Broadcasting (Jan - Mar 1950)

^OPSICLE Ij Signs For CBS-TV Series T|HE Popsicle Parade of Stars. ' ponsored by the Joe Lowe Corp.. lew York, and starring a top tallint headliner for each of 10 15{ Minute programs, will start in mid:j,tay on CBS-TV. The show is :d to be budgeted at from S180.:a 8200,000 for time and talent. The program, signed through jlaine-Thompson Co. Inc., New Tork, will be on behalf of Popsicle, ■jreamsicle, Fudgsicle and Iceiream-on-A-Stick and will feature Irthur Godfrey, Groucho Marx, lick Haymes, Margaret Whiting ;!nd other stars. ■ Telecast day and time and order "jf stars" appearances will be an-ounced shortly. All available fa Uities of CBS-TV have been purchased by the sponsor for the rogram. CONGRESS REMODELS FOR TV Video-Suited Walls Aid Reception of Truman Speech HI Telefile (Continued from Telecasting 5) find Prize Party for Messing :akeries, all half-hour shows. Anther half-hour WCBS-TV local ommercial series, John Reed King 'hoiv, is scheduled to start Feb. 11 or Flagstaff Foods. Faye Emerson, while sponsored !,:y Ansonia De Luxe Shops (New fifork chain of shoe stores), offered iO% discount cards to viewers reuesting them. The three-week :ffer pulled over 10,000 requests. This program also achieved a ratcg of 24.0, no mean feat for a Dcal show aired at 11 p.m. The Chuck Wagon, participating •rogram of Western movies presented within a studio show that jives continuity to this six-a-week •uvenile series, once told its j'oung 'iewers that for 15 cents they ■ould get a Sheriff Bob badge, .♦lore than 10,000 youngsters sent "or badges like that worn by this (dmired TV character. BASE rate of WCBS-TV for an hour of Class A time (6:30-11 p.m., Monday jihrough Friday; noon to 11 p.m., cSaturday and Sunday) is 81,500. For Class B time (5:30-6:30 p.m., Monday through Friday) the base 'i-ate is 8900 per hour, dropping to 3600 for all other time. Twentysecond station break announceiinents are S250 in A time, S150 in iB time and SlOO in C time. Oneiaiinute announcements are 8320 in :A time, 8195 in B time and 8130 in C time. Participating announce'ments (one-minute) are 8250 each. Frequency discounts run from 5'"(L 26 times a year to 15 fc for S or more times a year. Studio facilities for camera rehearsals of live programs are available up to a ratio of five-toone of air time at 8250 an hour. Charges for pre-broadcast film iTun-throughs range from 875 for |five minutes to 8250 for a full hour. On Feb. 1 the WCBS-TV base evening hour rate vnW be raised to 82,000, with other rates going up proportionately. EVIDENCE . that television has come into its legislative own in Congress was amply demonstrated when President Truman delivered his State of the Union message to a packed house and peering orthicons, against a backdrop of TVsuited walls. Once again, as last year, televiewers saw the President in oratorical action through NBC-TV's pickup under a pool arrangement. But this time, they got better reception — Congressional chambers had undergone some renovation which took note of some of TV's own peculiar requirements. When David Lynn, capitol architect, set out on his remodeling program, he consulted with telecasters and came up with the idea of blue-tapestried, acousticallytreated walls which lend themselves best as background. Highpowered floodlights also were in TV WRITERS Hold Craft Meeting TELEVISION Writers Group will hold a craft meeting tonight (Jan. 23) at the Beekman Tower, New York, on packaging of video shows. Speakers will be Sylvan Taplinger of Kenyon & Eckhardt, who will present the agency viewpoint; Irvin Sulds, president of National Society of Television Producers, who will give the slant of the independent packager, and Robert Hannum, who will speak for the authorpackager. Prior to the craft meeting, a report will be made to the group on meetings held two weeks ago by the National Television Committee, the latter brought into being last July by the National Television Conference. At the most recent meeting of the conference, presided over by Author John Hersey, the committee was given the right to accept as members video writers not at present in any of the Authors League guilds. The committtee will be able