While I comment mostly on politics here, there is a PBS program that I'd like to discuss that I believe deserves mention for its stellar presentation, and narration;
The Pioneers of Television
I have a tremendous respect and admiration, nay a soft spot, for the generations that have come before me. One of the generations I admire most is, The Greatest Generation. These people grew up in an America, and also a Germany, an England, an India, a Brazil, very different from the ones that we know today. As an American, I'll speak from what I know of in my own country. Many of The Greatest Generation grew up as what we would consider today as abysmally poor. A good deal of them grew up in homes without electricity, much less any other modern convenience.
When their country called on them during WWII, they not only willingly left their homes & everything they knew, many for the first time, but did so patriotically even going to fight for the freedoms of other countries like France, Holland, England, The Phillippines, and etc. Many of these brave men still lie in graves scattered all around the world. The wives and girlfriends worked tirelessly in munitions and airplane factories to support their country. When they came home with their battle scars, they and their wives made families and set about, without complaint, to built the most free and prosperous country the world had ever known. They saw to it that they and their neighbors were clothed and fed. They built and housed their families in the best housing they could afford. They brought us arguably the most fantastically styled cars in history during the 1950's. Art, culture and education exploided with The Greatest Generation. They dressed with pride and treated one another respectfully. And all of this was done through hard work, sheer grit & determination, and rugged individualism.
When television first began in the last 1940's, no one, including the fledgling televison industry, knew quite what it should be. I know in todays world of laptops, iPhones, & tablets that seems amazing. Many of the first t.v. shows were current/ events / news shows, or the comedy of successful, well established Vaudeville & radio acts bringing their routines to the small screen. Shortly after this, the idea of playing games on t.v. for the viewer to watch was given a try. To gain viewer interest, producers gave prizes away to contestants, &/or they showed known celebrities playing the game as with one of the first t.v. game shows, "What's My Line?".
For me, seeing well established old time Vaudevillians like Jack Benny, Bob Hope, Milton "Uncle Milty" Berle, Jackie Gleason, & Red Skelton working their hearts out to make people laugh on live t.v. is still some of the best television ever! And it was ALL live! If a performer screwed up....guess what?... it was seen by thousands, & sometimes millions of people. My favorite all time television moment happened late one night, long before I was even born. A young comedian took a chance and decided to host a show that came on late at night when all the other stations where off the air, showing test patterns. The show was called "Tonight!" on the National Broadcasting Network (NBC). The young comedian was the late, Steve Allen. It was a big risk, because who knew if hard working Americans in the late 1950's would stay up to watch t.v. that late at night? In those days of live t.v., most of the shows had monitors off camera, so that the performer could see what the viewer was seeing, and could then make any adjustments to the performance that might be needed. As he began his routine, Mr. Allen glanced into the live monitor and got a glimpse of how ridiculous he looked. This single item became the downfall of the segment for Steve Allen, and gave us one of the singularly most hilarious moments in television history! I've seen this probably 100 times, & it still makes me laugh so hard that it brings me to tears:
youtube.com/watch?v=YaNxy4wDv1k
For me, old t.v. shows, old movies, & books are like a time machine into our shared past. With life as busy as it is today, it's sort of like we're all living in a fog. What these programs & movies do for us is they give us a "magic sword". We're able to take that sword, cut through the fog of modern life, and have a clear view, almost magically of what came before us, like a window. In Jan. 2013 PBS will be replaying these epic shows. So folks I encourage you to stop, take a moment and make yourself some popcorn, and sit down with me to enjoy and revel in the history of The Greatest Generation & the wonderment of,
The Pioneers Of Television
-redrocker
