It started as a thin blue line that flickered to life on a postage stamp sized screen.

This was the birth of Television on September 7th, 1927, a prodigy by the name of Philo Taylor Farnsworth unveiled it to the world.

The San Francisco Chronicle marveled, calling it the greatest wizardry yet of the civilized day.

Yet this revolutionary medium languished in the shadows until the end of World War two, when it exploded into the spotlight.

we didn't know how to how to run a television station, but we learned on the job It was an almost magical time here in Oklahoma and throughout the country.

when you're helping create something brand new, nobody knows the rules.

Any idea is an idea to pursue whether it's coming from the guy in the mailroom or the janitorial staff or the general manager.

It really tested you from a creative standpoint to make what you were doing interesting enough that you would invite an audience to give a few minutes of their time to see and to watch and hear what you were, what you were doing.

Actually in Burbank and.... Tony Curtis!

They were the friendly faces that filled our living rooms.

The people we've invited into our homes for decades.

Oklahoma's television pioneers.

In the beginning, there was static.

A snow that danced across a 12 inch screen.

And then a miracle happened.

Faces appeared out of the void.

Faces and characters that would become as familiar as members of the family.

My mother and dad had a an appliance store in Cushing, Oklahoma.

I remember that there was a television set in the front window of my father's store in the main intersection of Cushing, Oklahoma.

I was just kind of stunned that pictures could fly through the air.

I always thought that that was sort of, something that God never intended.

Out of thin air, Images appeared and entertained us in our homes.

The big wooden box with the tiny screen brought the world into our living room.

I remember delivering them and putting these ungainly antennas on top of houses, or you'd have to climb up on top of the houses and assemble these things on the roofs, and then, you know, nail them down so that they wouldn't be blown over by Oklahoma wind.

Oklahoma television really began.

June 6th, 1949, when WKY-TV channel four signed on.

They were the only television station in the state of Oklahoma.

But just a few months later, KOTV in Tulsa came on.

So there were two Oklahoma City had one station.

Tulsa had one.

Our Heavenly Father, we thank thee for the consecrated skills of the engineers and the patience that makes possible this great endeavor.

In December of 53, KWTV channel nine went on on low power because they wanted to get on the air in December because OU was playing in the Orange Bowl.

On January 1st, and it was being televised on CBS.

But then in the spring of 54, they went on full power on the tall tower that they built was at that time was the tallest manmade structure in the world.

It was taller than the Empire State Building.

KVOO came on in 52 and Lawton KSWO came on in 53.

But then in spring of 54, Ada, Muskogee and Enid all signed on with television stations in those towns.

Just a couple of years later, KXII and Ardmore came on and KETA OETA's first station in Oklahoma City, came on in 56 with the studios on the OU campus and the tower and transmitter right where we are now.

Television was a new frontier, and its pioneers loved the freedom that they found in front of and behind the camera.

It was new.

It was new industry.

It was fascinating industry.

And people were amazed to see, you know, pictures and see news and all the things.

And WKY TV operated out of the Municipal Auditorium on Couch Drive.

And our studios were where the little theater was.

They had the announcer booth on that same floor.

The control room was on the second floor.

We had a monitor in the hall and TV was so new and so fantastic.

In the 50s, there would be 30 or 40 people out there watching that little old TV set every night.

It was an open, free, creative, wonderful time.

Creative people were attracted in droves.

We did all kinds of interesting, different things that nobody would consider doing today.

Me me me me.

You know, just a completely different world.

It was so spontaneous and so live.

Everybody came in every morning all ready to do their thing.

I can remember back that, I hardly called it a job.

I said, I have to back in and pick up my paycheck because my life doing television was so much fun.

I was ashamed to be paid for it.

Network programs arrived on film, leaving stations to fill the rest of the day with local shows of every kind.

Titles like Sleepwalkers, Matinee At Home with Holly, Cookes book Wiley and Jean Sooner Shindig!

These were all programs done live.

Everything you did then, 99% of it was live.

You jump, say, from the announcer's booth, run around in front of a camera.

Well, you're just, swinging down to the next set, and you move the cameras fast and, you also, in those days, did live commercials within the live programing with liberal benefits for the treatment of other diseases named.

I heard that there were only 7500 TV sets in the whole state.

That's what I was told.

They didn't have the choice they had now.

So that was a great advantage, you know, for the ratings, Obviously.

Did real good because we were the only ones on the air.

In 1950, WKY radio wasn't sure what to do with their new announcer, so they tried him out on TV.

Danny Williams hosted a wrestling program and an afternoon talk show.

Probably the funniest thing that ever happened to me in TV is one afternoon I had this little kid on from Midwest City Elementary or somewhere, and one of my thought questions was is, what is your daddy do?

And a little kid said, he's in Korea.

And I said, isn't that great?

