I represent the first generation who, when we were born, the television was now a permanent fixture in our homes. When I was born people had breakfast with Barbara Walters, dinner with Walter Cronkite, and slept with Johnny Carson.
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Eleven people killed in a
stampede outside Who concert in Cincinnati, Ohio.
The general-admission ticketing policy for rock
concerts at Cincinnati's Riverfront Coliseum in the 1970s was known as "festival seating." That
term and that ticketing policy would become infamous in the wake of one of the
deadliest rock-concert incidents in history. Eleven people, including three
high-school students, were killed on this day in 1979, when a crowd of
general-admission ticket-holders to a Cincinnati Who concert surged forward in
an attempt to enter Riverfront Coliseum and secure prime unreserved seats
inside.
Festival seating had already been eliminated at many
similar venues in the United States by 1979, yet
the system remained in place at Riverfront Coliseum despite a dangerous
incident at a Led Zeppelin show two years earlier. That day, 60 would-be
concertgoers were arrested, and dozens more injured, when the crowd outside the
venue surged up against the Coliseum's locked glass doors.
In the early evening hours of December
3, 1979, those same doors stood locked before a restless and growing crowd of
Who fans. That evening's concert was scheduled to begin at 8:00 pm, but
ticket-holders had begun to gather outside the Coliseum shortly after noon, and
by 3:00 pm, police had been called in to maintain order as the crowd swelled
into the thousands. By 7:00 pm, an estimated 8,000 ticket-holders were jostling
for position in a plaza at the Coliseum's west gate, and the crowd began to
press forward. When a police lieutenant on the scene tried to convince the
show's promoters to open the locked glass doors at the west gate entrance, he
was told that there were not enough ticket-takers on duty inside, and that
union rules prevented them from recruiting ushers to perform that duty. At
approximately 7:20, the crowd surged forward powerfully as one set of glass
doors shattered and the others were thrown open.
With Coliseum security nowhere in
sight, the police on hand were aware almost immediately that the situation had
the potential for disaster, yet they were physically unable to slow the stream
of people flowing through the plaza for at least the next 15 minutes. At
approximately 7:45 pm, they began to work their way into the crowd, where they
found the first of what would eventually turn out to be 11 concert-goers lying
on the ground, dead from asphyxiation.
Afraid of how the crowd might react to
a cancellation, Cincinnati fire officials instructed the promoters to go on
with the show, and the members of the Who were not told what had happened until
after completing their final encore hours later.
In the aftermath of the tragedy, the City of
Cincinnati banned festival seating at its concert venues. That ban was
overturned, however, 24 years later, and improved crowd-control procedures have
thus far prevented a reoccurrence of any such incident.
Actor, producer,
and director with a career in entertainment spanning roughly eight decades.
Lloyd has appeared in over sixty films and television shows. In the 1980s, he
gained a new generation of fans for playing Dr. Daniel Auschlander, one of the
starring roles on the groundbreaking medical dramaSt. Elsewhere.
November 8, 1979
The program, "The Iran Crisis: America Held Hostage", premiered on
ABC-TV.
The
show was planned to be temporary, but it evolved into "Nightline" in
March of 1980. The program had its beginnings on November 8, 1979, just four days after the Iran hostage crisis started. ABC News president Roone Arledge felt
the best way to compete against NBC's The
Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson was
to update Americans on the latest news from Iran. At that time, the show was
called The Iran Crisis–America Held Hostage: Day "xxx",
where xxx represented each day that Iranians held hostage the
occupants of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, Iran. Originally, World News Tonight lead anchor Frank Reynolds hosted
the special report. Shortly after its creation, Reynolds stopped hosting the
program. Ted Koppel, then ABC News's State Department Correspondent, took
on the hosting duties. It was not until a few days later that a producer had
the idea of displaying the number of days on America Held Hostage:
Day 15, Day 50, Day 150, and so on.
November 8, 1994:
Salvatore
"Sonny" Bono is elected to the U.S. Congress.
If
you had made a friendly wager back in 1974 as to which recent or current
pop-music figure might go on to serve in the United States Congress in 20
years' time, you might have picked someone with an apparent political agenda,
like Joan Baez, or at least one who was associated with some kind of cause,
like nature-lover John Denver. You almost certainly wouldn't have placed your
bet on Sonny Bono, a singer of arguably limited talents who appeared content to
stand, literally and figuratively, in the shadow of his far more popular wife,
Cher. It was indeed Salvatore "Sonny" Bono, however, who had a future
in elective politics—a future that included his election to the United States
House of Representatives from California's 44th Congressional District on this
day in 1994
Sonny
Bono fell almost completely out of the public eye following the cancellation of
The Sonny and Cher Show in 1977. While his ex-wife and erstwhile musical
partner, Cher, launched a hugely successful second phase of her career with
well-received acting roles in the 1980s, Sonny left the spotlight behind to
focus on the restaurant business. Although he presented himself as a
none-too-bright bumbler during his days on television, Bono had been an astute
operator in shepherding his and Cher's early musical career and in his later
business dealings. The owner of several successful restaurants, Bono got
involved in politics after growing frustrated with the bureaucratic hurdles
placed before one of his restaurant construction projects by local officials in
Palm Springs, California, in the late 1980s. Though he himself had registered
to vote for the first time only one year earlier, Bono was elected mayor of
Palm Springs in 1988. Following a failed run in the California Republican
Senatorial primary in 1992, Bono turned his attention to the 44th District's
Congressional seat in 1994. A conservative Republican, Bono was swept into
office as part of the Newt Gingrich-led Republican "revolution" that
year, and he was re-elected in 1996.
