1947 in television

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The year 1947 in television involved some significant events. Below is a list of television-related events during 1947.

Events

• January 3 – Proceedings of the U.S. Congress are televised for the first time.
• January 22 – The first commercial television station west of the Mississippi River, KTLA, begins operation in Hollywood.
• January 29 – RCA company demonstrates an all-electronic color television system using live images, to the US Federal Communications Commission.
• January 30 – The FCC rejects CBS' color television system.
• February 10 to March 11 – BBC television service in the UK is temporarily suspended due to a national fuel crisis.
• March 11 – The first successful American children's television series, Movies for Small Fry debuts on the DuMont Network.
• July 16 – RCA demonstrates the world's first all-electronic color camera to the Federal Communications Commission. (Only television receivers were present at the demonstration on January 29; the camera was at a remote studio.)
• September 30 – The opening game of the World Series is the first World Series game to be telecast. The 1947 World Series was watched by an estimated 3.9 million people (many watching in bars and other public places), becoming television's first mass audience.
• October 5 – The first telecast of a presidential address from the White House. President Truman speaks about the world food crisis. It is preceded by a Jell-O commercial, and features the president discussing his program for food rationing. The address was televised by WTVW-TV (presently WJLA-TV Channel 7 in Washington DC) as part of its inaugural broadcast. It was also simulcast by radio. It was long believed that no copy of this broadcast existed, but segments are preserved on kinescope in the Library of Congress. (For the record, President Franklin Roosevelt's address broadcast over NBC experimental television W2XBS—now WNBC—at the 1939 New York World's Fair preceded the 1947 Truman broadcast. However, Truman's broadcast is indeed the first from inside the White House.)
• October 13 – The puppet show series Junior Jamboree, later known as Kukla, Fran and Ollie, premieres on WBKB in Chicago, Illinois.
• November 6 – Meet the Press first appears as a local program in Washington, D.C..
• November 8 – Memorial service broadcast from the Cenotaph by the BBC, using tele-recording for the first time.
• The first Hollywood movie production for TV, The Public Prosecutor.
• There are 44,000 television sets in use in the United States.

Debuts

• March 11 – Small Fry Club (1947–1951)
• April 3 – Juvenile Jury (1947–1954)
• May – The Swift Home Service Club (1947–?)
• May 2 – Doorway to Fame (1947–1949)
• May 7 – Kraft Television Theater on NBC, the first regularly scheduled drama series on a network (1947–1958)
• May 15 – King Cole's Birthday Party (1947–1949)
• May 21 – In the Kelvinator Kitchen (1947–1948)^[1]
• June 16 – The Walter Compton News (1947–1948)
• July 8 – Major League Baseball on NBC (1947–2000)
• July 25 – Musical Merry-Go-Round (1947–1949)
• October 13 – Junior Jamboree (later named Kukla, Fran and Ollie), on WBKB in Chicago (1947–1957)
• October 1947 – first telecording by BBC (kinescope), showing black singer Adelaide Hall performing two songs with chorus and her guitar
• November 18 – situation comedy Mary Kay and Johnny on Dumont network (1947–1950)
• November 19 – Missus Goes a Shopping debuts on CBS, becoming that network's first commercial daytime series.^[2]
• November 20 – Meet the Press, first network telecast on NBC (1947–present)
• November 27 – Charade Quiz (1947–1949)
• November – Swing Into Sports (1947–1949)
• December 4 – Television Playhouse (1947–1948)
• December 8 – Americana (1947–1949)
• December 27 – Puppet Television Theater (later called Howdy Doody), a children's television program on NBC (1947–1960)
• The Jack Eigen Show (1947–1951)
• Café Continental (UK) on the BBC Television Service) (1947–1953)