You probably get to sleep with your mama.

He said, yeah, every night but Tuesday.

And then Uncle Phil comes over and sleeps with her.

When I started my show, I called at home with Ida B. I designed my show from a ladies home Journal.

Table of contents.

So, in 1968, I was probably the first magazine show on.

But I didn't call it that.

But that's what it was.

From the studios of KOCO TV, it's the Ida B show.

Now, here's Ida.

Morning!

Waking up at 6:00 and seeing the heavy clouds with the sunrise coming up underneath.

It was a beautiful sight to see.

Every weekday morning, Ida cooked, gave household tips, and even interviewed celebrities Ann-Margret, but she wasn't a real big star yet.

Of course, John Wayne and Bob Hope.

Jimmy Stewart.

This is a picture that, promises to be one of the very outstanding Western pictures.

Did you film it in on location or was it done in... Monument Valley.

A lot of it.

A lot of it in Hollywood and around Hollywood.

In the days before satellite interviews, it was common to bump into a movie star in the hall at the station in town, usually to plug a new picture, or the studios would fly a local reporter out to the set.

MGM was shooting several full pictures at the same time all over Europe, and they would provide the stars for the shows, and you would interview them.

I got 26 or 27 interviews with people, like Raquel Welch and Robert Wagner and Edward G. Robinson, Anthony Quinn, Mr. Quinn, Galen Stacy from Oklahoma City.

We would ask you now about your current property, your current job, the 25th hour is, what about the screenplay appealed to you as an actor and tell everything about it?

The interesting thing is that, they were really pros.

They knew that we were after good program material, and those pros knew how to give it to you.

News According to Doyle, a comprehensive report of the news, sports and weather.

The minute television news hit, it became instantly popular.

There's an old story about, right after television hit, a higher percentage of homes had television than had telephones.

They could not wait to get a television set and and watch the news.

Very popular.

The Newsroom with Ernie Schultz.

Most of the people who were in it at that time, came out of radio, originally started in broadcasting as an engineer, but, due to the, the war effort and they the draft laws and so forth, a manager came in one day and he auditioned everybody on the staff.

And that that very afternoon, I did a newscast at 6:00.

My first job in television news was in 1954, and I knew nothing about television and was fortunate enough to be hired by the channel five affiliate in Oklahoma at that time, which was in Enid and we had a tiny staff, 3 or 4 people, and we did two newscasts a day.

And we learned as we did it.

And that was very fortunate because there was nothing to compare it to.

What kind of a gig is that?

You get to decide what it is that's important for your community.

And that was this remarkable thing that local television news was for a number of years.

The Tulsa Board of Education late today issued a joint report of progress on Integration and Tulsa schools.

It runs to nine pages and apparently is a summary of the work, which was done at a special school board meeting earlier this week at that time, and television news at channel four, you had you were a photographer and a reporter in addition to.

I was also, assignment editor.

And I produced my own show newsrooms in Lawton.

Ada and Enid worked with the same conditions as bigger stations in Oklahoma City and Tulsa on a Sunday.

I remember, one of our photographers, the film processor, broke down and the take up real wouldn't work.

And so he ran next door to the dressing room where there were a group of, wrestlers getting ready to videotape a wrestling show.

And he said, I need you guys.

And he grabbed the front of the film and gave it to the the first wrestler go down that hall.

And he, as it came out of the film processor, he gave it to another wrestler and he went down the hall, came out of the film press, and that's how he got the film.

Through the film process, using a, I don't know, half dozen professional wrestler.

Before teleprompters, anchors relied on written scripts and their personal knowledge of the story.

The first couple of years that we were on the air, I virtually memorized my newscast.

I had copy in front of me, and I always looked at it occasionally, too, so that the people would think I was not just making this stuff up.

This Oklahoma City fella that covered the news up here for us would send us film on the bus, and the bus would arrive about 4 or 415 in the afternoon.

We'd we'd have to pick it up, run out to the station to process the film.

Try to get it, edited the script and get it on the air by 6:00.

Our bus would come in at about 8:00, same same, process.

Hope the bus would be on time.

Grabbed the film running to the station, process it real fast, and, try to get it edited and on air by 10:00.

So it was it was a it was a hassle.

That's the reason I got an ulcer.

You could talk about the the benefits and and the contributions of of television news.

And they are considerable.

But I would say that the contributions of, of television weather are even greater because we're talking about human lives, however, and but many, many human lives have been saved by television weather warnings.

The very beginning, A fella named Wally Conan Good evening everyone.

I'm Wally Conan, WKY-TV staff meteorologist.

And there on the board, I've drawn our graphic representation of a tornado funnel, one of the most dreaded phenomenon and indeed one of the most severe in all of weather.

And the weather service says you're not to use the word tornado in any forecast.

It is said it will alarm the people and they'll panic.

