Philo T. Farnsworth & 100 Years of TV

Paul Schatzkin

Over 100 weeks, we're going to countdown to the Centennial on Sept 7, 2027 by recounting the 100 Top Moments in the First 100 Years of Television.

  1. 3d ago

    E62: The First Living Room War: When Cronkite Broke Ranks

    By 1967, half a million American troops were fighting in Vietnam, and the casualty figures had become a nightly fixture in American living rooms. But for most of the war's early years, television largely reflected the official story coming from Washington and the Pentagon. Then came the Tet Offensive. On February 27, 1968, CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite returned from a reporting trip to Vietnam and delivered something extraordinary on television: an editorial assessment of the war. After witnessing the devastation of Tet firsthand, Cronkite concluded that the war was "mired in stalemate" and that negotiations offered the only realistic way out. It was an extraordinary moment—not simply because Cronkite was America's most trusted television journalist, but because millions of Americans were watching the war unfold, night after night, in their own living rooms. This episode of Countdown to the Centennial examines the rise of television's "Living Room War," the Tet Offensive, Cronkite's decision to break with the official narrative, and the remarkable claim that President Lyndon Johnson watched the broadcast and realized he had lost the confidence of the American people. Television had brought the war home. Now, for the first time, television itself was helping turn the nation against it. Chapters (00:00:00) - Intro and episode setup(00:00:47) - Origins of the Vietnam War(00:03:14) - America's growing military commitment(00:04:48) - Escalation and the rise of TV war coverage(00:06:18) - Combat footage reaches American living rooms(00:08:28) - Television fuels the anti-war movement(00:10:29) - The Tet Offensive shatters official narratives(00:12:16) - Cronkite travels to Vietnam(00:13:56) - Cronkite's stalemate broadcast(00:15:11) - Johnson's reaction and withdrawal from the race(00:16:46) - The war's end and reunification of Vietnam(00:17:44) - Legacy and memorial(00:18:21) - Closing and next episode preview

    E62: The First Living Room War: When Cronkite Broke Ranks

  2. Oct 11

    E61: All You Need Is Love: The Night Television Went Global | Countdown #47

    In 1945, a young British radar instructor named Arthur C. Clarke imagined satellites orbiting high above the Earth, relaying radio and television signals around the world. Twenty-two years later, the idea became reality. On June 25, 1967, hundreds of producers and technicians connected more than a dozen countries across five continents for Our World, the first live global satellite television broadcast. Viewers watched events unfold from around the planet in real time, connected by an electronic web of satellites, ground stations, and control rooms. Then came the grand finale. From Abbey Road Studios in London, the Beatles performed John Lennon's newly written anthem, “All You Need Is Love,” before an audience that included some of the biggest names in British rock. An estimated 400 million people around the world watched as the world's first global television broadcast closed with a song whose message needed no translation. This episode of Countdown to the Centennial tells the story of how a science-fiction vision became the Global Village—and how the Beatles gave it a soundtrack. Chapters (00:00:00) - 100 Years of Television: A Countdown to the Super Bowl(00:01:10) - Arthur C. Clarke's Satellite Communications(00:11:05) - The Beatles(00:13:44) - 100 Years of Television

    E61: All You Need Is Love: The Night Television Went Global | Countdown #47

  3. Oct 4

    E60: The First Super Bowl: The Game Television Built | Countdown #48

    In the beginning, there was baseball. But by the 1960s, television had discovered that football was almost perfectly designed for the small screen. From the first televised football game in 1939 to the legendary 1958 NFL Championship Game, television helped turn professional football from a cultural backwater into a national obsession. Then came the AFL, the rivalry between CBS and NBC, and a merger that created the ultimate championship game between the two leagues. The first Super Bowl was more than just another football game. It was arguably the first major sporting event created and staged entirely for television. In fact, when NBC was still in a commercial break at the start of the second half, the officials made the teams kick off again so viewers on both networks could see the play. In this episode of Countdown to the Centennial, we trace the unlikely rise of the Super Bowl—from its half-empty first game to Joe Namath's guarantee, Super Bowl parties, prime-time television, and its eventual displacement of the World Series as America's biggest sports broadcast. Chapters (00:00:00) - countdown: 100 Years of Television(00:00:46) - The Making of the Super Bowl(00:13:27) - 100 Years of Television

    E60: The First Super Bowl: The Game Television Built | Countdown #48

  4. Sep 27

    E59: Marshall McLuhan: The Medium Is the Message | Countdown #49

    In 1964, Marshall McLuhan published Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man and gave the television age a way to understand itself. McLuhan argued that television was far more than a machine for delivering programs. It was changing the way people thought, experienced time and space, and related to one another. His famous phrase — “the medium is the message” — suggested that the technology itself could be more consequential than the content it carried. He also predicted the emergence of a “global village,” as electronic media collapsed distances and created shared experiences among millions of people. The Kennedy assassination and the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show had already demonstrated the extraordinary power of television to make people everywhere see and experience the same thing at the same time. McLuhan's ideas could seem baffling, even mystical. But decades later, his insights would take on new meaning in the age of the internet, smartphones and social media. The television screen changed the world. McLuhan helped us understand why. Chapters (00:00:00) - Marshall McLuhan: Understanding Media(00:09:36) - Marshall McLuhan's 'Understanding Media'(00:13:41) - 100 Years of Television

