Thursday, December 07, 2023

TV Show Title Cards Part Two

Here are some more TV show title cards from 1952. Again, these were all hand mounted, with hand-lettering and art. No credit to the artist(s) given, as was the norm. Some fascinating graphics from some very long gone vintage television shows. 

 

Racket Squad ran for three seasons from 1950 to 1953. While it starred Reed Hadley and involved ordinary citizens getting duped into confidence schemes, the narrator of the show, Hugh Beaumont, would go on to great fame as the father in the long running Leave It To Beaver series. 


 

Dr. Froelich Rainey hosted the quiz show What in the World? from 1951 to 1955 "in which the scholar-contestants tried to identify artifacts. The objects were primarily archaeological in nature, but also consisted of fossils, ethnographic items and more. It premiered on October 7, 1951 on CBS." - Wikipedia


 

Big Town, about a crusading newspaper editor, was a big thing. It started (like a lot of TV shows) on radio (with Edward G. Robinson as the newspaper editor), some movie adaptations, then television -- airing for four years on CBS and one more on NBC. It was also a DC Comic book for fifty issues. TV and radio episodes can be found online.



 

A classy shot of Jack Benny. 




Perry Como had a number of shows and specials, The Perry Como Chesterfield Show (1950-55) being one.

 

 

Steve Allen was another guy who was all over in this time, what with guest appearances on What's My Line? and his own shows.


 

No information on Singing Rails found online.

 

Here's a pre-Mister Ed Alan Young with his own show! It ran for nine years on radio and TV with different formats.

 

I think this is an alternate title to Studio One, the long-running, award-winning anthology series.

 

I love the lettering extravaganza on this Thrifty Cut Rate Presents Story Theatre title card.


 

Peter Potter's Jukebox Jury was a music/quiz show that started locally on KCBS in Los Angeles, and soon went national.

 

While this is a title card for a TV series called A Table at Ciro's, the only information that comes up is an IMDB listing for a 1996 TV movie by that name starring Darren McGavin, Sherilyn Fenn, Lois Chiles and Donna Murphy.

 

Steve Allen, with no glasses? Unrecognizable.

 

Gee whiz, Beat the Clock, was a game show that came and went and came and went through the years.

 

"The Continental is an American television series that aired on CBS in 1952. It starred Renzo Cesana in the title role. The 15-minute program was shown on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11:15pm, at the end of the night's prime time schedule." - Wikipedia

Amos 'n' Andy, first a long-running radio show and then a television series. Reviled, now, for its insensitivity. But in its day, such a popular radio series that movie theatres advertised that they would stop the feature and pipe the radio show into the loudspeakers for the audience.

 

Ghaa! The Guiding Light. My goodness. That soap opera was on for years. Wikipedia says:  

"It is listed in Guinness World Records as the second longest-running drama in television in American history. Guiding Light aired on CBS for 57 years between June 30, 1952 and September 18, 2009, overlapping a 19-year broadcast on radio between January 25, 1937 and June 29, 1956."

 

From the Ed Sullivan site

"The Ed Sullivan Show aired from 1948 until 1971 and changed the landscape of American television. Sullivan’s stage was home to iconic performances by groundbreaking artists from rock ‘n’ roll, comedy, novelty, pop music, politics, sports, opera and more." 

It was originally titled Toast Of The Town.

 

"Sports Beat" with Bill Symes is lost to history so far as the web is concerned. Lovely art here.

 

Whistling Wizard was a rare, short-lived color TV show for kids with the Baird Puppets (performed by Bil and Cora Baird). The Baird Puppets are best known for the Lonely Shepherd sequence in The Sound of Music movie.



- Edited from an October 7, 2021 blog entry.

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