Television shows

Series	Debut	Ended
Picture Page (UK)	October 8, 1936	1939
	1946	1952
Starlight (UK)	November 3, 1936	1939
	1946	1949
For The Children (UK)	April 24, 1937	1939
	July 7, 1946	1950
The Voice of Firestone Televues	1943	1947
	1949	1963
The World in Your Home	1944	1948
Boxing From St. Nicholas Arena	1946	1948
You Be the Judge	1946	194?
See What You Know	January 1946	1949
Hour Glass	May 9, 1946	March 1947
Face to Face	June 9, 1946	January 26, 1947
Geographically Speaking	June 9, 1946	October 1947
Cash and Carry	June 20, 1946	July 1, 1947
Serving Through Science	August 15, 1946	1947
I Love to Eat	1946	1947
You Are an Artist	1946	1950
Gillette Cavalcade of Sports	November 8, 1946	June 24, 1960
Let's Rhumba	1946	1947
Television Screen Magazine	1946	1949
Campus Hoopla	1946	1947
Swing Into Sports	1947	1949
Chicagoland Mystery Players	1947	July 23, 1950
The Jack Eigen Show	1947	1951
Small Fry Club	1947	1951
Juvenile Jury	1947	1954
The Swift Home Service Club	May 1947	?
Doorway to Fame	May 2, 1947	July 4, 1949
Kraft Television Theater	May 7, 1947	1958
King Cole's Birthday Party	May 15, 1947	June 23, 1949
In the Kelvinator Kitchen	1947	1948
The Walter Compton News	June 16, 1947	January 1948
Major League Baseball on NBC	July 8, 1947	October 17, 2000
Musical Merry-Go-Round	1947	1949
Kukla, Fran and Ollie	October 13, 1947	1957
Meet the Press (longest running program with more than 4000 episodes)	1947	Still in broadcast
Pantomime Quiz	November 13, 1947	October 9, 1959
Mary Kay and Johnny	November 18, 1947	March 11, 1950
Charade Quiz	1947	1949
Television Playhouse	December 4, 1947	April 11, 1948
Americana	1947	1949
Howdy Doody	December 27, 1947	September 24, 1960
Kaleidoscope (UK)	November 2, 1946	1953
Pinwright's Progress (UK)	November 29, 1946	May 16, 1947
Muffin the Mule (UK)	1946	1955
Paging You (UK)	1946	1948
Café Continental (UK)	1947	1953
Eye Witness	1947	1948

Ending this year

Date	Show	Debut
January 17	The Voice of Firestone	1943
	Let's Rhumba	1946
January 26	Face to Face
March	Hour Glass
May 16	Pinwright's Progress (UK)
May 18	I Love to Eat
May 27	Serving Through Science
July 1	Cash and Carry
October	Geographically Speaking
Unknown	Campus Hoopla

Births

• February 2 – Farrah Fawcett, actress (Charlie's Angels) (died 2009)
• February 24 – Edward James Olmos, Actor (Miami Vice)
• March 1 – Alan Thicke, actor (Growing Pains)
• March 6 – Rob Reiner, actor (All in the Family), producer and director
• April 6 – John Ratzenberger, actor, (Cheers)
• April 12 – David Letterman, comedian and talk show host (The Late Show)
• April 23 – Blair Brown, actress (The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd)
• June 21
  • Meredith Baxter, actress (Family Ties)
  • Michael Gross, actor (Family Ties)
• June 22 – David Lander, comedic actor (Laverne & Shirley)
• July 2 – Larry David, actor, writer and producer (Seinfeld)
• July 3 – Betty Buckley, actress and singer (Eight is Enough)
• July 22 – Albert Brooks, actor (The Simpsons), comedian and director
• September 6 – Jane Curtin, actress and comedian (Saturday Night Live, 3rd Rock from the Sun)
• October 1 – Stephen Collins, actor (7th Heaven)
• October 17 – Michael McKean, actor and comedian (Laverne & Shirley)
• November 24 – Dwight Schultz, actor (The A-Team)
• November 25 – John Larroquette, actor (Night Court)
• December 11 – Teri Garr, actress and comedian ([[]])
• December 29 – Ted Danson, actor (Cheers)

References

1. Brooks, Tim & Marsh, Earle (1979). The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network TV Shows: 1946–Present. Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-25525-9.
2. McNeil, Alex (1996). Total Television. Penguin Books USA, Inc. ISBN 0-14-02-4916-8.

External links