usually for money and/or prizes...
The network was a pioneer in television programming aimed at minority audiences and featuring minority performers, at a time when the other American networks aired few television series for non-whites. Among DuMont's minority programs were The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong was an American television series which aired on the now defunct DuMont Television Network. It starred Chinese American silent film and talkie star Anna May Wong, who played a detective in a role written specifically for her. The Gallery of Madame Liu Tsong was the...
, starring Asian American
Asian American
Asian Americans are Americans of Asian descent. The U.S. Census Bureau definition of Asians as "Asian” refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent, including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan,...
film actress Anna May Wong
Anna May Wong
Anna May Wong was an American actress, the first Chinese American movie star, and the first Asian American to become an international star...
, the first U.S. television show to star an Asian American, and The Hazel Scott Show
The Hazel Scott Show
The Hazel Scott Show was an early American television program broadcast on the now defunct DuMont Television Network. The series ran during the summer of 1950, and is most notable for being the first U.S...
, starring pianist and singer Hazel Scott
Hazel Scott
Hazel Dorothy Scott was an internationally known, American jazz and classical pianist and singer.-Early years and education:...
, the first U.S. network television series to be hosted by a black
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
woman.
Although DuMont's programming pre-dated videotape
Videotape
A videotape is a recording of images and sounds on to magnetic tape as opposed to film stock or random access digital media. Videotapes are also used for storing scientific or medical data, such as the data produced by an electrocardiogram...
, many DuMont offerings were caught on kinescopes. These kinescopes were said to be stored in a warehouse until the 1970s. Actress Edie Adams
Edie Adams
Edie Adams was an American singer, Broadway, television and film actress and comedienne. Adams, a Tony Award winner, "both embodied and winked at the stereotypes of fetching chanteuse and sexpot blonde." She was well-known for her impersonations of female stars on stage and television, most...
, the wife of comedian Ernie Kovacs
Ernie Kovacs
Ernie Kovacs was a Hungarian American comedian and actor.Kovacs' uninhibited, often ad-libbed, and visually experimental comedic style came to influence numerous television comedy programs for years after his death in an automobile accident...
(both regular performers on early television) testified in 1996 before a panel of the Library of Congress
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...
on the preservation of television and video. Adams claimed that so little value was given to these films that the stored kinescopes were loaded into three trucks and dumped into Upper New York Bay
Upper New York Bay
Upper New York Bay, or Upper Bay, is the traditional heart of the Port of New York and New Jersey, and often called New York Harbor. It is enclosed by the New York City boroughs of Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Staten Island and the Hudson County, New Jersey municipalities of Jersey City and Bayonne.It...
. Nevertheless, a number of DuMont programs survive at The Paley Center for Media in New York City, the UCLA Film and Television Archive
UCLA Film and Television Archive
The UCLA Film and Television Archive is an internationally renowned visual arts organization focused on the preservation, study, and appreciation of film and television, based at the University of California, Los Angeles. It holds more than 220,000 film and television titles and 27 million feet of...
in Los Angeles, in the Peabody Award
Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards recognize distinguished and meritorious public service by radio and television stations, networks, producing organizations and individuals. In 1939, the National Association of Broadcasters formed a committee to recognize outstanding achievement in radio broadcasting...
s Collection at the University of Georgia
University of Georgia
The University of Georgia is a public research university located in Athens, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1785, it is the oldest and largest of the state's institutions of higher learning and is one of multiple schools to claim the title of the oldest public university in the United States...
, and the Museum of Broadcast Communications
Museum of Broadcast Communications
The Museum of Broadcast Communications is an American museum that currently exists exclusively on the Internet and not in any physical capacity. Its stated mission is "to collect, preserve, and present historic and contemporary radio and television content as well as educate, inform and entertain...
in Chicago.
Although nearly the entire DuMont film archive was destroyed, several surviving DuMont shows have been released on DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
. A large number of episodes of Life Is Worth Living have been saved, and they are now aired weekly on the Eternal Word Television Network
Eternal Word Television Network
The Eternal Word Television Network is an American cable television network which presents Catholic-themed programming. It was founded in 1980 by Mother Mary Angelica of the Annunciation, PCPA...
Catholic cable network, which also makes a collection of them available on DVD (In the biographical information about Fulton J. Sheen added to the end of many episodes, a still image of Bishop Sheen looking into a DuMont Television camera can be seen). Several companies which distribute DVDs over the Internet have released a small number of episodes of Cavalcade of Stars and The Morey Amsterdam Show
The Morey Amsterdam Show
The Morey Amsterdam Show is an American sitcom which ran from 1948-1949 on CBS Television and 1949-1950 on the DuMont Television Network , for a total of 71 episodes.-Synopsis:...
