Sunday morning broadcasting had been planned as excerpts from various church services in the DFW area, showing how the public and their church services were responding to the horrible event of Friday. Instead, if ANY of it went on the air, the networks immediately cut to the Oswald story. (This is an old broken down choir director talking: I was "there" and alas all our plans were for nought.)
Morris Martin
Head, Music Library and Ozier Sound Archives
University of North Texas
-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Donald Tait
Sent: Monday, January 28, 2013 1:19 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] TV history research question
A tiny point about Randy's interesting message: Lee Oswald was shot late Sunday morning and died very soon thereafter. The President's funeral was scheduled for the next day, and took place then. I remember starting to watch NBC television coverage around 1 PM Central time Sunday (the same time zone as Dallas) and the first words I heard David Brinkley say were "Lee Oswald died at...." I couldn't believe it. Coming on top of everything else, it was like something out of a fantastic movie script. (I'd missed the morning's coverage, including the shooting on live television, and knew nothing about it.)
Don Tait
-----Original Message-----
From: Randy A. Riddle <[log in to unmask]>
To: ARSCLIST <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sun, Jan 27, 2013 11:58 am
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] TV history research question
I've been watching the uncut footage from NBC and CBS the past few weeks and that's what piqued my interest in the topic. I've read several accounts over the years from newsmen and journalists about the event - I kept wondering as I watched the footage what was going on in the control booth and back rooms as the technicians tried to deal with it.
NBC's and CBS's different approaches are interesting to watch. CBS had an appearance of being a little more in control of the situation with Cronkite or another newsman front and center. NBC, with three newsmen on camera was a bit of a technical and logistical cluster**k - the room seemed crowded with the different men stepping on each other and persistent technical problems. It's very confusing.
There's a persistant misconception that this was an event that was brought "live" into people's living rooms. But watching the uncut footage you see that during the first day, at least, you didn't actually see very much from Dallas for quite some time after the films had been processed and logistics worked out to get it to the networks.
There's not the kind of immediacy you see in event coverage today until you get to the day of Kennedy's funeral when live cameras were simultaneously covering the funeral in Washington and the shooting of Oswald at the Dallas city jail. I wasn't even born then and, seeing it now, it's still a powerful and completely bizarre confluence of events.
Roger asked:
"Did the Dallas stations go on the air about it before the networks did? If so,is there any footage of this?"
If you go on YouTube, you'll find uncut footage from WFAA-TV - they cut into a fashion show with a breathless newsman in a studio and they bring in different individuals who had just witnessed the event.
One annoying technical aspect of the footage I've been looking at, particularly from CBS and NBC, is that the picture looses synch and starts to roll just about each time there's a cut to another camera or a remote video source. I'm assuming that's a problem with the original transfers of the 2" Quad tapes.
Randy
On Sun, Jan 27, 2013 at 12:16 PM, Michael Biel <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Randy --
>
> I can tell you that when you see the complete uncut broadcasts rather
> than the selected excerpts you will get an entirely different view of
> the coverage. For example, Cronkite's work is 150% different from what
> everybody says about it. Neal Ellis has DVDs available of practically
> every second of coverage that weekend on all the networks and local
> Dallas-Ft. Worth radio. I've spoken to Don Pardo about his breaking
> the story on NBC before any other network -- the recording wasn't
> found till about ten years ago, so his bulletin had been largely
> ignored by historians. And you might want to speak to Bill Bragg of
> YesterdayUSA who was working as a broadcast technician in Dallas at
> that time and knows EVERYBODY in Dallas broadcasting. EVERYBODY. I
> think you know how to contact Neal and Bill, and I can find my Pardo interview.
>
> Mike Biel [log in to unmask]
>
>
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] TV history research question
> From: "Randy A. Riddle" <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Sun, January 27, 2013 11:26 am
> To: [log in to unmask]
>
> The "Broadcasting" and "Television Magazine" pieces might be closer to
> what I'm looking for. I'll check them out. I'm not interested in the
> journalists as much as the technical crews that would have been
> working at the networks during the event - cameramen, directors,
> engineers, that kind of thing.
>
> On Sun, Jan 27, 2013 at 11:17 AM, Michael Dolan
> <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> About 10 years ago, the Newseum put out a book called "President
>> Kennedy Has Been Shot" which compiled the recollections of print and
>> broadcast journalists covering the assassination.
>>
>> Also, trade publications at the time printed articles about the coverage.
>>
>> Specifically, "Broadcasting" ran something in their December 2, 1963
>> issue and the January 1964 issue of "Television Magazine" had a lengthy article.
>>
>> There was also a recording called "Dialog on Dallas" where some
>> journalists talked about covering the assassination. The recording
>> may have been done within a month but I'm not sure. Someone on the
>> list probably knows more about it.
>>
>>
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