I must have been 13 or 14 when a friend told me about a book he’d stumbled across at his grandfather’s house. It was a paperback called The Brothers MAD, and it contained material from MAD magazine from the 1950s. My friend let me borrow it. I loved looking through it, because it was a time capsule from a long-gone era. But one piece in particular fascinated me: a spoof of Today called The Dave Garrowunway Show, which – through the magic of drawings by Jack Davis – was a completely madcap look at the early days of the morning show, and the lurking threat of mayhem from the hands (and feet) of J. Fred Muggs. It is a dead-on spoof of early Today, and even Dave Garroway loved it, putting in a plug for the issue on Today.
Ever since this blog began I’ve wanted to bring The Dave Garrowunway Show to you, because it’s sublime. But the version in The Brothers MAD is chopped up to fit the paperback book format and the resolution of the pictures suffered in the printing process. And copies of the November 1955 MAD go for more than I’m willing to pay right now. Fortunately, the Internet can be a very handy thing every now and again, and while looking for something a couple nights ago I stumbled across an incredible online archive.
It is with pleasure that I can finally bring you, in its entirety and in its original format, The Dave Garrowunway Show. The first page is here; please page through to enjoy the rest. (And I mean that – enjoy.)
Sometimes you run across neat stories and you picture in your mind how they must have played out. Long ago I was sent the notes from an interview Garroway’s longtime associate Lee Lawrence conducted with commercial coordinator Lou Bradley, and it had this neat story in it. I wondered how it must have come across. As luck would have it, I found some photos from this very tale today, so you can both read it and see it unfold.
In mid-1960, Dave’s wife Pamela put her Ford Thunderbird up for sale. Bradley worked out a deal to buy the car from her. On June 7, he brought an envelope with the cash sealed inside and handed it to Dave, who put it in a pocket of his jacket. Bradley suggested he at least count it, but Dave went on about his business.
That day, the show’s guests included comedians Henny Youngman and Milton Berle. Berle, of course, was being full-on Milton Berle.
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At one point he told Garroway, “You couldn’t pay me to do this interview.”
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Suddenly, Bradley saw Garroway look at him and smile “this big, huge Garroway smile that no other human being ever had.” And out came the envelope.
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As Bradley recalled, “It devastated the whole studio.”
It was on this date in 1913 that the master communicator himself, Dave Garroway, was born. In all those great photos and those interesting kinescopes from back in the day, Dave seems so young and lively. It’s difficult to grasp that if he were still here, he’d be 108.1
And it was on this date four years ago that our website officially opened. In the time since, we’ve told some stories, clarified some history, shared some neat things, and most of all we’ve chronicled the effort to finally put Dave’s life story between hard covers. We’re closer now than we’ve ever been to making that happen.2
The neatest thing of all has been meeting some terrific people along the way. I’ve had the chance to talk with people whose parents and relatives worked with Dave, with other people interested in the Garroway story, with researchers working on projects adjacent to my own. And best of all, the project has let me get to know members of Dave’s own family, some truly special people I have enjoyed getting to know. There are times the book itself seems like a happy by-product; for me, the real reward comes from the people I’ve met. Thank you all for that.
So on this 13th of July, raise a glass of something you like and remember our Dave. We didn’t have him as long as we wish we could have, but what a life he lived, and what a hard act he was to follow.
:: Yes, I know this is the first update in a long time. You can blame never-ending work issues for that. Finishing the manuscript also ran me out of gas. And in the seemingly fleeting moments I have to call my own, I have been following my own fascinations. See, like our Dave, I am an incurable collector of gadgets and curiosities, and I get too fascinated by them sometimes.3
There will be updates from time to time. I hope I find some new things to share, and of course the moment I have anything I can announce on the book’s prospects, I will share. Keep your fingers crossed…!
I am remiss. There, I’ve said it. I won’t bore you with the personally-related reasons for my silence4, though given my line of work you can imagine it’s been an interesting time. But the semester is over and I can think about other things for a little bit (well, I think I can, anyway).5
By way of making up for it a little, here’s a king-size treat for you: an episode of Wide Wide World from 1958, in which we take a look at westerns. By this point, Wide Wide World was no longer doing what it once did, which was hopscotching around to show amazing sights that live cameras picked up as they happened.6 Plus, the program’s founder, Pat Weaver, was long gone from NBC by this point and his “going places and doing things” philosophy had given way to what would become more traditional forms of program content.7
There are other changes you’ll notice if you’re a Wide Wide World enthusiast. David Broekman’s lush, elegant theme is preceded by an otherworldly series of notes as a crude animated globe forms.8
And, as it turned out, “The Western” was the final installment of Wide Wide World. General Motors, which had sponsored the series since its debut, proposed altering the format to 15 one-hour installments. But those plans never took, and no other sponsor took the show over. Wide Wide World was gone, and with it went some ambitious plans for the fourth season, including a visit to Europe and possibly a trip into the Soviet Union to interview Russian leaders within the Kremlin.
That said, when you’re able to get the likes of Gary Cooper, James Arness, Gene Autry and James Garner9 on your program, it’s not a small way to say farewell. So, even though it’s a blurry copy of the program, enjoy the final Wide Wide World, from June 6, 1958.