During
his time in office, Bono did not treat his fellow lawmakers to any singing
performances, but the man behind the hits "I Got You Babe" (1965) and
"The Beat Goes On" (1967) did trade on his public persona as a
good-natured, non-threatening nice guy. As The Washington Post noted in its
obituary following Bono's death in a skiing accident in 1996, "Bono
brought to Congress a rare skill: He could make lawmakers—even the most pompous
among them—laugh at themselves." Or as President Bill Clinton said,
""His joyful entertainment of millions earned him celebrity, but in
Washington he earned respect by being a witty and wise participant in
policymaking processes that often seem ponderous to the American people."
As a result of its extensive influence, Sesame Street is one of the
most highly regarded, and most watched, educational shows for children in the
world. The original series has been televised in more than 120 countries, and
25 independent versions have been produced. The show has been called
"perhaps the most vigorously researched, vetted, and fretted-over
program". As of 2009, the series has received 118 Emmy Awards,
more than any other television series. An estimated 77 million Americans
watched the series as children.
Sesame Street uses a combination of animation, puppets, and live actors to
stimulate young children's minds, improve their letter and word recognition,
basic arithmetic,
geometric forms, classification, simple problem solving, and socialization by
showing children or people in their everyday lives. Since the show's inception,
other instructional goals have been basic life skills, such as how to cross the
street safely, proper hygiene, healthy eating habits, and social skills; in
addition, real-world situations are taught, such as death, divorce, pregnancy and
birth, adoption, and even all of the human emotions such as happiness, love,
anger, and hatred. Also, recently, the Sesame Street Muppets discussed
the late-2000s recession with their latest
prime-time special Families Stand Together: Feeling Secure in Tough Times.
The series has made many published lists, including greatest all-time show
compilations by TV
Guide and Entertainment Weekly. A 1996 survey
found that 95% of American preschoolers have watched the show by the time they
are three years old.
Sesame Street will celebrate its 40th anniversary and will include a segment
with First Lady Michelle Obama interacting with the Muppets.
Jon Stone was responsible for hiring the first cast of Sesame Street.
He did not audition actors until Spring 1969, a few weeks before the five test
shows were due to be filmed. He videotaped the auditions, and Ed Palmer took
them out into the field to test children's reactions. The actors who received
the "most enthusiastic thumbs up" were cast. For example, Loretta
Long, was chosen to play Susan when the children who saw
her audition stood up and sang along with her rendition of "I'm a Little Teapot". It was Stone's goal
to cast white actors in the minority. As Stone said, casting was the only
aspect of the show that was "just completely haphazard".Most
of the cast and crew found jobs on Sesame Street through personal
relationships with Stone and the other producers. Stone also hired Bob McGrath
to play Bob, Will
Lee to play Mr. Hooper, and Matt Robinson to play Gordon.
Early in his acting training, when studying at the American Theater Wing, one of Jones' teachers wasWill Lee, who in 1969 would playMr. HooperonSesame Street.Jones is considered bySesame Workshopto be the first celebrity guest onSesame Street,since inserts of the actor reciting thealphabetand counting numbers appeared inthe unbroadcast test pilotsand heavily influenced the show's pedagogical models. These inserts were later included infirst seasonepisodes, beginning withepisode 0002. However, Jones didn't originally think the show would last and thought the Muppets were the problem; he toldMatt Robinsonthat "this Muppet business has got to go, kids will be terrified."
In 1978, Jones appeared on Sesame Street in Episode 1148 as a movie star who visits Hooper's Store in search of the perfect egg cream. In the story, Mr. Hooper slowly recognizes him as a famous movie star, "I've seen almost every picture you've made!" (As a big fan, Mr. Hooper makes no mention of Jones's segments from Sesame Street’s early years where the cast would sometimes transition to his recitation of the alphabet by name. One of which, in Episode 0077, includes Mr. Hooper so furious over the misplacement of his glasses that he can't even think of the alphabet. Gordon urges him to watch James Earl Jones to help.)