Well that's ridiculous, but in addition, we watch our weather charts or cold fronts coming in from the west, which are the trigger mechanism.

And particularly for that new phenomenon we've discovered just since World War two, the jet stream, because it almost always is a cross current.

Well, in 1950, after this research had been going on and he was working with it, he thought there was a definite possibility of tornado development that night.

So he issued a tornado forecast.

Oklahoma reports severe storms.

And then a few hours later, he issued a tornado warning, the first ever issued anywhere in the world.

My Wally Conan at channel four Flying Laboratories went aloft to fly through the thunderstorms to gather data.

The Air Force joined the effort and sent jets off from Tinker to study the formation of the storms and their effect on aircraft.

As spring came in, the storm fronts came with it.

The southern part of Oklahoma City was hit repeatedly, with homes scattered like broken matches.

Somehow there were no deaths here.

The property damage went far into the millions.

The letters at the station got there.

Thousands of letters, and they sent them all copies, all to Washington, DC.

And they changed the rules.

Now, where were you last night when this thing hit?

Well, I was, up in the Baptist church basement.

As I recall, the Baptist church is pretty well gone this morning.

Well, it is.

It’s just about destroyed.

Compared to the computer models and Doppler radar of today, conditions in the weather department were primitive.

I'd have to drive clear to the airport, get all the weather information, drive back to the TV station, put everything together, and then get up and draw the weather map on the board.

As you were talking to the guy at the weather service office, he would, describe the map for you so you'd have a low pressure over Illinois and you'd make an “L” on your little chalk board there.

And make yourself a little map as as he described it, the map that I worked with, I work behind the glass map.

And so everybody thought I was writing backwards.

And of course, there was just really one map.

Well, they had some kind of electronic deal where they could kind of switch it, and actually I didn't have to write it backwards.

It looked like I was writing backwards for the audience, but I wasn't really.

A standard deal.

You had the four sided cube that you spun around, you had a map on each side, and then, you had a larger map that was stationary on the wall.

It was about as low tech as you can get.

Blackboard on a piece of chalk.

We used a plastic Elmer's glue bottle.

We, of course, removed the glue, fill that up with a water color and white paint.

Stick a rag in the end of it.

And that was your brush that you went on the air with.

On occasion you’d squirt it too hard and blow the white paint all over the place.

For the first time, Oklahomans could be alerted to severe weather.

We were the first station with radar.

Our radar was off of, World War two B-25 bomber in Dallas.

Jimmy Lake, who owned the station, had him take the radar out of the bomber, had it converted so he'd pick up precipitation.

And then we started showing it on the air.

People went crazy.

Whole just kind of a positioning type radar and swept around.

And you can see that there was a return of some sort there.

You really couldn't tell much about it, but you knew that there's something was going on out there.

It was just a little round thing, but then a little green thing went round and around.

And here's a green blip where there was a rain shower.

They thought this was the greatest thing since sliced bread.

WKY-TV Weather Station Here's Jim Williams for The Noonday report on weather conditions.

Viewers came to trust meteorologists like Jim Williams and Harry Volkman, and Harry Volkman was he was the weatherman and he was here for many years.

And there are many people who still remember him at our temperature, 56 degrees here, 51 at the airport at 1040.

Well, that's all the weather.

Thanks for watching and good night.

Harry Volkman, KOMA/KWTV’s weatherman has been brought to you by... Tulsa viewers tuned in to KOTV for King Lionel and Lee Woodward to give the forecast.

And over at KTUL the station manager told Don woods that if he wanted to do the weather, he'd have to draw a cartoon.

Gusty would react to the forecast.

The forecast is for rain.

I'd have gusty with an umbrella.

If there is a severe weather situation, I’d have him diving into the fraidy hole, which is a hole in the ground that he dove in to get away from the tornado, gusty was such a hit.

He was hung in the Smithsonian and became the official state cartoon.

Everywhere I went I drew gusty for people, so it just went on and on and on and got bigger and better.

And now a word from our sponsor.

Don't miss that July clearance sale at Mathis Brother’s furniture.

Woo!

I couldn't read it even a cue card because I'm nearsighted and I wouldn't wear glasses.

So I had ad lib, all my commercials and everything.

There were no teleprompters.

There was nothing.

You memorized everything Or you just winged it.

And I would do like during the news six live commercials.

And one of those commercials were for me to pour an orange drink and drink it on camera and do the commercials.

Well, I did, I put it, I took a drink.

What?

It went down the wrong pipe and I really got choked on camera.

I almost died on camera and they're always trying to break me up.

They gave me an iced tea to sell and they put, salt instead of sugar in the iced tea.

Then I was supposed to sell some chocolate covered cherries.

So what they did, they took the one on top, opened the top, put hot pepper inside, closed it.