. Two more DuMont programs, Captain Video and His Video Rangers and Rocky King, Inside Detective
Rocky King, Inside Detective
Rocky King, Inside Detective was an American television series broadcast on the now-defunct DuMont Television Network from 1950 to 1954. It was one of DuMont's most popular programs. It was a live crime series set in New York City....
, have had a small amount of surviving episodes released commercially by at least one major distributor of public domain programming.
Awards
DuMont programs were by necessity low-budget affairs, and the network received relatively few awards from the television industry. Most awards during the 1950s went to NBC and CBS, who were able to out-spend other companies and draw on their extensive history of radio broadcasting in the relatively new television medium. DuMont, however, did win a number of awards during its years of operation.During the 1952–1953 television season, Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, host of Life Is Worth Living, won an Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for Most Outstanding Personality. Sheen beat out CBS's Arthur Godfrey
Arthur Godfrey
Arthur Morton Godfrey was an American radio and television broadcaster and entertainer who was sometimes introduced by his nickname, The Old Redhead...
, Edward R. Murrow
Edward R. Murrow
Edward Roscoe Murrow, KBE was an American broadcast journalist. He first came to prominence with a series of radio news broadcasts during World War II, which were followed by millions of listeners in the United States and Canada.Fellow journalists Eric Sevareid, Ed Bliss, and Alexander Kendrick...
, and Lucille Ball
Lucille Ball
Lucille Désirée Ball was an American comedian, film, television, stage and radio actress, model, film and television executive, and star of the sitcoms I Love Lucy, The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour, The Lucy Show, Here's Lucy and Life With Lucy...
who were also nominated for the same award. Sheen was also nominated for— but did not win— consecutive Public Service Emmys in 1952, 1953, and 1954.
DuMont received an Emmy nomination for Down You Go
Down You Go
Down You Go is an American television game show originally broadcast on the DuMont Television Network. The Emmy Award-nominated series ran from 1951–1956 as a prime time series hosted by Dr. Bergen Evans...
, a popular game show during the 1952–1953 television season (in the category Best Audience Participation, Quiz, or Panel Program). The network was nominated twice for its coverage of professional football during the 1953–1954 and 1954–1955 television seasons.
The Johns Hopkins Science Review
The Johns Hopkins Science Review
The Johns Hopkins Science Review is a critically acclaimed television series sponsored by Johns Hopkins University which aired on the now-defunct DuMont Television Network.-Broadcast history:...
, a DuMont public affairs program, was awarded a Peabody Award
Peabody Award
The George Foster Peabody Awards recognize distinguished and meritorious public service by radio and television stations, networks, producing organizations and individuals. In 1939, the National Association of Broadcasters formed a committee to recognize outstanding achievement in radio broadcasting...
in 1952 in the Education category. Sheen's Emmy and the Science Review Peabody were the only national awards the DuMont Network received. Though DuMont series and performers would continue to win local television awards, by the mid-1950s the DuMont Network no longer had a national presence.
Ratings
| Videodex 62 City Ratings | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| First week of August 1950 | ||||
| Rank | Series | Network | # of cities | % TV homes |
| 1 | Toast of the Town | CBS | 34 | 37.2 |
| 2 | Stop the Music (TV series) Stop the Music (TV series) Stop the Music is a prime time television game show that aired for an hour on Thursday evenings on ABC from May 5, 1949 to April 24, 1952, and again for a half-hour from September 7, 1954, to June 14, 1956. It had also been broadcast on radio from 1948 to 1949.The series hosts were Bert Parks and... |
ABC | 50 | 28.4 |
| 3 | Kraft TV Theater | NBC | 34 | 27.5 |
| 4 | Ford Star Revue | NBC | 45 | 26.9 |
| 5 | The Garry Moore Show The Garry Moore Show The Garry Moore Show is the name for several separate American variety series on the CBS television network in the 1950s and 1960s. Hosted by experienced radio performer, Garry Moore, the series helped launch the careers of many comedic talents, such as Don Adams, George Gobel, Carol Burnett, Don... |
CBS | 19 | 26.4 |
| 6 | The Big Story The Big Story (radio/TV) The Big Story was a radio and television crime show which dramatized the true stories of real-life newspaper reporters. The only continuing character was the narrator, Bob Sloane. Produced by Barnard J. Prockter, the shows were scripted by Gail Ingram, Arnold Pearl and Max Ehrlich. Tom Victor and... |
NBC | 32 | 25.6 |
| 7 | The Original Amateur Hour | NBC | 54 | 25.3 |
| 8 | Break the Bank | NBC | 42 | 24.2 |
| 9 | The Lone Ranger The Lone Ranger The Lone Ranger is a fictional masked Texas Ranger who, with his Native American companion Tonto, fights injustice in the American Old West. The character has become an enduring icon of American culture.... |
ABC | 39 | 23.9 |
| 10 | Your Hit Parade Your Hit Parade Your Hit Parade, is an American radio and television music program that was broadcast from 1935 to 1955 on radio, and seen from 1950 to 1959 on television. It was sponsored by American Tobacco's Lucky Strike cigarettes. During this 24-year run, the show had 19 orchestra leaders and 52 singers or... |
NBC | 18 | 23.7 |
| 11 | Cavalcade of Stars | DuMont | 20 | 22.2 |
