As a bonus, here’s a visit Dave made to Bob and Ray’s TV show shortly before Today made its debut.
:: We’re still here and we’re doing okay, incidentally. There just hasn’t been anything to report. The manuscript is still in the editing/review process, which from experience I know takes time. I also haven’t made many new discoveries, and even if I had, the day job keeps getting in the way. Good things are to come, and soon, I hope. Stay tuned.
Today is a day that should be celebrated everywhere, with cake and ice cream for everybody, for it was on this day in 1913 that our beloved Dave Garroway was born. Not to mention, it was on this day in 2017 that this website was officially launched. It was a birthday tribute to Dave, a way of keeping his memory alive in a world where he’s so often been forgotten.
Five years ago, if you’d asked me if the book would be completed by now, I’d have told you that I hoped it would be, but it was a tall order. I’d love to get the James Webb Space Telescope to look back five years and tell me “yes, it will be.”1 The book is being proof-read; I’ll make whatever alterations are advised, and then it’ll be off for layout and the next steps, and of course I’ll say more about that when the time is right.
The end of the writing process is so much of why it’s been quiet here, but I thought we’d celebrate Dave’s birthday by taking a look at some favorite pictures I’ve accumulated over the years. For various reasons, none of these will be in the book2 but there’s no reason why we can’t take a few minutes here to enjoy them.
Happy birthday, Old Tiger.
The principals of the Chicago School pose for a family portrait. Our Dave is in a typically relaxed pose on the couch. (NBC photo)Nearly two decades later, Garroway returns to the Chicago studio to appear in a special. (NBC photo)A younger Garroway goofs around for the photographer in a Chicago studio. (NBC photo)On top of the news in the RCA Exhibition Hall. (NBC photo)My favorite photo that I couldn’t get for the book: daughter Paris visiting dad at work. (NBC photo)Reviewing a “Dave Garroway Show” script with cast members Shirley Harmer and Jill Corey. (NBC photo)Publicity shot for “Dave’s Place,” his November 1960 prime-time special. (NBC photo)The lights down, another “Today” comes to an end. (NBC photo)
You may recall that several years ago I wrote about one of my most cherished artifacts, my RCA BK-4 “Starmaker.” The Starmaker, you may recall, was that unusual foot-long microphone that Dave Garroway and his fellow on-air staffers on Today used for the first few years.
Dave wearing a BK-4 on a harness for hands-free operation. (NBC photo)
My Starmaker was in excellent condition, with only one weird scar across the front below the RCA emblem. I figured it was just something that happened while it was being used. From time to time I toyed with the idea of sending it to a microphone specialist for a checkup, but figured it would be one of those “someday” things when I had fewer pressing needs.
A few weeks ago, somebody contacted me about something and, in that way conversations go, the topic of the BK-4 came up. It occurred to me I should pay the little one some attention, so I got it out of storage. What I saw broke my heart. I’d spooled up that super-long cable and placed the microphone atop it. Bad idea, it turned out. The old cable jacket had eaten into the paint, leaving two big and ugly scars across the front of the microphone. The microphone itself was not damaged, but the paint was ruined. I felt kind of sick about it, especially since my own negligence had done this. (I think that weird little scar I mentioned earlier, the one that was already on the microphone, was the result of a similar cable jacket burn.)
I’m going to spare you pictures of the microphone with the paint damage. Instead, here’s a photo of Gilda silently reproving me for being such a doofus with a priceless artifact.
Now, I could have fixed this myself with some careful sanding and a can of spray paint, but I didn’t feel right doing that. An artifact like this deserves the best treatment I could find. And that’s what I decided to do.
I boxed the Starmaker up and sent it off to New Jersey. That’s where Clarence Kane runs ENAK Microphones and Repair Service. Clarence worked for RCA back in the day and, when RCA got out of the microphone business, set up his own service center to keep microphones going. Clarence is now assisted by Luke Petersen, who has been very busy the last several years learning the ins and outs of dozens of microphone types. But instead of telling you about these two, maybe I should let this neat little film speak for me:
I sent my Starmaker off a few weeks ago, and I expected it to take a while. But early last week I got an invoice, and last Thursday UPS brought me a box, and with my heart wedged between my adenoids I cracked the thing open. Inside, very carefully packaged, was my beloved Starmaker…
Complete with a neat little thank-you from Clarence and Luke. I appreciate that, gentlemen…but it is I who should be thanking YOU.