to assign these new members to a guild or to the Television Writers Group. WTAR-TV to NBC WTAR-TV Norfolk, Va., which takes the air Mar. 1, has been signed by NBC-TV as the network's 58th afSliate. It is not affiliated with any other network. ABC-TV Signs Packard PACKARD Motor Co., Detroit, through Young & Rubicam Inc., New York, will sponsor a weekly half -hour television show on ABCTV starting in March. Time and details of the program will be announced later. stalled in the chambers. NBC-TV technical personnel described it as the best pickup yet of floor proceedings, even though they found the lights too powerful for panning the galleries. They used two cameras (in the galleries) running conduits up to the attic where the equipment was stationed. When the renovation is completed this summer, they -will be able to feed transmission through wall sockets beside either House or Senate chamber, thus locating their mobile units on the spot. Similar permanent provisions are being made at the White House, also under renovation, where every room of any size will be so equipped, it was learned. Talent (Continued from Telecasting 3) nouncements carrying a commercial message. (With regard to such spot announcements, SAG may, however, delegate to TVA its responsibility for organization and administration in those areas where SAG does not have or elect to establish a branch office.) New members entering television would join TVA if their first emplojTiient is in the live field or SAG, if their first employment is in the films. Members' proper classification as to live film would be reviewable every six months. SAG proposed each partner bear its own expenses for organizing and administering television and each contribute equal capital to the partnership. It further proposed the life of the agreement be two years, which is the present life of TVA, subject to termination by either party on 90 days notice. KTLA (TV) Multiscope N. Y. Central Spots INSTALLATION of multiscope equipment, claimed to be the first on the West Coast, has been announced by KTLA (TV) Los Angeles. New equipment makes possible simultaneous projection of title cards, news pictures, news ticker tape, maps, time signals and other elements on the television screen. This is accomplished by a contrivance of lenses, tubes and "cold" lights which project images directly upon the iconoscope of the television camera. Through a series of apertures and levers, an operator may thus achieve almost any result desired in multiple picture projection. Bonafide Renews BONAFIDE MILLS Inc. has renewed, effective Jan. 27, its sponsorship of Bonny Maid Versatile Varieties, telecast Friday, 9-9:30 p.m., on NBC-TV. The one-year contract was signed through Gibraltar Advertising Agency. Show is produced by Basch Radio and Television Productions. New Yoi-k. Tele-Pulse Surveys SAMPLE size of Tele-Pulse surveys has been increased by 14'~'c in all cities. Dr. Sydney Roslow, director of The Pulse Inc., has announced. Number of TV families interviewed has risen from 1,400 to 1,600 in New York and in other markets from 1,050 to 1,200. Eight Million Sets PREDICTION of more than 82 billion in television set sales during 1950 and of more than eight million sets in operation by the end of the year was made fortnight ago by Louis I. Pokrass, chairman of the board of Tele King Corp., New York set manufacturer. NEW YORK Central Railroad, New York, through Foote, Cone & Belding, New York, has started a TV spot announcement campaign called Minute Melodramas. The spots will be used on a 52 week basis, six times weeklv, on WABD (TV), WCBS-TV, WPIX (TV) and WJZ-TV, all New York video stations. Best Buy In Booming TV Market... With eight TV stations in the three-city market of Cincinnati, Dayton and Columbus . . . the three WLV/ Television stations (WLW-T, Cincinnati; WLWD, Dayton; WLW-C, Columbus) receive 44% of oil viev/ing from 1 1 :00 a.m. to 1 1 :00 p.m., Sunday through Saturday. While WLW-TV rates remain unchanged, the number of sets continues to skyrocket — 97,600 on Dec. 1, 1949, to 132,200 by Jan. 1, 1950, in this three-city market. WLW-TELEVISIOH CINCINNATI 2, OHIO Page 69 • BROADCASTING January 23, 1950 TELECASTING • Page 11