| 12 | Mama Mama (TV series) Mama is a weekly Maxwell House-sponsored CBS television comedy-drama series which ran from July 1, 1949 until March 17, 1957.Based on the Kathryn Forbes memoir Mama's Bank Account, which was also adapted for the 1944 John Van Druten play and subsequent 1948 film I Remember Mama, it told the... |
CBS | 16 | 22.0 |
| 13 | Wrestling | DuMont | 15 | 21.4 |
| 14 | Beat the Clock Beat the Clock Beat the Clock is a Goodson-Todman game show which has aired on American television in several versions since 1950.The original show, hosted by Bud Collyer, ran on CBS from 1950–1958 and ABC from 1958–1961. The show was revived in syndication as The New Beat the Clock from 1969–1974, with Jack Narz... |
CBS | 33 | 20.7 |
| 15 | Masterpiece Playhouse | NBC | 32 | 19.2 |
The earliest measurements of television audiences were performed by the C. E. Hooper
C. E. Hooper
The C. E. Hooper Company was an American company which measured radio and television ratings during the "Golden Age" of radio. Founded in 1935, the company provided information on the most popular radio shows of the era...
company of New York. DuMont performed well in the Hooper ratings; in fact, DuMont's talent program, The Original Amateur Hour, was the most popular series of the 1947–48 season. Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
ranked DuMont's popular variety series Cavalcade of Stars the tenth most popular series two seasons later.
In February 1950, Hooper's competitor A.C. Nielsen
ACNielsen
ACNielsen is a global marketing research firm, with worldwide headquarters in New York City. Regional headquarters for North America are located in Schaumburg, Illinois. As of May 2010, it is part of The Nielsen Company.-History:...
bought out the Hooperatings system. DuMont didn't fare well with the change: none of its shows appeared on Nielsen's annual top 20 lists of the most popular series. One of the DuMont Network's biggest hits of the 1950s, Life is Worth Living, received Nielsen ratings of up to 11.1, attracting more than 10 million viewers. Sheen's one-man program — in which he discussed philosophy, psychology and other fields of thought from a Christian perspective — was the most widely viewed religious series in the history of television. 169 local television stations aired Life, and for three years the program competed successfully against NBC's popular The Milton Berle Show. The ABC and CBS programs which aired in the same time slot were cancelled.
Life is Worth Living wasn't the only DuMont program to achieve double-digit ratings. In 1952, Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
magazine reported that popular DuMont game show Down You Go had attracted an audience estimated at 16 million. Similarly, DuMont's summer 1954 replacement series, The Goldbergs
The Goldbergs
The Goldbergs is a comedy-drama broadcast from 1929 to 1946 on American radio, and from 1949 to 1956 on American television. It was adapted into a 1948 play, Me and Molly, and a 1973 Broadway musical, Molly.-Radio:...
, achieved audiences estimated at 10 million. Still, these series were only moderately popular compared to NBC's and CBS's highest-rated programs.
Nielsen wasn't the only company to report television ratings, however. Companies such as Trendex, Videodex, and Arbitron
Arbitron
Arbitron is a consumer research company in the United States that collects listener data on radio audiences. It was founded as American Research Bureau by Jim Seiler in 1949 and became national by merging with L.A. based Coffin, Cooper and Clay in the early 1950s...
also measured TV viewership. The adjacent chart comes from Videodex's August 1950 ratings breakdown, as reported in Billboard
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
magazine.
Disputes with AT&T and Paramount
DuMont struggled to get its programs aired in many parts of the country, in part due to technical limitations at telephone company AT&TAT&T
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications corporation headquartered in Whitacre Tower, Dallas, Texas, United States. It is the largest provider of mobile telephony and fixed telephony in the United States, and is also a provider of broadband and subscription television services...
. During the 1940s and 50s, television signals were sent between stations via coaxial cable
Coaxial cable
Coaxial cable, or coax, has an inner conductor surrounded by a flexible, tubular insulating layer, surrounded by a tubular conducting shield. The term coaxial comes from the inner conductor and the outer shield sharing the same geometric axis...
links which were owned by AT&T. The service provider didn't have enough cable lines to provide signal relay service from all four networks to their affiliates at the same time, so AT&T allocated times when each network could offer live programs to their affiliates. In 1950, AT&T allotted NBC and CBS each over 100 hours of live prime time
Prime time
Prime time or primetime is the block of broadcast programming during the middle of the evening for television programing.The term prime time is often defined in terms of a fixed time period—for example, from 19:00 to 22:00 or 20:00 to 23:00 Prime time or primetime is the block of broadcast...
network service, but gave ABC only 53 hours, and DuMont just 37. AT&T also required each television network to lease both radio and television lines. DuMont was the only television network without a radio network, but was forced to pay for a service it didn't use. DuMont protested AT&T's actions with the Federal Communications Commission
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission is an independent agency of the United States government, created, Congressional statute , and with the majority of its commissioners appointed by the current President. The FCC works towards six goals in the areas of broadband, competition, the spectrum, the...