…looking better than it’s looked in forever. Not only had the paint been accurately redone (while preserving the NBC-TV rollmark on the back!), but at my request they had also given it a check-up and installed a new cable with a standard XLR connector (and, also at my request, returned the old cable for historical purposes). All I need is a good pre-amp, and I could put this little one back to work, which is what I think it wants to be doing anyway.
To say I’m happy is an understatement. I was positively giddy over it. And while the reconditioning job was not inexpensive, I have absolutely no regrets. I owed it to that microphone, not only for what my carelessness had done, but also to make sure that microphone will be in good shape for its next 70 years.
If you have an old microphone that needs service, give the folks at ENAK a call or send them an e-mail. I highly recommend them.
:: Things are quiet on the book front, which is much of why you haven’t heard much from me in a while. Right now the main thing is waiting for some paperwork to come down, and waiting for the recommended edits from the copy editor. Things are in work, though, so stay tuned.
I don’t know if you felt a little shift in the universe or not a little after 2 p.m. our time Sunday. If you did, it was caused by a Microsoft Word document, about 412,000 bytes, being transferred via e-mail to the publisher.
I wish I could say it prompted great celebration here, or even some kind of release. But, to be honest with you, it was the culmination of several straight days of making last edits, hoping to be sure the format met as many of the publisher’s requirements as possible. I went through that document – all 494 pages of it, by the time it was done – several times. By Sunday afternoon, I had officially reached the “I’m done” point, and sent it on. Not only was I satisfied things were as in order as I could make them, but I was tired from reading it, and I just wanted it over with. I was numb.3 I went in the kitchen and got a can of Coke4 and a little snack. And that’s how I celebrated.
What happens next? Well, the publisher will send the file to a copy editor, who will go through it very, very carefully. Anything that’s amiss in it, I’ll have to correct or otherwise bring in line with house style. Nor is my work completely done, either, because I have two or three photographs that still need resolution of rights and permissions.5 Once all of that is squared away, I can forward the image files and captions to the publisher.
Then, for the most part, my work will be done for a while, at least until it’s time to review edits and then (soon, I hope) galleys. Then, at some point after that, along will come completed books. And then, I hope will follow the really fun part, which will be some kind of tour (I hope) and speaking engagements and what not, and those are fun, and I hope there will be more than a few of those.
Anyway, for now, there you are. This project is a lot closer to being done, and the dream Dave Jr. had for so long is a lot closer to coming true. I wish Dave was here to see it, but I can’t help thinking he knows.
:: As horror has unfolded on another side of the world over the last month, this is a time more appropriate than most others to pray for the thing Dave Garroway wished: peace. Do so, please.
If you’ve never written a book…oh, are you missing out on fun. I don’t mean it just from how you’ll spend so much of your life looking for source material, hunting down obscurities, lining up interviews, getting cooperation and all other manner of hilarity. I mean it in that if you’re writing non-fiction, especially history or biography, you’re going to need illustrations.
Sometimes you’ll be fortunate. I certainly was with my last book, because Ben Robertson’s papers at Clemson University included a reasonable selection of photos. Since my publisher put a limit on how many photos I could have, and since the photos in the Robertson papers were a decent cross-section of his life, it wasn’t difficult. Better still, since Clemson held the rights to the photos, getting permission was easy.
I wish the same could be true for Dave Garroway. Yes, the Garroway papers at Wyoming have some photos, and I have secured high-resolution scans of several of them. I have Wyoming’s permission to use them, and that will suffice for a few. Dave’s daughter Paris has also gone through the family photos and unearthed some treasures, and I’m having her get those scanned at the resolution I need for the book. That only takes me so far, though. Some of the Wyoming photos, and at least one of the photos Paris has, have their rights managed by others, and I need permission from them. I also have several very nice NBC press photos I would like to use.
It ain’t this easy in a book. (NBC photo)
The temptation may be there to say “Okay, it’s a small-run book…take your chances. Better to ask forgiveness than permission.” That’s not how I work, though, at least not in print. Here on the blog, I’ll use low-resolution images and claim fair-use. (I’m certainly not making any money off this, for one, and I also try to keep the images small and give credit as I can.) For one thing, copyright is something I often talk about with my students. How would it look if I got in trouble for something I admonish them against? I won’t even get into how much it would cost me in legal fees and penalties and all that. Yech.
