The Huntley Brinkley Report on Apollo 13 1970

Chet Huntley anchors this April 14 1970 edition of The Huntley Brinkley Report on NBC, with coverage of the ongoing Apollo 13 saga.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• TV
• television
• news
• history
• retro
• 1970
• April
• 14
• Chet
• Huntley
• Richard
• Nixon
• space
• mission
• disaster
• rescue
• Apollo
• 13
• moon
• astronaut

[JRF1961]

Why is this in B/W when NBC went all to color broadcasting in 1965?

[robatsea2009]

@JRF1961 Most likely due to the primitive video recording technology of the era used to record the broadcasts (which were indeed in color).

[SixteenMilliMeter]

@robatsea2009 It's black & white because it was recorded off the air by the Vanderbilt TV News Archive in Nashville. Vanderbilt began taping the Big 3 network newscasts in 1968 when it found out that most of the newscasts weren't being saved by the networks themselves. Vanderbilt used industrial grade B&W videotape recorders and didn't start recording in color in 1979.

[robatsea2009]

@SixteenMilliMeter thanks for clearing that up!

[zxcdsa11]

This newscast is wonderful. We get all the pertinent facts delivered in a logical sequence without all the infantile emotionalism that is so common today. God I miss the days when news was informative and feelings were left to the soap operas.

[Soulthinker2007]

@SixteenMilliMeter

I remember a clip I saw from one of the broadcasts where the HBR was sponsored by Texico. After their "good night" segment Huntly said "And good night for Texico".

[SixteenMilliMeter]

@Soulthinker2007 Unfortunately, most of them are simply gone. NBC chose not to preserve them. If it weren't for the Vanderbilt TV News Archive in Nashville, most of the last two years of "The Huntley-Brinkley Report" would be gone as well.

[Soulthinker2007]

I would love to see more of the Huntley-Brinkley reports from the late 50's and most of the 60's. Especially the introductions.

[pvx]

@robatsea2009 Yes, SixteenMM is correct, the giveaway is the time/date stamp at the top of the screen, as was Vanderbilt's practice for their recordings. (Plus the WSM-TV ID (the station being in Nashville) is more proof. :) )

[ride442]

I agree that the reporting was factual and drama free. How refreshing. Reporters and the networks were professional back in the day. Anymore I have to wait for the BBC news report to aire late night in order to get anything close to those old standards. What a shame.

[altfactor]

Wasn't David Brinkley enroute to Houston that evening to host his half of the NBC newscast from there for the rest of the flight?? I seem to recall Brinkley was in Houston to do the news there the rest of that week.

I believe John Chancellor had co-anchored the launch from Cape Canaveral, but was flown to Houston in the early hours of the crisis to co-annchor NBC's live coverage of the rest of the flight from there (with Frank McGee anchoring coverage of the rest of the flight from New York).

[mtstroud]

The ID card is for WSM-TV, the Nashville NBC affiliate. WSM-TV at the time was the sister station of WSM radio, known as the station that more or less helped make country music a national phenomenon. In fact, country music is the reason, believe it or not, that WSM-TV carried no Saturday NBC newscasts until the late 1970s. The commitment to a syndicated country music show at 5:30 Central Time preempted the "NBC Saturday News." Hence, those broadcasts are not available in the Vanderbilt archive.