(FCC), and eventually received a compromise.
DuMont's biggest corporate hurdle, however, may have been with the company's own partner, Paramount. Relations between the two companies were strained as early as 1939, when Paramount, without DuMont, opened experimental television stations in Los Angeles and Chicago. Dr. DuMont claimed that the original 1937 acquisition proposal required that Paramount would expand its television interests "through DuMont". Paramount representative Paul Raibourn, who also was a member of DuMont's board of directors, denied that any such restriction had ever been discussed (Dr. DuMont was vindicated on this point by a 1953 examination of the original draft document).
DuMont aspired to grow beyond its three stations, applying for new television station licenses in Cincinnati and Cleveland
Cleveland, Ohio
Cleveland is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Cuyahoga County, the most populous county in the state. The city is located in northeastern Ohio on the southern shore of Lake Erie, approximately west of the Pennsylvania border...
in 1947. This would have given the network five owned-and-operated station
Owned-and-operated station
In the broadcasting industry , an owned-and-operated station usually refers to a television station or radio station that is owned by the network with which it is associated...
s (O&Os), the maximum allowed by the Federal Communications Commission at the time. However, DuMont was hampered by Paramount's two stations, KTLA
KTLA
KTLA, virtual channel 5, is a television station in Los Angeles, California, USA. Owned by the Tribune Company, KTLA is an affiliate of the CW Television Network. KTLA's studios are on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, and its transmitter is located atop Mount Wilson...
in Los Angeles and WBKB in Chicago (now WBBM-TV
WBBM-TV
WBBM-TV, virtual channel 2 , is the CBS owned-and-operated television station in Chicago, Illinois. WBBM-TV's main studios and offices are located in The Loop section of Chicago, as part of the development at Block 37, and its transmitter is atop the Willis Tower.-History:WBBM-TV traces its history...
)--the descendants of the two experimental stations that rankled DuMont in 1940. Although these stations never carried DuMont programming (with the exception of one year on KTLA in 1947–48), and in fact competed against DuMont's affiliates in those cities, the FCC ruled that Paramount's two stations were effectively DuMont O&Os, which effectively placed DuMont at the five-station cap. DuMont would not be able to open additional stations as long as Paramount owned stations or owned a portion of DuMont. Paramount refused to sell.
In 1949, Paramount Pictures launched the Paramount Television Network
Paramount Television Network
The Paramount Television Network was a venture by American film corporation Paramount Pictures to organize a television network in the late 1940s...
, a service which provided local television stations with filmed television programs; Paramount's network "undercut the company that it had invested in." Paramount didn't share its stars, big budgets, or filmed programs with DuMont; the company had stopped financially supporting DuMont in 1941. Although Paramount executives had indicated they would produce programs for DuMont, the studio never supplied the network with programs or technical assistance. The acrimonious relationship between Paramount and DuMont came to a head during the 1953 FCC hearings regarding the ABC–United Paramount Theaters merger when Paul Raibourn, an executive at Paramount, publicly derided the quality of DuMont television sets in court testimony.
Trouble from the start
DuMont began with one basic disadvantage: unlike NBCNBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
and CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
, it did not have a radio network from which to draw revenue and big names. Most early television licenses were granted to established radio broadcasters, and many longtime relationships with radio networks carried over to the new medium. As CBS and NBC gained their footing, they began to offer programming that drew on their radio backgrounds, bringing over the most popular radio stars. Early television station owners, when deciding which network would receive their main affiliation, were more likely to choose CBS' roster of Lucille Ball
Lucille Ball
Lucille Désirée Ball was an American comedian, film, television, stage and radio actress, model, film and television executive, and star of the sitcoms I Love Lucy, The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour, The Lucy Show, Here's Lucy and Life With Lucy...
, Jack Benny
Jack Benny
Jack Benny was an American comedian, vaudevillian, and actor for radio, television, and film...
, and Ed Sullivan
Ed Sullivan
Edward Vincent "Ed" Sullivan was an American entertainment writer and television host, best known as the presenter of the TV variety show The Ed Sullivan Show. The show was broadcast from 1948 to 1971 , which made it one of the longest-running variety shows in U.S...
over DuMont, which offered a then-unknown Jackie Gleason
Jackie Gleason
Jackie Gleason was an American comedian, actor and musician. He was known for his brash visual and verbal comedy style, especially by his character Ralph Kramden on The Honeymooners, a situation-comedy television series. His most noted film roles were as Minnesota Fats in the drama film The...
and Bishop Sheen
Fulton J. Sheen
Servant of God Fulton John Sheen, born Peter John Sheen was an American archbishop of the Catholic Church known for his preaching and especially his work on television and radio...