I could go through the big image brokers. If I could afford Getty Images, that would be super, because Getty has dozens and dozens of Garroway photos. I don’t have Getty Images money, though. Shutterstock has a smaller selection, but they’re good and they’re mostly different, and while the cost is lower (and though I may go that route if I strike out with the other things), it’s still a trifle dear.
At the moment, photo clearances are the major thing that keeps me from sending the manuscript in and beginning the process with my publisher. I have a contact who is trying to assist on the NBC photos, for one. And I have had some unexpected successes: one photo I dearly wanted to use still had its rights held by the Associated Press. I contacted AP and a very kind representative took up the case and worked out a very affordable rate. On top of that, the AP still had the negative, so the image you will see in the book will look as good as the day it was made.
There’s one more surprise, and I negotiated it last week. I’m not going to spoil the fun just yet, but the book now has a cover image. It was one I had never seen before, and I loved it the moment I saw it. I think you will, too. And it’s all thanks to a friend who put me in touch with the right person, and that right person was very happy to work with me to make it happen.
So there you are. As with any project, it all comes down to the items on the punch list, and the help of good people along the way. And maybe that’s the real value of a project like this.
On January 31, 1987 NBC gave over a prime-time hour so that Today could celebrate its 35th anniversary. As you’ll see, this is a fascinating special, particularly because of one feature.6
A word of warning: This is a very image-heavy retrospective. This special was fast-paced and used a lot of archival footage. I didn’t include everything I had wanted to include, because otherwise I’d still be editing photos this time next week. Anyway, here we go.
“Hunter takes a detour tonight so we can help our friends at the Today Show celebrate a special anniversary.”7 This six-feathered version of the Peacock that we know so well? When this airs, it’s less than a year old.
We open with Jane Pauley and Bryant Gumbel, who just happen to be walking along 49th Street in front of the old Exhibition Hall. Gumbel points out where they are and how it was where Today began. “I think there’s a bank there now,” Gumbel adds mid-sentence, in that parenthetical way of his. Jane Pauley sets the scene for what television was like in 1952 – only 15 million sets in the whole country, with most viewership in the evenings, and the thought of an early-morning television show was unusual. “In fact, only 26 stations carried that first Today show,” she says.
The people on the sidewalk just keep passing by, paying no heed. There’s no way you could do this now, not when everybody wants to mug for the camera.
Then we go to a montage of classic moments, with a simple and very pretty rendition of “Sentimental Journey” in the background. And, sure enough, the first clip we see is J. Fred Muggs with Dave Garroway.
The focus in the opening montage is on lighthearted moments. You’d almost get the feeling Today was a comedy revue. The only really serious moment is Pope John Paul II holding hands and praying with Gumbel and Pauley. Then we dissolve to the dignitaries gathered for the evening, and the velvet voice of Fred Facey introduces the show.
“Welcome to Today at 35, and our family reunion,” Gumbel says, teeing up the introductions as being like a family album. We’re introduced to the returning family members with archival footage, followed by a shot of them in the studio. One neat touch is that the NBC logo appropriate for the start of their tenure is shown alongside their names.
The entire gathering was introduced in alphabetical order: Frank Blair, Tom Brokaw, John Chancellor, Hugh Downs, Betty Furness, Joe Garagiola, Jim Hartz, Florence Henderson, Jack Lescoulie, Lee Meriwether, Edwin Newman, Helen O’Connell, Betsy Palmer, John Palmer, Willard Scott, Gene Shalit, Barbara Walters, and Pat Weaver (“all of this is his baby – which he enjoys now from retirement,” Gumbel says). Jane Pauley and Bryant Gumbel round out the introduction.
“Our beginnings were humble,” Gumbel says, teeing up the obligatory clip of the first morning. “Dave Garroway and a staff of 35, working in a storefront with people looking in the window. The critics all laughed, and said it wouldn’t last even 13 weeks.”
I think there’s some kind of written regulation at NBC that they have to show this clip at least once in every special.
When we rejoin the present, Bryant Gumbel is sitting at a re-creation of the original set – “this is NOT the original,” he takes pains to point out.8
Gumbel is joined by Hugh Downs, Tom Brokaw and Frank Blair there to recount the early days of Today. Gumbel asks Blair if he felt like a pioneer. “Definitely,” Blair says. He noted that being up early and doing this unusual thing bound them together. Blair notes that producer Mort Werner was asked once what makes Today click: “It’s a matter of chemistry.”