Then I pop that in my mouth and tears had come down my cheeks.

In 1952, Danny Williams thought his time in TV was over.

I'm getting ready to go back to San Antonio and Hoyt Andres, who was the program director at WKY-TV, said no, said, you're not going to leave here.

I said, we're going to put you on a Monday afternoon.

You're going to be Dan D. Dynamo from outer space.

You're going to have a synchro retroverter, and you're going to be able to go back and forth in time.

I said, are you crazy?

I go on the air the next Monday.

I got a TV set, a smock and 32 minutes to fill.

And I invented all sorts of characters.

And because Sputnik came along about that time and the baby boomers are coming along, the show just took off.

It got so big, it was unbelievable.

Here we go into the future to visit 3D Danny All right, Ark, stand by.

Its secure on the planet Earth.

Hey, Unicorpmen, how are you today?

My name is Dan D. Dynamo, superintendent of the Space Science Center and supreme galaxy chief of the universe science corp, I salute you.

And today's meeting is now in session with a set made of Jell-O molds and plastic spoons.

The show was like Star Wars, but without a budget.

What I did was every night I'd make an outline like, you know, today we we've heard from the planet Arcturus and the Duke of Mewkton is up there, and he's trying to take over, and we've got to send a spaceship up there.

As I told you, we've tuned in.

Boys and girls from Earth right now.

They're watching through a veil.

A thing called television on the planet Earth.

John Ferguson worked with me.

He played Ubik and the Duke of Mewkton.

All kinds of characters, Got and Bazark I went and created a villain called the Duke of Mewkton He was mean.

He was a real threat to Three D Danny, because he was a different type.

In other words, he was evil, he was diabolical, and he was scheming and he was whatever.

And just always a point that he was going to outsmart Danny but never could outsmart him, until the final He wanted, you know, at the very last, the hero still came through.

It was just like it was like a live kids space adventure soap opera.

Every station had a children's show.

Those that sat transfixed in front of the tube still light up at the mention of names like Uncle Hiram, Big Bill, and Uma Zog and Mister Zing and Taffy where the kids would come up and oh, they just went wild.

And they had Tuffy the Tiger, and they had all these little skits that they put on.

You know, if you're mean to people, then people will be mean to you.

And we try our very best to make sure that no one is ever mean to anyone else on this program.

Well, maybe occasionally.

And they had a pet chicken, you know, but it was just strictly to entertain children.

And the children loved it.

Down the turnpike, children loved Miss Fran.

Hello.

I'm Miss Fran from Storyland.

and this is my friend Foxy.

Hi!

We’ll see you every Monday... Had a set that was a big tree stump.

And I sat in front of the, you know, hollow tree.

The puppets came out of the holes in the trees, and I sat on the stump.

One day a week, we had a children's day, and, kids could write in and tell us what their unusual pets were.

People would bring their skunks, their snakes, their tarantulas Miss Fran had to always hold the things in her hand to prove to the children not to be afraid.

One time we had a raccoon and a tarantula on at the same time, and the raccoon ate the tarantula.

And the tarantula was somebody's pet.

You know, we had lots of things, but it was live, and, you know, so be it.

There's nothing you could do about it.

I’d been working at channel five for about a year, and one of our directors was doing the pokey show, and they said he went to California.

They said, Bill, would you like to do the puppet?

And I said, “No, not really”.

And he said, “Well, ten bucks a week?” And I went, “Well, maybe.” After starting at KTEN in Ada, Bill thrash moved to KOCO.

One of the shows he directed starred a clown and a sock.

Yes, you look just like a Christmas tree, do I?

Why do I look like a Christmas tree?

You just got that big red ball up there.

on your nose.

Looks like a tree to me, you got that big red coat on.

Look like a big hunk of popcorn.

Ho Ho was a special guy, Ed Burchall And he, was very serious about being ho ho the clown.

And it was more than the TV show.

And the kids loved him.

But more importantly than that, he loved the kids.

Ho hos puppet.

Pokey the puppet played by Bill Howard, who was stage manager channel five in those days.

So this is pokey, and I've had probably 20 of these.

They wear out and get dirty.

So this is number like 25.

Good morning, Ho Ho!

For you big kids who are watching.

For you big kids who are watching.

big kids who are watching.

(Laughter) There was a lot of ad libbing that went on.

And, Bill was the master of that, being a genuine wit and and great at ad libbing.

And sometimes would make Ho Ho nervous.

Oh, my goodness, It just worked.

Ho Ho and I just had a chemistry that it worked.

Oh.

Thank you, Ho Ho!

They did little adventures like little movies.

Well, so we created one for ho ho and call it the Lone Bungler.

Pronto.

I've never seen the likes of this.

We're completely surrounded on the north and the east.

In the south and the west.

Pronto.

This looks like it might be the end of us.