. In smaller markets, with a limited number of stations, DuMont and ABC were often relegated to secondary status, so their programs got clearance only if the primary network was off the air or delayed via kinescope
Kinescope
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor...
recording ("teletranscriptions" in DuMont parlance).
Adding to DuMont's troubles was the FCC's 1948 "freeze" on television license applications. This was done to sort out the thousands of applications that had come streaming in, but also to rethink the allocation and technical standards laid down prior to World War II. It became clear soon after the war that 12 channels ("channel 1" had been removed from television broadcasting use) were not nearly enough for national television service. What was to be a six-month freeze lasted until 1952, when the FCC opened the UHF
Ultra high frequency
Ultra-High Frequency designates the ITU Radio frequency range of electromagnetic waves between 300 MHz and 3 GHz , also known as the decimetre band or decimetre wave as the wavelengths range from one to ten decimetres...
spectrum. The FCC, however, did not require television manufacturers to include UHF capability. In order to see UHF stations, most people had to buy an expensive converter
Set-top box
A set-top box or set-top unit is an information appliance device that generally contains a tuner and connects to a television set and an external source of signal, turning the signal into content which is then displayed on the television screen or other display device.-History:Before the...
. Even then, the picture quality was marginal at best. Tied to this was a decision to restrict VHF allocations in medium- and smaller-sized markets. Television sets were not required to have all-channel tuning until 1964.
Forced to rely on UHF to expand, DuMont saw one station after another go dark due to dismal ratings. It bought small, distressed UHF station KCTY
KCTY (defunct)
KCTY operated on channel 25 in the Kansas City market from June 9, 1953 to February 28, 1954. The studio for channel 25 was located in the Pickwick Hotel in downtown Kansas City, Missouri but the transmitter was located in a rural area of Overland Park, Kansas.The station was the second...
in Kansas City
Kansas City Metropolitan Area
The Kansas City Metropolitan Area is a fifteen-county metropolitan area that is anchored by Kansas City, Missouri and is bisected by the border between the states of Missouri and Kansas. As of the 2010 Census, the metropolitan area has a population of 2,035,334. The metropolitan area is the...
in 1954, but ran it for just three months before shutting it down at a considerable loss after attempting to compete with three established VHF stations.
The FCC's Dr. Hyman Goldin said in 1960, "If there had been four VHF outlets in the top markets, there's no question DuMont would have lived and would have eventually turned the corner in terms of profitability."
The end
During the early years of television, there was some measure of cooperation among the four major U.S. television networks. For example, the "golden spike" ceremony had been broadcast by all four networks. However, as television grew into a profitable business, an intense rivalry developed between the networks, just as it had in radio. NBC and CBS competed fiercely for viewers and advertising dollars, a contest neither underfunded DuMont nor ABC could hope to win. According to author Dennis Mazzocco, "NBC tried to make an arrangement with ABC and CBS to destroy the DuMont network." The plan was for NBC and CBS to exclusively offer ABC their most popular series after they had aired on the bigger networks. ABC would, in effect, become a network of re-runs, but DuMont would be shut out. ABC president Leonard GoldensonLeonard Goldenson
Leonard H. Goldenson was President of the U.S. television and radio broadcaster ABC.-Early life and career:...
rejected NBC executive David Sarnoff
David Sarnoff
David Sarnoff was an American businessman and pioneer of American commercial radio and television. He founded the National Broadcasting Company and throughout most of his career he led the Radio Corporation of America in various capacities from shortly after its founding in 1919 until his...
's proposal, but "did not report it to the Justice Department".
DuMont survived the early 1950s only because of WDTV in Pittsburgh, the lone commercial VHF station in what was then the sixth-largest market. WDTV's only competition came from UHF stations and distant stations from Johnstown, Pennsylvania
Johnstown, Pennsylvania
Johnstown is a city in Cambria County, Pennsylvania, United States, west-southwest of Altoona, Pennsylvania and east of Pittsburgh. The population was 20,978 at the 2010 census. It is the principal city of the Johnstown, Pennsylvania, Metropolitan Statistical Area, which includes Cambria County...
; Youngstown, Ohio
Youngstown, Ohio
Youngstown is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Mahoning County; it also extends into Trumbull County. The municipality is situated on the Mahoning River, approximately southeast of Cleveland and northwest of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania...
; and Wheeling, West Virginia
Wheeling, West Virginia
Wheeling is a city in Ohio and Marshall counties in the U.S. state of West Virginia; it is the county seat of Ohio County. Wheeling is the principal city of the Wheeling Metropolitan Statistical Area...