Downs remembers being on the NBC staff in Chicago and watching the first Today program from the booth – “I was duly amazed, but I didn’t think people would be up tuning in.” Brokaw muses, “As I sit here thinking about it, these are my heroes! I was growing up out there in South Dakota, and television was truly my window on the world.” Downs remembers moments that, looking back, he called “golden.”
Garroway sits, bemused, as an entire marching band winds through the Exhibition Hall…and watches a flea circus perform on the air.
Blair notes the program was criticized “when we brought the chimpanzee in,” but the reasoning was that kids would turn the program on to see the chimpanzee, and the parents would realize there was a news program going on. “So we all owe a great debt of gratitude to J. Fred Muggs…wherever you are,” Blair says with mock solemnity.
I guess I owe the little guy this much.
Gumbel asks all three if one appreciates Today more after you’ve left it. Brokaw is grateful for having done it; Downs makes a lighthearted but appreciative comment. It becomes clear that Frank Blair never really let go. “If I were younger, I would love to still be doing it. I would boot John Palmer right out of here and take over. But you reach a point of no return. You run out of fuel, and it’s better that a younger man has my job now.”
As they go to break, there’s a clip of John “Skid” Chancellor and Frank “Checkers” Blair running the first Today Show Grand Prix, a go-kart race inside the studio.
There’s a commercial. Soft piano. A woman’s voice, over shots of a bedroom: “Silk always makes me feel sensuous.” And when the woman in the commercial wears pantyhose that glistens like silk and feels like silk, “I feel wonderful…all over.”9
Then GM, in a Very Important Commercial, talks about its commitment to building better cars, culminating in a new six-year, 60,000-mile warranty “that tells you each and every GM car we build today is the best-quality, best-value GM car ever.”10
When we come back, Jane Pauley leads off a segment with Barbara Walters, mentioning her ascent from being hired by Dave Garroway as a writer to becoming co-host. There are clips of her interviewing dignitaries and statesmen and other VIPs…followed by the obligatory clips from a segment in which Walters went undercover at a Playboy Club in 1962, complete with the bunny costume.
Walters remembers the “bunny dip” used to serve patrons their drinks.
They segue into how Walters’ role evolved from writing women’s features to doing general features. Then there’s another clip, a 1965 segment where Walters spends an evening with the information telephone operators in the 50th Street office, and tries it herself, only to be greeted by the voice of Jack Lescoulie on the other end of the line.
Pauley asks Walters who she looked up to growing up. Walters replies that someday Pauley herself would hear young women say what Walters heard: “I grew up with you.”11 And Walters says she was very proud that when she left, Pauley took her place. “I think it’s a great credit to me that someone like you followed.”12
From there Pauley segues to talking about the role of the Today Girls. And four of them – Lee Meriwether, Helen O’Connell, Florence Henderson and Betsy Palmer – regale us with a cute song about what it was like and the people (and chimpanzee) they worked with, complete with more clips.
Edwin Newman is mentioned only in passing in this song, but I love this clip during the montage – from the end of a special he did long ago. He gives the NBC News disclaimer at the end, while taking a long-awaited bath, then squeezes the sponge over his head and lets out a satisfied sigh.
At the end, Jane Pauley comes over and has a little fun with how they sang her name. She then asks Bernie Wayne, who wrote the song and played the piano, to play a few bars of his most famous composition.
It turns out to be “There She Is, Miss America.” Which, of course, Lee Meriwether came to Today after her reign as Miss America, and there’s a moment of warm reminiscence. That’s promptly disposed of in the throw to break, with the famous clip of Harpo Marx13 chasing a Today Girl around the studio.
Then a bumper, with an RCA TK-11/31. Always a lovely thing to see.
Commercials: A UPS ad looks back on the company’s history through old black-and-white photos. Then lots of fast-paced, high-energy scenes of modern UPS operations. Lots of 727s and 747s. “We run the tightest ship in the shipping business.”
Great airplanes. I loved flying on 727s, back when you could. I miss them.
That’s followed by a commercial for a very personal thing women use. Somehow, clear blue liquid is supposed to demonstrate how effective it is. Right. (No, I’m not showing a picture.)
Then Ann-Margret and Claudette Colbert in “The Two Mrs. Grenvilles,” coming February 8.
“Sir, does this mean Ann-Margret won’t be coming?”
Followed by a Saturday Night Live promo with host Paul Shaffer being heckled by the Church Lady.
