CBS' "Up to the Minute" - on Walter Cronkite's First CBS Evening Newscast - from 1992!!

[manhbx96]

and a half century later still going strong

[Roseantique2003]

Goodness....when JFK talks, you just have to listen, don't you? Our candidates today are just bor-ing......

[observer9670]

Kennedy's aides said he desperately wanted Barry Goldwater to get the Republican nomination. JFK felt that Goldwater's extreme conservative views would doom his chances to win. Kennedy was most afraid of Nelson Rockefeller getting the Republican nomination.

[observer9670]

Huntley-Brinkley expanded to a half hour the following week. They also had an interview with JFK on their first half hour broadcast. ABC didn't expand their evening news to a half hour until 1967.

[fromthesidelines]

Yes, you're absolutely correct, 'altfactor'. "THE CBS EVENING NEWS" was carried live, by most stations, at 6:30pm(et) {and still is}. Some affiliates (eventually, New York's WCBS-TV by mid-1965) preferred scheduling a "delayed edition" at 7pm(et), so they could expand their local newscasts to an hour.

[altfactor]

Geritol sponsored Ted Mack's "Amateur Hour" during the 1960's, so it's no surprise he was their corporate spokesman for their commercials, even those on other programs.

[altfactor]

In a way, this was barbaric. Black-and-white, reports from the field shot in film (no live minicams yet), no satellites to feed reports from overseas, and smaller news staffs than the networks have today.

It doesn't mean the journalism was worse; it probably was the best that network TV could do given the technical limitations of the time.

[gymnastix]

@altfactor "Barbaric" is not the correct adjective to use in a comparison between the technological limitations of network television newscasts of this era (1962) versus those of today (2011).

A better choice of a term would be "archaic" or even "primitive." But "barbaric" implies hostility extending to violence, such as cannibalism.

[altfactor]

@gymnastix The point I wanted to make was that TV news coverage has come a long way over the years.

In fact, the big three networks probably couldn't have mounted an evening newscast longer than fifteen minutes until the beginning of the sixties because their news gathering infrastructure was so small.

[lcs1956]

I wouldn't use the word barbaric. It looks more reasoned and calm than the hyperkinetic stuff they put on today.

[fromthesidelines]

Pharmaceuticals, Inc., the makers of Geritol, also sponsored "TED MACK'S ORIGINAL AMATEUR HOUR" on CBS' late Sunday afternoon schedule during the '60s- hence, Mack himself pitching Geritol. Philip Morris, on behalf of their various cigarette brands, was another "participating sponsor" of Cronkite's nightly newscast at the time.

John Roberts, after a stint at CNN, is currently working for Fox News Channel.

[airdaleva42]

Watching kennedy speak and mentioning the 64 election seems so ironic.The world would a lot better off if events had been different.

[manhbx96]

From April 16,1962 to March 6 1981 this man dominated news journalism with the CBS Evening News

[byrd4216]

His first 30-minute newscast. Cronkite had been anchoring a 15-minute version since April 1962, and Douglas Edwards anchored it before that, going back to 1948.