. No other commercial VHF station signed on in Pittsburgh until 1957, giving WDTV a de facto monopoly on television in the area. Since WDTV carried secondary affiliations with the other three networks, DuMont used this as a bargaining chip to get its programs cleared in other large markets.
Despite its severe financial straits, by 1953 DuMont appeared to be on its way to establishing itself as the third national network. DuMont programs aired live on 16 stations, but it could count on only seven primary stations—its three owned-and-operated station
Owned-and-operated station
In the broadcasting industry , an owned-and-operated station usually refers to a television station or radio station that is owned by the network with which it is associated...
s ("O&Os"), plus WGN-TV
WGN-TV
WGN-TV, virtual channel 9 , is the CW-affiliated television station in Chicago, Illinois built, signed on, and owned by the Tribune Company. WGN-TV's studios and offices are located at 2501 W...
in Chicago, KTTV
KTTV
KTTV, channel 11, is an owned-and-operated television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in Los Angeles, California. Serving the vast Los Angeles metropolitan area, KTTV is a sister station to KCOP , Los Angeles' MyNetworkTV station...
in Los Angeles, KFEL-TV (now KWGN-TV
KWGN-TV
KWGN-TV, virtual channel 2 , is a television station in Denver, Colorado, owned by the Tribune Company and affiliated with the CW Television Network...
) in Denver and WTVN-TV (now WSYX
WSYX
WSYX, channel 6, is an ABC-affiliated television station located in Columbus, Ohio. WSYX is owned by the Sinclair Broadcast Group, which also operates Fox affiliate WTTE through a local marketing agreement...
) in Columbus, Ohio
Columbus, Ohio
Columbus is the capital of and the largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio. The broader metropolitan area encompasses several counties and is the third largest in Ohio behind those of Cleveland and Cincinnati. Columbus is the third largest city in the American Midwest, and the fifteenth largest city...
. In contrast, ABC had a full complement of five O&Os, augmented by nine primary affiliates. ABC also had a radio network (it was descended from NBC's Blue Network
Blue Network
The Blue Network, and its immediate predecessor, the NBC Blue Network, were the on-air names of an American radio production and distribution service from 1927 to 1945...
) from which to draw revenue and affiliate loyalty. However, ABC had only 14 primary stations, while CBS and NBC had over 40 each. By 1953, ABC was badly overextended and on the verge of bankruptcy.
By this time, DuMont had begun to differentiate
Product differentiation
In economics and marketing, product differentiation is the process of distinguishing a product or offering from others, to make it more attractive to a particular target market. This involves differentiating it from competitors' products as well as a firm's own product offerings...
itself from NBC and CBS. It allowed its advertisers to choose the locations where their advertising ran, potentially saving them millions of dollars. By contrast, ABC operated like CBS and NBC, forcing advertisers to purchase a large "must-buy" list of stations.
ABC's fortunes were dramatically altered in February 1953, when the network was bought by United Paramount Theatres
United Paramount Theatres
Plitt Theatres was one of the largest chain of cinemas in the United States.The theater chain was divested from Paramount Pictures as a result of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in the case United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. ....
, which had recently spun off from Paramount Pictures. The merger provided ABC with a badly needed cash infusion, giving it the resources to provide a national television service on a scale approaching that of CBS and NBC. Through UPT president Leonard Goldenson
Leonard Goldenson
Leonard H. Goldenson was President of the U.S. television and radio broadcaster ABC.-Early life and career:...
, ABC also gained ties with the Hollywood studios that more than matched those DuMont's producers had with Broadway.
Realizing that the ABC-UPT deal put DuMont on life support, network officials were receptive to a merger offer from ABC. Goldenson quickly brokered a deal with Ted Bergmann, DuMont's managing director, under which the merged network would have been called "ABC-DuMont" until at least 1958 and would have honored all of DuMont's network commitments. In return, DuMont would get $5 million in cash, guaranteed advertising time for DuMont sets and a secure future for its staff. A merged ABC-DuMont would have been a colossus rivaling CBS and NBC, as it would have owned stations in five of the six largest U.S. television markets (excluding only Philadelphia) as well as ABC's radio network. It also would have inherited DuMont's de facto monopoly in Pittsburgh, and would have been one of two networks to wholly own a station in the nation's capital (the other being NBC). However, it would have had to sell a New York station — either DuMont's WABD or ABC flagship WJZ-TV (now WABC-TV
WABC-TV
WABC-TV, channel 7, is the flagship station of the Disney-owned American Broadcasting Company located in New York City. The station's studios and offices are located on the Upper West Side section of Manhattan, adjacent to ABC's corporate headquarters, and its transmitter is atop the Empire State...
). It also would have had to sell two other stations to get under the FCC's limit of five stations per owner.