What do you mean, “Us,” white man?

Jeannie, she would just ignore me.

And that if ho ho was reading a little children's book and she was asleep because the hot lights put her out.

She's laying there asleep by him he's reading this little book.

And the show, that little segment’s not doing real well I would reach over here and pull on her leg.

Well, she didn't like that and she would snap at it.

Well, Ho Ho just... “Jane!” “She tried to kill me Ho Ho!”, but the audience saw that I was pulling her leg.

It's just about time for us to leave.

Happy New Year, everybody.

We'll be seeing you tomorrow.

There we are.

(Laughter) At channel eight in Tulsa, Creek artist AC Blue Eagle hosted a 90 minute children's show every weekday afternoon.

And it was at channel six that Steve Powell said his first howdy to the kids.

Foreman Scotty became a part of every young visitor to the circle four ranch.

Whether they sat in the bleachers or on Woody the Birthday Horse, it was an afternoon of making faces for the magic lasso and dreams of winning the Golden Horseshoe.

They thought I was going to leave WKY so they hired Steve Powell out of Tulsa, who had a show called Foreman Scotty But we're having a pretty good time, and we hope you Callahans at home are having a good time, too.

Once in Oklahoma City, Foreman Scotty traveled in time and space alongside 3D Danny.

I wrote a movie one time which was shot downtown, which was which was kind of amazing about Dan D Dynamo.

But it really became a big thing “And I don't like it.

It’s too quiet!” “C’mon, let’s get out of here!” “Hold it, Scotty!

I know it's futile,” “but I'm gonna give it one more try.” Shot it downtown on Robinson, right across from that theater.

I mean, we stopped traffic all day long.

I mean, it's unbelievable, We put Foreman Scotty on 3D.

I started putting him up front so I could play characters and all that stuff.

Then we changed the show to Giant Kids Matinee.

And then when I went to radio and quit the show, then it became the Foreman Scotty show.

So help me, I'll send you on the nicest, longest vacation and the biggest pile of rocks you've ever seen.

I want it dismantled Every day, 20 to 30 kids would be on the set in the studio and would visit and celebrate birthdays and all the stuff that went with the Foreman Scotty show, and that ran from the 50s until 71.

Danny went to the radio Foreman Scotty, and then I'm still on the show, and I became his assistant, like Ubik was to Danny.

I became Whitecloud the assistant, the pal and friend of foreman Scotty.

Foreman Scotty, we used to fake fights.

We put our hand up here like this, and the other guy’s, body would be toward the camera and they would slap the hand, you know, like this.

And I cannot tell you how many times Foreman Scotty would knock the Hell out of me.

(Laughs) But he was a great guy.

Steve Powell.

God bless you, Steve.

In 1971, new FCC regulations brought an end to most local children's shows.

They came up with rules that didn't allow the children's host to endorse product or to, you know, say, okay, kids, go out and buy this or go tell your mother to go to the store and buy this product, because this is what Ho ho wants, or this is what Foreman Scotty or 3D Danny want you to do, or miss Fran because just think of that I just mentioned four children's live hosts that were in Oklahoma City, and then there were, excellent children programs and popular programs in the Tulsa market.

Every TV station in that era had a local kid show.

Foreman Scotty is much more popular, I think, among Oklahomans than 3D was for one reason.

When 3D was on in the early 50s, there weren't that many TV sets.

And then when Foreman Scotty at 59 by 59 on and then 60, I think color came in and TV really took off.

The following program comes to you in Living Color live in color, Mathis Brothers Furniture 301 West Reno presents country social starring Buck Mathis, Joyce Taylor huge color cameras purchase lights just that the the candle power just went up enormous.

And had great big, gigantic color cameras.

Those things were my my yearly salary 4 or 5 times.

You know.

The early television news was mostly read, and it looked more like radio news than it did television.

Good evening everyone.

David Hall, the always smiling.

It wasn't until videotape came into prominence that the pictures on the news overwhelmed the anchors.

It made some stories better looking.

I don't know whether it made the anchors better looking or not.

That may or may not have been an improvement in that.

For somebody else to say.

Joe Jerkins, who was the program director, then call me in and, you know, he said, well, we've got color cameras out here now and we've got videotape.

So if you'll come out and do a an audition for Sunday school, you'll get to see what you look like in color.

And I thought, you know?

So I came out and did an audition, and I liked what I looked like in color lighting.

Period.

Nice try.

You could you do it?

So we invited the boys and girls.

The color arrived.

The music changed, and kids lined up to dance on TV.

All of this started in 66 for me on the scene.

Actually, I just on a hunch, I went into the program director and I said, you know, I'd like to do a dance show.

And he said, you know, we just had a sponsor come in and say they want to do a dance show.

So talking about being at the right place at the right time, that's where I was in Tulsa.