In "Wuntafordy," an animated Sesame segment singing the numbers "1 to 40" a cappella-style by The Lemmings, Jones contributed the spoken voice saying "30."
Jones also performed the voice of the Mountain King in the Creature Shop-effects TV-movie Merlin.
CTW Board of Advisors chairman Gerald S. Lesser and other researchers paid particularly close attention to James Earl Jones' appearance, in terms of children's response and the effectiveness of his alphabet recitation. Lesser described the basic performance as follows:
“Mr. Jones' recitation of the alphabet takes a full minute and a half. He stares compellingly at the camera. At the time the sequence was made, his head was shaved for his role of Jack Johnson in The Great White Hope, and it gleams in the close-up. His immense hollow voice booms the letter names ominously. His lip movements are so exaggerated that they can easily be read without the sounds.<ref>Lesser, Gerald S. Children and Television: Lessons from Sesame Street. 1974. p. 120-121.”
During the recitation, each letter appeared briefly near the actor's head prior to its being named, remains for the recitation and then disappears, and a pause in both Jones' speech and the visuals occurs before the next letter. The result of this particular staging prompted a particular positive response from viewers that producer Samuel Y. Gibbon, Jr. and research director Edward L. Palmer, as well as Dr. Lesser, termed "the James Earl Jones effect." The first time a child sees the performance, he responds to the invitation to say the alphabet along with the actor. Upon later viewings, the children would name the letter as soon as it appeared, but before it was named by Jones. Further repetition encouraged children to shout out the letter even before it appears. The "James Earl Jones effect" thus demonstrated to Sesame Street's producers and curriculum advisors the value of both repetition and anticipation, and supplied proof that Sesame Street could promote interactive learning as opposed to merely passive viewing.
It's nothing short of an extraordinary show. When I got hired, I started thinking, 'Hmmm, I'm not really an actor. I wonder what I'm going to be doing?' It was interesting. I kept saying, 'Who am I supposed to be?' I told my wife, 'They're not going to pay me just for going in and being myself for 130 shows'. They did make me the music teacher. I come out of that background, and I'd taught music to kids before. Finally they said, 'We don't want you to be anybody but yourself'. And that was pretty much true of anyone in the original cast and those they hired later.
-Bob McGrath
Robert Emmett McGrath
June 13, 1932 – December 4, 2022
Bob McGrath died on December 4, 2022, at the age of 90.
Bob McGrath was born on June 13, 1932 inOttawa,Illinois. He was named for Irish patriotRobert Emmet. As a child, he would sing for his family while his mother would play the piano. His mother enrolled him in the Roxy Theater’s Amateur Program, where he came in second place. He graduated fromMarquette High School.
McGrath graduated from University of Michigan in 1954 where he was in School of Music. While attending Michigan, he was a member of the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club and of the fraternity of Phi Gamma Delta, where during fraternity events, he washed dishes while fraternity brother David Connell waited tables, a connection which Connell would use when casting began for Sesame Street. After graduating, he was inducted in to the U.S. Army, where he spent 2 years in Germany, booking and performing for the Seventh Army Symphony Orchestra.
McGrath worked with Mitch Miller and was the featured tenor on Miller's NBC-TV television singalong series Sing Along with Mitch for four seasons from 1960 to 1964. He was a singer on the Walt Kelly album Songs of the Pogo.
In the mid-1960s, McGrath became a well-known recording artist in Japan, releasing a series of successful albums of Irish and other folk songs and ballads sung in Japanese. This aspect of his career was the basis of his "secret" when he appeared on the game shows To Tell the Truth in 1966 and I've Got a Secret in 1967. From 1969 to 2016, McGrath was a regular cast member on Sesame Street, playing the character of Bob Johnson.
Along with series matriarch Susan Robinson, played byLoretta Long, McGrath had been one of the two longest-lasting human characters on the series since the show's debut. ANogginsegment proclaimed the four decades of Bob when promotingSesame Streeton that network. In July 2016,Sesame Workshopannounced that McGrath would not return to the show for its 47th season because it would be re-tooling the series, but the company did say that McGrath would continue to represent the Workshop at public events. Sesame Workshop later announced that there would be talks to bring him back.Sesame Workshop said that he would still representSesame Street.Although McGrath had not been in any new material since season 45, he subsequently appeared in online videos for the show. He also returned for the 2019 TV specialSesame Street's 50th Anniversary Celebration.
McGrath wrote many children's books, including Uh Oh! Gotta Go! and OOPS! Excuse Me Please!
In 1995, he was awarded a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award.
McGrath's Sing Me a Story was nominated for the 7th Annual Independent Music Awards for children's album of the year.
On April 10, 2010, he was the first recipient of the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club Lifetime Achievement Award. McGrath also served as master of ceremonies at the Glee Club's 150th anniversary celebration weekend.