However, Paramount veto
Veto
A veto, Latin for "I forbid", is the power of an officer of the state to unilaterally stop an official action, especially enactment of a piece of legislation...
ed the plan almost out of hand due to antitrust
Antitrust
The United States antitrust law is a body of laws that prohibits anti-competitive behavior and unfair business practices. Antitrust laws are intended to encourage competition in the marketplace. These competition laws make illegal certain practices deemed to hurt businesses or consumers or both,...
concerns. A few months earlier, the FCC had ruled that Paramount controlled DuMont, and there were still some questions about whether UPT had really separated from Paramount.
Westinghouse Electric (1886)
Westinghouse Electric was an American manufacturing company. It was founded in 1886 as Westinghouse Electric Company and later renamed Westinghouse Electric Corporation by George Westinghouse. The company purchased CBS in 1995 and became CBS Corporation in 1997...
for $9.75 million in late 1954. While this gave DuMont a short-term cash infusion, it eliminated the leverage the network had to get program clearances in other markets. Without its de facto monopoly in Pittsburgh, the company's advertising revenue shrank to less than half that of 1953. By February 1955, DuMont executives realized the company could not continue as a television network. It was decided to shut down network operations and operate WABD and WTTG as independents. On April 1, 1955, most of DuMont's entertainment programs were dropped. Bishop Sheen aired his last program on DuMont on April 26 and later moved to ABC. By May, just eight programs were left on the network, with only inexpensive shows and sporting events keeping what was left of the network going through the summer. The network also largely abandoned the use of the intercity network coaxial cable, on which it had spent $3 million in 1954 to transmit shows that mostly lacked station clearance.
In August, Paramount, with the help of other stockholders, seized full control of DuMont Laboratories. The last non-sports program on DuMont, the game show What's the Story
What's the Story
What's the Story was an American television game show broadcast on the DuMont Television Network from July 25, 1951 to September 23, 1955 and aired in eleven different timeslots....
, aired on September 23, 1955. After that, DuMont's network feed was used only for occasional sporting events. DuMont's last broadcast, a boxing match
Boxing from St. Nicholas Arena
Boxing from St. Nicholas Arena was an American sports program originally broadcast on NBC from 1946 to 1948, and later on the now-defunct DuMont Television Network from 1954 to 1956.-Broadcast history:The DuMont version was hosted by Chris Schenkel....
, aired on August 6, 1956. The date has also been reported as April 1950, September 1955, or August 4, 1958. According to one source, the final program aired on only five stations nationwide.
DuMont spun off WABD and WTTG as the "DuMont Broadcasting Corporation". The name was later changed to "Metropolitan Broadcasting Company" to distance the company from what was seen as a complete failure. In 1958, John Kluge bought Paramount's shares for $4 million, and renamed the company Metromedia
Metromedia
Metromedia was a media company that owned radio and television stations in the United States from 1956 to 1986 and owned Orion Pictures from 1986-1997.- Overview :...
in 1960. WABD became WNEW-TV and later WNYW
WNYW
WNYW, virtual channel 5 , is the flagship television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in New York City. The station's transmitter is atop the Empire State Building and its studio facilities are located in the Yorkville section of Manhattan...
; WTTG still broadcasts under its original call letters
Call sign
In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign is a unique designation for a transmitting station. In North America they are used as names for broadcasting stations...
.
For 50 years, DuMont was the only major broadcast television network to go off the air, until UPN
UPN
United Paramount Network was a television network that was broadcast in over 200 markets in the United States from 1995 to 2006. UPN was originally owned by Viacom/Paramount and Chris-Craft Industries, the former of which, through the Paramount Television Group, produced most of the network's...
and the WB
The WB Television Network
The WB Television Network is a former television network in the United States that was launched on January 11, 1995 as a joint venture between Warner Bros. and Tribune Broadcasting. On January 24, 2006, CBS Corporation and Warner Bros...
networks shut down in 2006 to merge and form the CW
The CW Television Network
The CW Television Network is a television network in the United States launched at the beginning of the 2006–2007 television season. It is a joint venture between CBS Corporation, the former owners of United Paramount Network , and Time Warner's Warner Bros., former majority owner of The WB...
network.
Fate of the DuMont stations
All three DuMont-owned stations are still operating and coincidentally, all three are owned-and-operated stationOwned-and-operated station
In the broadcasting industry , an owned-and-operated station usually refers to a television station or radio station that is owned by the network with which it is associated...
s of their respective networks, just as when they were part of DuMont. Of the three, only Washington's WTTG still has its original call letters.
WTTG and New York's WABD (later WNEW-TV, and now WNYW) survived as Metromedia-owned independents until 1986, when Metromedia was purchased by the News Corporation
News Corporation
News Corporation or News Corp. is an American multinational media conglomerate. It is the world's second-largest media conglomerate as of 2011 in terms of revenue, and the world's third largest in entertainment as of 2009, although the BBC remains the world's largest broadcaster...
to form the nucleus of the new Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as Fox Network or simply Fox , is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the...