Back to the anniversary show, it’s time for a look at the entertainment greats that have been on Today. Some neat finds in the montage, including this exchange between George Gobel and Dave Garroway, when the entire morning’s show was done outside the studio:
Gobel: “The whole show? Out here in the street?”
Garroway: “Yep.”
Gobel: “Well, see now, that’s television for you. You know, just one bad week and you’re out.”
There’s also a glimpse of the famous/infamous “Caesar and Cleopatra” sketch with Jack Lescoulie and Jayne Mansfield.14
Gumbel is at the desk, this time with various occupants of the sidekick role: Willard Scott, Gene Shalit, Joe Garagiola and Jack Lescoulie.
The first anecdote has Lescoulie telling the story of the day Ava Gardner was supposed to be on Today, but didn’t show up. The quick-thinking Garroway summoned staff member Estelle Parsons to the desk. “You be Ava Gardner.” And Garroway conducted the interview. This dissolves into a discussion about how humor is tough to sell in the morning, which leads to playful bickering between Joe Garagiola and Gene Shalit. “Did you ever have hair?” Shalit asks. Garagiola replies, “I think you’re overdressed!” Without missing a beat, Willard Scott leaps up, his toupee in hand. “I think we can correct that!” And he plonks the toupee atop Garagiola’s head.
“This is the dignified Joe Garagiola look….”
…and then Willard turns the toupee. “Now here’s the Hippie Joe Garagiola look! Give him a guitar and watch him go!”
Lescoulie tells a story about a day he was late getting to the studio, and how in those days the tradition was to cut your tie if you made a mistake. Up against the segment clock, Gumbel asks Lescoulie to tell about the ring he wears.
It’s a duplicate of the one Garroway wore, Lescoulie says, and he gave it to him in 1953. “The inscription inside is typical Garroway,” he says, “And it says ‘To Jack from Dave, for being just what you are by the dawn’s early light.’ And I’ve worn it ever since.” Lescoulie then looks toward the camera. “And, old partner, thank you, and peace to you.”
There’s then a montage, introduced by Jane Pauley, about the versatile but lesser-sung members of the Today family.
The very first clip in the montage is the only glimpse you’ll get all night of the forgotten Jim Fleming.
Then there’s an interview with Betty Furness.
Betty mentions that she was a friend of Garroway’s15, so she watched the very first show, and when they began to have women on the show, she wanted to be on the show. “But nobody would talk to me!” She notes that she continued to be snubbed even after she was no longer doing commercials at CBS. What finally got her a role on Today was her work as a consumer reporter for WNBC-TV, and a chance meeting at the elevator with a Today producer led to a substitute hosting job. Then Gumbel crashes the interview16 to show a clip of Jane Pauley bogarting his cigar at a political convention a few years before.
Then more ads.
AT&T is going to combine computers and communications so we can get the right information to the right people at the right time. Reckon how that’s gonna work out?
Smart Cat. Ask any cat and they’ll tell you they’re smarter than humans, anyway.
A slow sweep of the newsroom on that first morning forms a neat bumper for the local throw.
Remington Steele is back! Tuesday!
Peak ’80s. (And, yes, Today did originate from Australia starting the following Monday.)
Back from the break, it’s time to talk about Important News, the big stories, the world leaders and presidents and aspirants and such who have stopped by. This leads in to a discussion with Barbara Walters, John Chancellor, John Palmer and Edwin Newman.
Chancellor starts the discussion with a self-deprecating joke about the montage that led the segment off.17 The comments from the panel speak of the influence the morning shows have gained, to the point that the White House kept track of the shows’ ratings and decided where to deploy their spokespeople accordingly.
Back at the 1952 desk, Jane Pauley takes note of the changes in technology, and notes that Today has featured new technologies right from the first day:
Garroway shows off a wirephoto machine on the first day. “We’ll show it to you mere minutes after it was taken. The print we show you will still be wet, but you won’t be able to feel it at home. I hope.”
Then Mufax shows the home audience grainy stills of the Queen’s coronation.
Hugh Downs and Jim Hartz join Pauley to talk about the change in technology, particularly in how microphones have grown tinier as time has passed. Downs predicts that at the rate they’re shrinking, microphones will disappear altogether in August 1991. Pauley disagrees: “No, I think it’ll be implants, Hugh.” They then discuss how Today has been around the world, buttressed with a quick montage of the many places the program has visited: Paris, Romania, Ireland, Tokyo, Rio de Janeiro, at sea aboard the liner s/s Norway. Jim Hartz suggests that the audience may have become jaded, because they have become accustomed to “whatever you can imagine, you can do.”