    E59: Marshall McLuhan: The Medium Is the Message | Countdown #49

  5. Sep 20

    E58: Yeah, Yeah, Yeah! The Night Beatlemania Came To America | Countdown to the Centennial #50

    On February 9, 1964, more than 70 million Americans tuned in to The Ed Sullivan Show to see four young musicians from Liverpool who had already conquered Britain but were only beginning to make their mark in America. The Beatles arrived at exactly the right moment. Just months after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, a generation raised in front of television was ready for something joyful—and John, Paul, George and Ringo delivered it with ringing guitars, sparkling harmonies, floppy haircuts, and the screams of thousands of teenage girls. This episode of Countdown to the Centennial traces the unlikely path that brought The Beatles to Ed Sullivan's stage—from Sullivan's encounter with Beatlemania at Heathrow Airport and Capitol Records' initial reluctance, to a Washington disc jockey who helped turn I Want to Hold Your Hand into an American sensation. Then came the television appearance that inspired countless young Americans to pick up guitars and start bands of their own. Television didn't create The Beatles. But on one extraordinary Sunday night, it introduced them simultaneously to an entire nation—and gave America a glimpse of the cultural upheaval that was about to come. Chapters (00:00:00) - Ed Sullivan: The Beatles(00:09:12) - The Beatles

    E58: Yeah, Yeah, Yeah! The Night Beatlemania Came To America | Countdown to the Centennial #50

  6. Sep 13

    E57: Play It Again: The Day Television Learned to Rewind Time | 100 Years of TV #51

    On December 7, 1963, the Army and Navy football teams met in Philadelphia for a game already heavy with national emotion. Postponed after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the contest became one of the first major public events in a country trying to regain its footing. Then CBS director Tony Verna tried something television had never successfully incorporated into a live sports broadcast. Using a second Ampex videotape recorder, Verna replayed a Navy touchdown moments after it happened. Viewers watched Roger Staubach take the snap, evade defenders, and throw to Ron Beagle in the end zone—again. This episode of Countdown to the Centennial tells the story of television’s first instant replay, the technical gamble behind it, and the decades of innovation that followed. From cue tones and slow motion to multiple angles and official replay reviews, instant replay proved that television could do more than conquer distance. It could manipulate time. Chapters (00:00:00) - 100 Years of Television: The Army Navy Game(00:09:49) - 100 Years of Television

    E57: Play It Again: The Day Television Learned to Rewind Time | 100 Years of TV #51

  7. Sep 5

    E56: Christopher Nolan Made the Wrong Damn Movie | 99th Anniversary Edition

    On September 7, 1927, in a San Francisco loft, Philo T. Farnsworth transmitted the first electronic television image—and set in motion the screen-based world we now take completely for granted. Ninety-nine years later, we carry screens in our pockets, work on them, communicate through them, watch them, and fill our lives with them. But the pivotal breakthrough that made this culture possible has largely been lost to history. In this special 99th-anniversary bonus episode of 100 Years of Television, Paul Schatzkin makes the case that we don't live in Oppenheimer's world. Unless you have an atomic bomb in your pocket. We live in Philo Farnsworth's world. And Christopher Nolan made the wrong damn movie. With exactly one year remaining until the Centennial of Television on September 7, 2027, this episode looks back at the teenage insight, the 1922 sketch, and the fuzzy first image of September 7, 1927 that became television's Big Bang moment. And we ask listeners to help spread the word as the countdown enters its final year. Chapters (00:00:00) - 100 Years of Television: A countdown to the centennial(00:01:29) - The Story of Television's 99th Anniversary(00:09:22) - 100 Years of Television

    E56: Christopher Nolan Made the Wrong Damn Movie | 99th Anniversary Edition

  8. Sep 5

    E55: We Interrupt This Program for a Special Bulletin: Countdown #52

    On Friday afternoon, November 22, 1963, millions of Americans were following the everyday lives of the Hughes family in the fictional town of Oakdale when a simple black title card appeared on their television screens: CBS News Bulletin. What followed was four days of continuous television unlike anything the world had ever experienced. Walter Cronkite's calm professionalism, the live murder of Lee Harvey Oswald, and the funeral of President John F. Kennedy transformed television from a source of entertainment into the nation's indispensable witness to history. This episode of Countdown to the Centennial explores how one tragic weekend forever changed television news, established the template for modern breaking-news coverage, and united an entire nation around a shared experience that millions would remember for the rest of their lives. Chapters (00:00:00) - We Should Have Laughed at Edison(00:00:20) - 100 Years of Television: The Day Television Was Discovered(00:03:42) - The Story of President Kennedy's Assassination(00:11:17) - The Story of The Kennedy Assassination(00:12:49) - 100 Years of Television

    E55: We Interrupt This Program for a Special Bulletin: Countdown #52
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Over 100 weeks, we're going to countdown to the Centennial on Sept 7, 2027 by recounting the 100 Top Moments in the First 100 Years of Television.

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