. Clarke Ingram
Clarke Ingram
Clarke Ingram is a United States radio personality and programming executive.Ingram is best known in his home market and hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Most recently, he was employed at Pittsburgh-area stations WKHB and WKFB , which program a mixture of talk shows and oldies...
, who maintained a DuMont memorial site, has suggested that Fox can be considered a revival, or at least a linear descendant, of DuMont. Indeed, WNYW is still headquartered in the former DuMont Tele-Centre, now known as the Fox Broadcasting Center.
Westinghouse changed WDTV's calls to KDKA-TV
KDKA-TV
KDKA-TV, channel 2, is an owned and operated television station of the CBS Television Network, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. KDKA-TV broadcasts from a transmitter located in the Perry North neighborhood of Pittsburgh, and its studios are located in downtown Pittsburgh at Gateway Center....
after the pioneering radio station
KDKA (AM)
KDKA is a radio station licensed to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. Created by the Westinghouse Electric Corporation on November 2, 1920, it is one of the world's first modern radio stations , a distinction that has also been challenged by other stations, although it has claimed to be the first in...
of the same name, and switched its primary affiliation to CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
immediately after the sale. Westinghouse's acquisition of CBS in 1995 made KDKA-TV a CBS owned-and-operated station.
DuMont Programming Library
DuMont produced more than 20,000 TV episodes during the decade from 1946–1956. Because the shows were created prior to the launch of AmpexAmpex
Ampex is an American electronics company founded in 1944 by Alexander M. Poniatoff. The name AMPEX is an acronym, created by its founder, which stands for Alexander M. Poniatoff Excellence...
's electronic videotape recorder in late 1956, all of them were initially broadcast live in B&W, then recorded on film kinescope
Kinescope
Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor...
for reruns and for West coast rebroadcasts. By the early 1970s, their vast library of 35mm and 16mm kinescopes eventually wound up in the hands of ABC, who reportedly disposed of all of them in New York's East River
East River
The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland...
to make room for more recent-vintage videotapes in a warehouse. Other kinescopes were put through a silver reclaiming process, because of the microscopic amounts of silver that made up the emulsion of B&W film during this time. It's estimated that only about 350 complete DuMont TV shows survive today, the most famous being virtually all of of Jackie Gleason
Jackie Gleason
Jackie Gleason was an American comedian, actor and musician. He was known for his brash visual and verbal comedy style, especially by his character Ralph Kramden on The Honeymooners, a situation-comedy television series. His most noted film roles were as Minnesota Fats in the drama film The...
's Honeymooners comedy sketches.
DuMont affiliates
In its later years, DuMont was carried mostly on poorly-watched UHF channels or had only secondary affiliations on VHF stations. DuMont ended most operations on April 1, 1955, but honored network commitments until August 1956.
See also
- ElectronicamElectronicamElectronicam was a television recording system that shot an image on film and television at the same time through a common lens. It was developed by James L. Caddigan for the DuMont Television Network in the 1950s, before electronic recording on videotape was available...
- Golden Age of TelevisionGolden Age of TelevisionThe Golden Age of Television in the United States began sometime in the late 1940s and extended to the late 1950s or early 1960s.-Evolutions of drama on television:...
- List of DuMont programs
- List of surviving DuMont Television Network broadcasts
- Passaic: Birthplace of Television and the DuMont StoryPassaic: Birthplace of Television and the DuMont StoryPassaic: Birthplace of Television and the DuMont Story is a television play which aired on the DuMont Television Network on November 14, 1951. The short tele-play was broadcast live and was a drama about the rise of DuMont Laboratories and its founder Allen B...
- NTA Film NetworkNTA Film NetworkThe NTA Film Network was an early American television network founded by Ely Landau in 1956. The network was not a full-time television network like CBS, NBC, or ABC. Rather, it operated on a part-time basis, broadcasting films and several first-run television programs from major Hollywood studios...
- WipingWipingWiping or junking is a colloquial term for action taken by radio and television production and broadcasting companies, in which old audiotapes, videotapes, and telerecordings , are erased, reused, or destroyed after several uses...
External links
- Clarke Ingram's DuMont Television Network Historic website
- The "Golden Telecruiser" Historic Pictures
- List of DuMont programs at the Internet Movie Database
Kinescopes
- Kinescopes of DuMont Network programs, from the Internet ArchiveInternet ArchiveThe Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It offers permanent storage and access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, music, moving images, and nearly 3 million public domain books. The Internet Archive...
: The Adventures of Ellery Queen, Captain Video and His Video Rangers, Cavalcade of Stars, Life Is Worth Living, Miss U.S. Television 1950 Contest, The Morey Amsterdam Show, The Old American Barn Dance, Okay Mother, On Your Way, Public Prosecutor, Rocky King — Detective, School House, They Stand Accused and A DuMont Network identification