We go to commercial with a look out the old 49th Street window.
Other side of the TK-11/31. I want one.
A sentimental spot for Amtrak. “There’s somethin’ about a train that’s magic.”18 Followed by a spot for this new pain reliever called Advil.
“The ritual of Oil of Olay.” Get you some of this stuff and some of that silky pantyhose from the first half-hour, and you’ll be at full-blown Mystical Womanhood before you know it.
A really neat spot for college basketball, with live action giving way to animated pastel renderings. Really beautiful, really classy. I wish we still saw stuff like this today.
During a brief interlude Pauley, Gumbel and Scott talk about what it’s been like, with all the stories and anecdotes and good times. Willard notes, “Everybody really seems to like each other.”19 Then Pauley says they’ve been wondering what Today will be like in the future, so through the magic of computers, they’ve sent Mike Leonard ahead 35 years…to the year 2022. Yes. To this year.
So this is what this year is like. Where’s the Snake logo, then?
“The cameras are robotic. Just stick to the script,” a robotic voice tells Leonard. Well, we do have robotic cameras now, I guess. Anyway, in this version of 2022, there’s a cure for the common cold.20 And they’ll talk live with some of the moment’s biggest celebrities:
The news is sent through absorption. Commercials are two seconds long and subliminal. And weather forecasters can actually do something about the weather: as a robocam hovers nearby, a blizzard in Buffalo gets sent to Los Angeles.
But there’s time to look back to 70 years ago, when Garroway tried out Mary Kelly’s electric typewriter.
This compares to the “rather large” portable television of 1986.
“But give them credit…they knew what the future held.”
Yeah, they got that one right.
And in a disturbing twist, digital facsimiles of yourself can be sent anywhere around the world. Which leads to several Mike Leonards ganging up on him.
This disturbs him. “Because that’s what made the Today show. All the human touches.” Garroway pops in every now and again, a patron saint of the program’s humanity.
Especially as he roars at a telephone receiver.
Leonard’s had enough of this technological dystopia. “Send me back 35 years.”22 So he clicks together his ruby-studded shoes…only to be trapped inside a computer screen.
A more serious look at the future comes in a brief visit with Pat Weaver. “It’s good to be back,” Weaver says, “and particularly on such an auspicious occasion.” Weaver doesn’t think the future will be like Leonard’s fanciful journey. “It’ll still be people. But the future will change, a lot.” Weaver hopes the future will bring fulfillment of the first promise of broadcasting: that you can sit at home, in your comfortable chair, and be somewhere else in the world, at the push of a button and the speed of light. Although he’s disappointed that the promise has yet to be fulfilled, he is optimistic “that with the new technology that we’re getting, we will finally be able to be a world without privilege” – that it won’t require family connections or wealth or aristocracy to enjoy the best things there are. Gumbel reminds Weaver of something he wrote in 1952: that the goal was to enrich life and make the common man quite uncommon. “That’s right!” Weaver says. “Glad to see you’re still consistent,” Gumbel says.23
We go to break with Garroway using his long microphone cord like a whip, to the amusement of the crowd outside.
As they say good night, they remember a couple of family members who have gone onward.
Frank McGee, who joined Today in 1971, “and before his death three years later, the quiet man from Oklahoma made a lot of new friends.”25
…and Dave Garroway. Gumbel closes: “We want to remember Dave Garroway tonight as we always remember him: on some weekday morning, sometime in the ’50s, in living black and white, slightly bemused by the world around him, and believing that a little whimsy never hurt anybody.”
“The environment you live in inevitably influences your personality…I wonder how ours is gonna get influenced, living as often as we do, many hours of the day, in this strange and unique room. This is the only room in the world like the one we live in. With many lights, and…I wonder if we’re gonna have lights growing out of our heads someday.”
It’s Garroway who sees us through the closing credits…and bids us good night, in his familiar way.
I have never talked much on this blog about my dealings with members of the Garroway family. There are reasons for this. One is that I respect their privacy. It took a while for me to establish contact – they weren’t exactly easy to get hold of, and I believed that was for their own reasons, and I have a great deal of respect for that. Heaven only knows how many times over the years they’ve been contacted by various people who had some idea for a book or some other project, or some other reason involving their famous relative.