I had hoped to post some very happy news soon. But life, as it will, has other ideas. Let me explain.
I keep an alert active on eBay for Garroway-related items. Most of it is run-of-the-mill stuff – old press photos, copies of Fun On Wheels, etc. – and most mornings I just glance at it and then delete it. But one day last week I saw one of those listings that simultaneously made my heart leap, and sink. The reason my heart leapt? It was an auction for a kinescope of the December 6, 1952 episode of Your Show of Shows, which Garroway guest-hosted while Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca were away.
At the very least, can I save the photos from the auction?
I’d stumbled across articles about this while working on the manuscript. It was reportedly a good show, and Garroway brought back some of the offbeat stuff he did on Garroway at Large. Such as the dentist sketch, where Garroway performed a dental procedure on the viewer, a bit so effective that it made one critic’s teeth ache.
There was no way I could pass this up. But I’ve tried bidding on kinescopes before, and I know they can be in demand. I also know the bidding can get high.10 I knew I could end up spending more than I really wanted. But where else would I find this? And I also know how eBay works, and I’ve had enough items sniped from under me to know you can’t rest until the auction’s over. It felt like a fool’s errand, but I bid what I could afford, and I left it be. I tried not to think about it, but I couldn’t help myself and checked every now and again. Sure enough, another bidder swooped in and outbid me right before the auction ended, winning the auction for just a couple dollars more than my maximum bid. No kinescope for me.11
Among the many things I won’t have answered now: Why on earth was Dave in this get-up?
I’m philosophical about it. As I said, I know how eBay works and I know how it gets used, and even if I hate the online auction format I know it’s part of the game, and I accept that going in.12 But, still, it bums me out to have lost out on this item, and I think you can appreciate why.
I lost out, but I salute the winner of the auction, and I wish them happiness with this piece of history. And I have a request: Please don’t sit on this thing. Please don’t squirrel it away. Please get it transferred and upload it to YouTube or the Internet Archive or something. It’s Garroway while he still had a lot of the Chicago School still in him. It’s a priceless document of a particular moment in television history and in Garroway’s life, and there’s a lot of folks who would really love to see it. Please do us that favor. We would be grateful.
This post is long overdue. It’s partly out of my own reluctance, because I have grappled with how to contain this man’s career in the space of a post – because the man was so good at so many different things. But maybe some of it had to do with how familiar he was. I imagined we would always have a world with Hugh Downs in it. He had been around forever, starting out at a local radio station in Ohio in 1939, moving into television in 1950 with WMAQ in Chicago, and finally calling it a career in 1999. And back in July, we lost him at the age of 99.
With Kukla and Ollie in Chicago. (NBC photo)
In those 60 years in broadcasting, Hugh Downs did everything. He was an announcer, billboarding a show about a little clown and a dragon and their human friend. He was right-hand-man to Arlene Francis on the Home show. He was Jack Paar’s sidekick. He hosted Today. He hosted a game show, narrated documentaries, did a series about the challenges and opportunities that come with getting older. He even composed music and recorded albums.
Being Jack Paar’s right-hand man made you prepared for anything. (NBC photo)
Then came a second act, when ABC hired him to host 20/20, which had suffered a disastrous debut.13 It was in that capacity I first really came to know of him, as the kindly man who introduced segments and talked with correspondents and informed us that they were in touch, so you be in touch. Downs’ steady presence as host helped the program feel (if you’ll pardon the expression) anchored. 20/20 would never have the hard edges of 60 Minutes, but Downs was perfect for 20/20‘s more populist mix of investigation and human interest.
Hugh Downs and Barbara Walters with Hugh Downs and Barbara Walters. (ABC photo)
I’m not going to go through the entire career of Hugh Downs here. It would take much too long, and you can read it elsewhere anyway.14 Instead, this remembrance is more subjective, because I remember him so well from all the years I watched him.
If you watched Hugh Downs you noticed how easygoing he seemed, how low-pressure he was, sometimes to the point of seeming sleepy. A spoof of 20/20 that ran in MAD Magazine during the period had Downs asleep at the desk in the final panel as Barbara Walters closed the program.15 It may have been easy to mock, but that low-key nature had much to do with why Downs wore so well. I teach my students that to be on television is to be a guest in your audience’s homes, and the moment you rub them the wrong way, they’ll show you out. Too often people on television forget this and they wear out their welcomes in a hurry. Hugh Downs knew this. He had a terrific ability to ration his wattage, to know how to be the host who knew how to keep a program going without becoming bigger than the show or its purpose, and to do it without wearing out the viewer. He had the ability to be interesting without being dominant.