It was dance party in Oklahoma City.

It was the scene.

The scene, a montage of America's top music makers.

Today's special guest is Al Green.

And now here's your host, Ronnie Kay.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Audience.

Ladies and gentlemen, standing 511, weighing in at 240 pounds, this is the heavyweight champion in the world of music.

Mr. Barry White.

My first, my last, my everything.

Dick Clark told me once.

He said I'm just a traffic cop.

He said, I say, you go, here you go here.

Here comes the artist.

Here comes the song.

You know, like this.

So really, that's what the host of a show like that was.

You know, you introduced the song Let the Kids Be the Stars.

You know, the legend of Elvis Presley just rolls on with another word called Kennedy for the promised Land.

We're from Norfolk, Virginia, California, home of mine.

Originally, we got a nucleus of kids that wanted to be on the show.

We set strict, parameters on it.

Nobody under 16.

You had to dress up to be on the show.

We didn't just do kind of a cattle call playing every week on the show, saying, hey, if you want to show up next week, come on out.

We didn't do it that way.

We got hold these kids, we became friends with them.

We recruited them like we're on a run.

We got some opening, a new role, maybe somebody that I selected the music for the show.

We had two cameras and, not a three camera shoot, but a two camera shoot, which is hard to shoot that a lot of 100 kids doing all the things you want to see on television.

So.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet a gentleman that has sold over 10 million copies of records.

Talking about love, Mr. Ray Charles.

You.

I can't stop loving you.

I've made up my mind long before MTV.

Big acts and major stars would play the local shows.

More so if a Ray Charles would come to town, I'd head to the Civic Center and say, Mr. Charles, I'll pick you up in the morning at 9:00.

Would you come out to the station?

And Ray said, you know, I think I will.

And I was like, here I am with the genius of, you know, of the business, and I'm riding in the front seat with him coming out to channel four.

And, his manager leans over from the back seat and says, how much are we getting paid for this?

And I said, oh my gosh, we don't have a budget.

You know, people just appear for the promotional value.

He said, well, we just turned down $5,000 on The Ed Sullivan Show, and my heart sank and I said, sir, I'll have to turn around and take you back to the hotel.

He said, well, he said, I tell you what, just because we're members of the union, we'll get if you'll give us $3, we'll do it.

I said, okay, I gave him three bucks and we did the show.

We still managed to.

They say that, the show was sold for 13 weeks to doctor Pepper.

The show lasted for eight years.

You know.

They tried to go after color.

The next great change to television was videotape.

You shoot the film, you take it back to the station and run it through a processor, and you really didn't know what you had until that point when you could physically see the film.

And the first tape was three inches wide.

So it was rather cumbersome.

And the cameras were very heavy.

You almost needed a caddy to carry the camera around with you.

You needed good, strong cameramen.

The big advantage of tape over film was time, the production time.

The video tape machines covered one wall, you know, 8 to 10ft wide.

One video tape machines.

Now they're they're small.

You're handheld.

Videotape allowed programs and commercials to be recorded in advance.

It eliminated the need for several staff announcers and for some, ended the spontaneity, the spark of live television.

Wow.

Good morning, Miss Fran.

How are you?

I'm fine.

How are you?

We would come in like we used to in live days and start.

And then it's all sudden some, I'd say, okay, stop.

We're going to start over.

Something went wrong with camera.

So and so, you know, and and it was just different.

You couldn't have the same spontaneous fun ongoing, you know.

Hi.

And I kept saying well just keep it going.

Keep it going.

No no no no we're going.

We'll start and start over again.

And he and I would look at each other and roll our eyes.

You know, over in the sports department, the switch to videotape made everyone's life easier.

We had those old wind up cameras of the bill and how things sometimes and wind up camera.

You'd be shooting a high school football game Guy’s at the 20, 15 Ten five and the film runs out.

The guy crosses the goal line.

You don't have it.

So what do you do?

Well, you get it.

You get another great play and shoot the crowd Cheering so and then splice it in there and make it look like they're cheering on the touchdown.

What you didn't get because the camera ran out.

We used to cover the OU games.

But we always did it with film.

We would interview the coaches who were there scouting the games for the next schedule game.

I would give a little preview of the, opponent that was coming up the next week.

The guard line or scrambling for no signal was that at the Oklahoma 27, Gilbert had learned how to shoot film, how to edit it and splice it.

One of the most difficult things, in fact, maybe the most difficult thing I've ever had to do on television.

And those days, the OU playback show was on Sunday afternoon.

People would stay up all night after the game Saturday splicing the film.

Now think how many plays there are in a football game.

There were about 250 splices, tape splices, you know, glued splices in that film.

So what's going to happen to you at least once every Sunday?

Film's going to break because of all those splices.

That was just a horrifying experience.

Just your stomach was in a knot every Sunday.