It’s a long story that involves connections that helped make connections, but in 2018 I had success in making contact with two very important people in Dave Garroway’s life, his daughter Paris and his son Dave Jr. From the very first time we talked on the phone, Dave Jr. was open, friendly, full of stories and memories that he freely shared.
As it happened, they were on the East Coast to see after some family business a few months later, and they wanted to meet with me. They drove down and spent a weekend in town, and to say it was a marvelous time is an understatement. Of course, hearing them tell stories about their dad, and seeing the photos and artifacts from the family’s collection, was a lot of fun. What I didn’t anticipate was that we would have fun just being together for lunch and talking about anything and everything. For my part, it was a chance to show them how seriously I took this project, and that I was going to see it through with dignity and respect.
That weekend passed too quickly, but every few weeks I would get a phone call from Dave Jr. If it was 15 minutes, it was a long conversation. Part of it was to check in on how the book was coming, and inevitably he would mention a story or two about his dad. But he would talk about other things he was doing. He might be about to work on one of his alternative-energy projects, or he might be about to take his van on a long road trip to see sights and visit friends, or he might be off to do something else. It was whatever was on his mind at that moment, in a sort of stream-of-consciousness style, but always with some mirth beneath.
Dave Jr. was very much a free spirit. He just plain thought differently. He had interesting views on science and the world. He developed scientific theories that he presented about, and hoped to turn into published works.26 It was not difficult at all to see his dad in him: not only the facial resemblance, with the eyes and the prominent chin, but the same fascination with figuring out how the world works. He was very much his father’s son.
Dave Jr. presenting at a 2017 conference. (Dave Garroway Jr. collection)
Over time, whenever the caller ID on my phone would light up with his number, it came to feel like hearing from a favorite uncle, the uncle who’s always working on something and has that goofy sense of humor and that slightly askew view of the world, but whom you love because he’s so much fun to share time with. And “boring” is a word I will never use to describe Dave Garroway Jr.27
I had great hopes for the year 2020. It was the year I was going to get out to see Dave and Paris, have long conversations with them, get some additional material for the book, and sift through family photos and scan the most interesting ones for the book. But then came the pandemic, and we had no idea just how serious it was going to be. As it grew worse I had no appetite to travel, nor any desire to put myself in a situation where I might unwittingly inflict a killer virus on someone.28 But even with travel plans out the window, I still had a mountain of material here to work with. Much of it was thanks to Dave Jr., who had not only accumulated a lot of archival material, but many years before had started writing out stories about life with his dad. They are very special stories – some of them heartwarming, some of them hilarious, one or two of them heartbreaking, but all of them provide a view of Dave Garroway that has never been presented.
For a long time I labored through all this material – organizing, then stringing things together into a narrative, much of it done in the wee small hours of morning before getting ready for work. The deadline on the agreement I had with Dave and Paris was that the manuscript would be complete by December 31, 2020. When my teaching duties ended for the Fall semester, I went at it full-bore.29
On the evening of December 25, as we watched A Christmas Story on the annual marathon, I was making final touches to the draft, preparing to export it as a PDF to send to Dave Jr. for review. The phone rang. It was Dave Jr., wishing me “a happy and a merry,” and he asked how the book was going. I informed him that he was about to get the completed first draft. My goodness, I wish I could bottle the joy that was in his voice when I told him. It was a Christmas gift unlike any other, both for me and for him. For many years he had wanted his dad’s story told. Now it was going to happen. That night, I sent him the file.
A couple weeks later I got a call from Dave Jr. He had received the file, had a couple copies printed, and was about to go through it with his sister. We talked about a few other things in our usual breezy manner, and then he said he’d be back in touch once he had done some additional reviewing. Good enough.
On January 29 I had come home after spending the morning on an errand. I was taking it easy after lunch. The phone rang. It was Paris. That was unusual, but I was delighted to hear from her. I was stopped cold when she told me that Dave Jr. had died. I knew from our conversations that he had endured a few health issues over the years, but he had seemed reasonably hale and hearty in our conversations. But now, he was gone. It sent me areel.
It has taken me close to a year to write this. I feel badly that it has taken this long. Part of why I haven’t written this remembrance until now is because I wanted to give the family some time to grieve and to deal with it all. Part of it was my belief that it wasn’t my news to share.30 But part of it was that I lost a friend, and maybe this delay was because I needed some space of my own, because it hurt a little to think about it. I came to know Dave Jr. because of my work on his dad’s life story, but I grew fond of him because he was just so much fun to have in my life.