Although not everyone was impressed. (ABC photo)
It helped that Downs was a man who had a genuine curiosity about so much. He was a perpetual student, always finding something new to learn or to be interested in or to read about or to visit. He learned how to scuba dive, how to fly airplanes, how to drive a race car, sailed his own boat across the Pacific. And for a time he was a teacher, too. He lived many lifetimes within the time of his life.16
If only they’d let him fly on the real thing. (ABC photo)
In thinking about the life and career of Hugh Downs, I’m struck by the similarities between him and Dave Garroway: both versatile broadcasters with a cool presence that wore well, especially on longer-form programs like Today (and it’s worth noting that when Downs took over Today after the John Chancellor experiment didn’t work out, more than one reviewer favorably compared Downs’s style to that of Garroway). Both of them were fascinated by so many interests and knew so much about so many things, and their knowledge informed the shows they hosted. On occasion I have wondered if Dave Garroway, had he the benefit of modern treatments for depression and other issues, might have been like Hugh Downs and likewise been able to make his career as long-lasting.
This much I do know, and it’s that Hugh Downs never lost his high regard for his friend Dave Garroway. Many years ago a friend was hoping to produce a documentary about Garroway, and one of the people he called on during his initial investigation was Hugh Downs. Not only was Downs happy to learn of the project, he offered to narrate it. Alas, the documentary never happened, and with it went the chance to hear Downs tell the story of his friend and colleague. It’s my hope, however, that they’re now reunited in the hereafter, maybe hanging around with Studs Terkel and Burr Tillstrom telling stories about the good old days in Chicago.
If there are morning shows in heaven, you know that with Dave Garroway and Hugh Downs at the anchor desk, it’s got to be worth watching.
I wish I could tell you there were super-exciting reasons why there’s been no posts of late. Instead, the photo of our Dave up above sums it up: a cluttered desk and some sort of business captured in midstream. February has been a diabolical month and the demands on my time and brainpower have been ceaseless, but it’s an occupational hazard in my line of work. It has also involved a lot of getting up way too early and staying too late, and in a weird way those goofy hours have made me feel a kinship with what our Dave went through during his years on Today.
The manuscript’s first draft, however, remains complete (what, you thought I was going to un-complete it, maybe?) and I’m sort of letting it rest until things settle down here. Then I will go through a paper copy of it and do my usual mark-up process before getting into revisions, and once everybody in the process is happy with how things are going I will begin shopping the manuscript. But things here have been so busy that it hardly seems it’s only been two months since that first draft was completed. A lot has happened, and when it’s appropriate I may talk about some of it, but not right now.
I hope to be back with some new content soon, and if things will ease up at work, it may be sooner rather than later. That’s my hope, anyway. Regardless, stay tuned and thank you as always for stopping in.
One of the blessings of the Internet era is that many archives have opened up and a lot of material has become available. Today’s post is about one such archive, available for endless hours of enjoyment.
Maybe you know the name Studs Terkel from his books, such as Working or The Good War. Maybe you’ve seen him in the occasional film role. Maybe you’ve seen him pop up in documentaries. It doesn’t matter, because the man could do anything and, through his long life, often did. But he had a particular talent for conversation, the ability to talk to anyone about anything, which he parlayed not only into his best-selling books but also into a radio series on WFMT in Chicago.17
And, as it happens, our man Dave Garroway stopped in to talk with Studs one day in 1974. Dave and Studs had known one another since the late 1940s, both as up-and-coming disc jockeys, and subsequently as television stars in the Chicago School firmament (Dave on Garroway at Large, Studs on Studs’ Place). Thanks to the wonderful Studs Terkel Radio Archive18, you can listen to the two old friends talk about a number of things: broadcasting, jazz, race relations and more. Take about an hour and let yourself be entranced by a master communicator and a master conversationalist.19 (Then when you’re done listening to that interview, take a look at the other interviews available in this magnificent collection and enjoy them, too. There’s only about 5,600 shows to go through, so make some time.)
Today a new president takes the oath of office.20 Sixty years ago today a new president21 took the oath of office, and Dave Garroway and Today were there to cover the impending transfer of power.
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Here’s Dave talking with Sen. Mike Mansfield, Sen. Everett Dirksen22, Rep. Charles Halleck, and Rep. Sam Rayburn.23 At right is Martin Agronsky of NBC News.
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Here Dave is interviewing Pat McMahon, who was a member of the PT-109 crew. McMahon was badly burned in the aftermath of the accident and unable to swim. His commanding officer, John F. Kennedy, saved his life. McMahon and Garroway are standing in front of the Kennedys’ house in Georgetown.
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Dave has a cup of coffee and shares a laugh with Joseph Donahue, chairman of the inauguration parade committee, and Maj. Gen. Charles K. Gailey of the Military District of Washington. Kennedy’s inauguration was famously chilly, so I hope there was a lot of hot coffee available all around.
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Dave during a break in the program, framed against the Capitol’s pillars.
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Dave in the seating for the inauguration parade outside the White House. Here you can see just how deep the snow was prior to the 1961 inauguration. We won’t get that this year, alas.
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And here’s Dave visiting the big reviewing platform where the new President would watch the parade. He’s standing with a couple of very special people. Who might they be? Let’s take a closer look…
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…and look who it is! It’s Dave with daughter Paris and stepson Michael, who accompanied him to the inauguration. What a memory to have, no?
Maybe you know the name Studs Terkel from his books, such as Working or The Good War. Maybe you’ve seen him in the occasional film role. Maybe you’ve seen him pop up in documentaries. It doesn’t matter, because 