Now, of course, you don't have that problem because it's all battery operated and so forth and taping.

But the film days were boy, that was tough.

As far as my training for television, I had zero training.

My first time on the air.

My wife, of course, was watching.

And here's what she said.

Here's what I did.

Of course, it wasn't teleprompters in those days.

She said, here's what you're doing.

You're going.

And looking at the copy.

And I was, of course, just made all kinds of mistakes.

And I got no training whatsoever for television.

So that's how I began.

I'm surprised I still had a job because I was pretty bad there in those early days.

Inside football features Bud Wilkinson and Howard Newman, executive producer Ned Hockman on the Bud Wilkinson TV show was the first coach's show in the nation in college, and so everything they did was new.

Bud it all looks so easy from the stands.

But I guess it isn't, Well, when you're sitting in that stadium and see a great passer like Grosscup baiting, throwing, hitting the receiver, actually it wasn't quite as simple as it looked, Bud Wilkinson was so charismatic it's hard to even describe give you some idea of how hard Grosscup was actually rushed.

Let's watch the play again.

Wilkinson was a master of taking complex plays and concepts and making them easy for viewers to understand.

The circle is around the ball.

The two defenders are only six yards apart.

The receiver is right between them.

We found out that that as long as we had Bud in one position with Howard Newman and then moving him over into showing up, how play develop by using little men on the table, or by moving over and showing the use of equipment, that football players wore like pads, helmets.

And we found that that we maintained our audience.

One man was set up here, another man here, and then the guards and the tackles will simply drop back and form a little cup and a pass.

And he had the little man.

I'm sure you've heard about the little men, Bud explained all that.

And then the plays that he would run from the split T, he explained those and it was just so educational and but it was a beautiful talker and could explain the explain things very well.

The surrounding area is usually not too sore.

So we had a sequence where Bud wanted to show how compare the padding today with the padding of old day.

So he gives us to to Howard and and tells him to put it on.

And then he takes a baseball bat and he hits the pad and and says.

Now Howard is barely, feeling this a real good lick right on the top.

The last head of the bat went down to low and hit the the the bone, the hip bone and and it it hurt.

Howard, quite a bit because he gradually scoots out of the picture and then, Bud continues to talk.

And if you play, if you play that over again, you can see, how Bud actually missed the spot where the pad was.

And he hit, Newman down low on the leg.

I think everybody in the state was watching.

Bud show is just a smash hit because it's the first one in the nation and in ground breaking in every stand from every standpoint.

Another groundbreaker was Don Wallace.

The Wallace Wildlife Show was a big hit with sportsmen and for 40 years, he reeled them in it was through his show that Oklahomans became familiar with the Texoma Striper Lake Guerrero in Mexico, and the wonderful fishing in Canada.

The Wallace Wildlife Show this week in the wonderful out-of-doors, fishing, hunting and beautiful scenery for other tastes.

There were other programs local bookseller Louis Meyer reviewed books on TV with an infectious enthusiasm that kept Tulsans tuning in for 40 years, beginning in 1952, Myers review were an unscripted mix of humor and optimism, with a little literature thrown in.

Mark Twain cut his baked potato buttered it, and took one big bite.

Imagine the shock of those fancy people when he spit that potato out on his plate in front of him and looked up and said, some damned fools would have swallowed that it was the longest running book show in the country.

The more books you read, that taller you grow.

And in 1967, Tom Paxton, who had had a mid-morning program on WKY-TV, went to Dallas and they started a show called Danny's Day.

This is Danny's day.

I everybody my name is Danny Williams.

With us today is a lady that’s written a book and also created the show I Love Lucy.

Oh, she's dynamite.

And so we had a talk variety show around the noon hour all those years, and it was very high rated.

And if anybody came to town, any celebrities, they did Danny's Day “Is that a wig?” It was great, man.

I got to go everywhere in the country.

I interviewed everybody.

You ever heard of that?

I have her name is Shirley MacLaine.

The most gifted one in life.

Yes you are.

You're right.

You laugh a lot.

Oh, it's no one.

Laugh if it wasn't for you.

Oh, then you are funny.

It was talk, variety, music and something different every day.

Five days a week.

Oh.

Oh, I got you, Danny.

But you're too heavy, is I?

Oh, my gosh.

He had through that period of time from the late 60s to 84.

Three different co-hosts.

Oh, Linda Scott, Mary Hart is now an Entertainment Tonight, of course.

All right.

Space cadet and Carrie Robertson.

Oh, there you are.

Hi there.

Carrie, how are you?

Carrie Hart was so popular.

And Carrie Robertson was so talented, and Linda Scott was so pretty.

“Kill myself” “Ha ha ha” But it was it was really a great show.

And I players had to take the set away.

Oh, don't let him take that.

That's you guys.

I got a little bit.

