Watching TV: Six Decades of American Television, Expanded Second Edition (Television and Popular Culture) 2nd Edition

I have both the 1982 and the 2010 edition of the book, but so far I’ve only read the 1982 edition. To the best of my knowledge, all material from the 1982 edition is in the later version except a handful of photographs.It is a fascinating and thorough history of television, starting at the very beginning - with wireless radio in the 1890’s up through the first experimental television broadcast in the late 1920’s. The book explains the technical developments, the scientific dead ends that required tv techno only to sort of re-boot in the early 1930’s. The books explains not the just technological ties between radio and television but also how the three major networks (which all started out as radio networks) used the radio business model and the radio programs genres (and stars) as they developed their operations. There’s a lot of information about all the different difficulties that hindered television from developing into America’s primary form of entertainment until the mid 1950’s - technical miscalculations and shortages, the Depression, war (WW2 and Korea both created obstacles) and even a musician strike in the mid 40’s all played a role in delaying the advent of nationwide network television. The book examines the relationship between the tv industry and the Hollywood filmmaking business, as this relationship changed from a heated rivalry to a close and mutually beneficial partnership. There is a. Lot of behind the scenes information on the business decisions involved inputting together television season schedules, and the chronological, season by season, format allows the authors to examine hit shows from each season while explaining how the individual series fit into longer term fads and tastes that lasted for several years at a time - westerns rules for a while, variety shows had their heyday, as did live drama, spy shows, silly comedies, socially relevant comedies, detectives and so forth. I find it especially interesting to watch how CBS used it original radio stars to quickly become the number one network and kept that spot for decades. It’s also fascinating to see how ABC, always bringing up the rear and near to extinction in the 50’s, finally grew into parity and eventually knocked CBS off its perch for a few seasons.Having only read the original 1982 edition so far, I will say that they only briefly touched on the cable tv phenomenon in that first versionof the book. Having been in my early teens myself during the late 70’s, I recall how cable slowly came into our lives between 1976 and 1981, and it’s impact was still fairly limited when they would have been writing this first copy. I look forward to getting into the 2010 revision and seeing how they address how cable developed and brought along huge changes in the 80’s and 90’s.

Only a daft fool would disagree with the laudatory reviews that preceed this one, as the book IS, without doubt, one of the best histories of TV EVER. So, why give one less star than the others? Couple of things: First, the missed opportunities of developing the ways in which TV could create stars out of nowhere (Betty White in "Life with Elizabeth"; the George Gobel, well, "phenomenon" is the only word; The amazing smash of Joan Weber's recording of "Let me go, lover" after it was featured on a Studio One broadcast). And,second, and this is, admittedly personal from an old Theatre cat, the complete and, apparently deliberate, ignoring of the Broadway theater. Two examples: In commenting on the influence of TV plays, the authors state that the success of the TV plays "No Time for Sergeants" and "The Miracle Worker" led to their movie incarnations. BUT, between those events, both were smash hit Broadway Plays, each running for over a year or more. Anyway, it's those, admittedy minor, annoyances that lead to the "loss" of a star. Oh, and the "G" in Maynard G. Krebs? It stood for Walter, not William.

I was hoping for a book like the first edition, "TV Schedule Book (first four decades of television)" the authors published in the mid eighties which included daytime and complete weekend schedules. I never thought there would be another edition. I was searching on the internet and come across "Watching TV: Six Decades of American Television." It's about the best book on the history of television. John

Television history is one of my research fields, so I find this resource indispensable. If you are looking for a light, "fan" read, then I think you would find this dull. However, if you are doing any research into television, than you really ought to have this book. In addition to having complete network prime time schedules for each fall (which is super useful), it also gives a good overview of each year and discusses several of the key shows from each year.

This is, by far, the most thorough book about TV history that I've ever seen. Reading it is addictive for a long-time TV watcher like me. I particularly enjoyed looking at the past years' Fall schedules, a great reminder of what we were watching way back when, especially in the days when we only had a handful of channels! This is a great coffee table book. Anyone who comes over gets wrapped up in it, and TV becomes the conversation of the day!

This is VERY detailed, with several pages on each year. I found it helpful as a reference when writing a book about TV culture, but only the biggest television fanatic would want to sit down and read it for fun.

I bought this as a textbook for my grandson who is a college film major.