A few years ago in a podcast series about a racer who was killed in a plane crash,31 one of his associates said his friend’s sudden passing was a reminder to “love ’em all you can, while you can.” Sometimes it takes that unexpected phone call to remind us how precious each word, each hug, each gesture can be – the regret that sometimes we take the people in our lives for granted, the reminder never to do so because in a blink of an eye they can be gone.
I didn’t know Dave Garroway Jr. that long – only a little less than three years – but what an unforgettable three years, and what an unforgettable character to have in my life. And how much do I miss those goofy, fun calls from my uncle Dave.32
Another year has passed – much too quickly, it seems. And another year has passed in which I haven’t written as much here as I would have liked. Unfortunately, that’s a side effect of having completed the manuscript and now working on the publication side of things.33
And in that regard, though I (obviously) can’t talk much about it, that’s probably the biggest news as the year ends. We do have someone who’s interested in working with us. Once I am free to talk about the details, I will do so, but experience (as well as superstition) has taught me not to talk in detail about such things until paperwork is signed.
There are other things I must get in order, including rounding up photographs and getting clearances, which is going to be time-consuming.34 But it will all get done, because I made a promise to the Garroway family, and I feel a duty to the man whose story I am telling, and I do my best to keep my promises.
In the meantime, I thank you again for being part of this journey, and I thank you for your patience as we move forward to the next chapter35 of this story. Here, too, are hopes that 2022 will be a lot kinder to all of us. And my fondest hope is for what Dave Garroway himself wished us all.
Some time ago, we36 here at Garroway At Large World Headquarters received an inquiry. A group near Chicago was planning a Garroway tribute. There was only so much I could do from my far remove, but I was happy to help where I could, of course.
Last week, the result made its debut. Somehow a group of very talented and creative folks put together a live, hour-long tribute to Dave Garroway and the Chicago School, and it is pure enjoyment from beginning to end. It’s a wonderful tour through Dave Garroway’s life, the good stuff as well as the more serious stuff (handled with respect, thankfully), and along the way there are some neat tributes to some of his contemporaries. There’s an interview with a television historian, who gives the context for what we’re seeing. There’s some neat musical moments, including a duet about early television that’s just plain fun (and that itself would have been right at home on Garroway At Large).
Garroway, charmingly brought back to life.
The production has a handmade feel to it. You will notice there’s not that much about it that’s fancy. A time or two it reminded me, happily so, of a school play, which only adds to its charm and makes it feel that much more heartfelt. Not to mention, it’s right out of the Chicago School aesthetic. The real Dave Garroway didn’t mind showing you that there was a stagehand above the set responsible for the falling leaves in a musical number, or incorporating a boom mic into a sketch. In this tribute, you’ll see some equipment, and you’ll see other signs that “it’s a show.”37
I’ve spent the last five years working on Dave Garroway’s life story, and yet if you’d asked me to write a show about him, I could not have captured the man’s spirit any better than this delightful show did. These folks did their homework, and what a surprise and a joy it was to watch this presentation. And from what I know about the man, I can’t help thinking Dave Garroway would have felt very honored by, and very happy with, this tribute, too.
Sometimes I wonder if anyone remembers Dave Garroway.38 I wonder if, for all he took part in that shaped the medium as we know it, he will forever be a footnote. This wonderful presentation reminded me that some people do remember Dave Garroway, and why he must be remembered. To all of those responsible for this tribute, a heartfelt “thank you.”
When Dave Garroway came back to Chicago after serving in World War II, he found himself occupying the midnight slot on WMAQ.39 He turned what seemed like a dead-end assignment into an unusual program of music, patter and whimsy that gained a following everywhere WMAQ’s signal could be heard. And he named this unusual program The 11:60 Club.
It even had membership cards, sent to fans who wrote in. (Author’s collection)
As it happens, The 11:60 Club took its name from a popular song of the time, which I’m happy to share here.
And as a bonus…notice how Garroway is listed as “Eagerest Beaver” of the 11:60 Club? That’s a reference to….
You can say many things about Dave Garroway, but there is no disputing that the man knew good music.
“Hunter takes a detour tonight so we can help our friends at the Today Show celebrate a special anniversary.”