Linda soundtrack's fever is what she's doing is sick but nice.

Keep you money.

Don't pay me till next year.

No money down.

No payments till 87 on this terrific Kenwood car stereo digital tuning, auto reverse for speakers 299 installed.

Just take it.

Take this Yamaha remote control 100 watt concert music system.

Only $43 a month.

Keep your cash flash Maxell tape on sale now if found out, come on, hurry the soundtrack now before she realizes what she's doing.

No money down, no payments till 87.

Now you can't miss with mistletoe.

It always hits the mark.

Comes pre-sliced in vacuum, packaged or in loaves.

Mistletoe blends are great.

Pickle, pimento, macaroni and cheese.

Salami.

Barbecue beef.

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Mistletoe.

Luncheon meats cut to order from loaves are prepackaged hits the mark every time.

They all lack that certain something to make their wardrobe complete.

And fortunately, Black's Aveda Semiannual Clearance Sale is in full swing.

This allows them to take advantage of terrific savings on suits, sport coats, black shirts, and many other markdowns throughout the store.

It's Black's big sale that comes but once a year, shop early for a best selection at Black's Aveda 109 West Main, where you can uncover some terrific bargains.

Until it attacked me last week was, taken care of, if you know what I mean.

And it in fact, now it's making this gorgeous collar that really accentuates this double neck coat.

As the broadcast day stretched into night, a camera operator at KOTV stepped in front of the lens and developed a cult following.

Gaillard Sartain clowning around at the channel six set led to the creation of a show called Doctor Mazeppa.

Papazoidy Uncanny Film Festival and camp meeting.

That is why once each year I myself doctor Menlo Park because we don't have a two headed boy.

But we do have a toe headed boy.

It is my feeling you are feeling.

Viewers that stayed up looking for a thrill found KVOO’s fantastic theater with Joseph Peter Hart and welcome to Fantastic Theater.

This Peter Hart.

In Lawton, It was Doctor Digby and Igor in shock theater number two.

While in Oklahoma City, John Ferguson was about to get a thrill of his own.

I couldn't believe it.

That was the first time in over two, some plus years that anybody walked up to me and said, we want to talk to you.

Could you create a character for a show?

Have my own show?

I said, what?

It deals with the two great mysteries of creation.

life and death.

We searched around, I think it was a colonial costume shop was up there on sixth Street there that we found.

They made the Cape, which I still have, and it's the original Cape.

And I did just did the makeup and we checked it out and all of a sudden Saturday night, 1130 following Danny Williams live wrestling, we went to shock theater, The music came up, and I said, good evening.

I’m Count Gregore, and this is shock theater.

We do hope that you'll be with us tonight.

Are you ready to be scared to death Then welcome to KAUT’s thriller movie with Count Gregore.

Good evening.

I am Count Gregore, and I do hope that you will be with me this evening.

It was a transitional period of what era we were in.

What time frame?

When the makeup really never changed.

And it just depend on what shows we had in the movies we had.

But basically it was to and it was always a little out of the box.

Never take this character serious.

Dracula, singing vampire.

Are you enjoying tonight's Dracula movie?

I'm sure you must.

It's always kind of a always a character with a little tongue in cheek.

Or is this, you know, to surprise.

A lot of people used to come up and say, you know, we have some of these movies over and over and over, but we'd watch.

We said we never knew what you were going to do.

And I said, well, guess what?

I think, if you'll excuse me, just follow me a little bit.

I'm going to hang around for a little bit and I hope you're hanging around, but oh man, I want I don't want to be hanging around with oh, my word will be, how can you comprehend?

People would say, I grew up with you over a 50 year span.

And how are with an honor.

That is how blessed.

In the end, it was the budget acts that killed local programs.

The emphasis of stations in those days was that their local efforts should be in news.

So we should not have so many of these local independent productions.

We should put those energies in doing the news morning, noon and night.

And that's what's really happened in the commercial business.

And you can see that now.

All the remains of that time are a few brief clips of video and the memories of those who helped shape a new industry.

I still run into people in the grocery store.

They say, you know, we don't.

We really miss children's programs.

We don't have any place where kids can go out and visit and sit there and be a part of the audience.

Just today, some woman, stopped me and said that she makes my meatloaf recipe at least 2 or 3 times a month, and that she thinks of me every time she makes it.

So it was a great business.

I tell you what, I loved my job.

I really did.

There was a time when there were Kinescopes, but there wasn't any film.

There wasn't any tape, there wasn't any two inch, one inch, three quarter.

And now digital, I mean, all those things, just we were there in the beginning.

You can watch this and other episodes of Back in Time on the PBS app or at OETA.tv/BackInTime You know that you get more by watching channel four.

And the reason is easy to see.

you know that you get more by watching channel four.

And the reason is easy to see when you are watching WKY personality TV.