Weekly television digest (Jan-Dec 1960)

6 MARCH 28, 1960 NAB FIELD-OFF & RUNNING: Informal nominations, recommendations and suggestions for a successor to the late NAB Pres.-Chmn. Harold E. Fellows (Vol. 16:12 p3) — ranging all the way from President Eisenhower dowm through the ranks of the broadcasting industry itself — began piling up last week. “We already have 25 or 30 names on hand — some of them just dreamed up,” Chmn. C. Howard Lane (KOIN-TV Portland, Ore.) of NAB’s 8-member selection committee told us. He begged off mentioning any of the names, since his nominating group won’t even get together for a preliminary look at the field until next week’s convention. Lane refused to join in speculation about who his committee might settle on for the NAB leadership. But he agreed that in letters & telephone calls, the talk about likely possibilities for the job already has taken in top national non-TV-radio figures as well as broadcasters who have won public stature. “We’ll be damned lucky to find somebody like Hal Fellows,” Lane said. “He was a combination of a respected front-running spokesman for the industry and an administrator.” If an available top-caliber candidate combining those qualifications can’t be found, it’s possible that the nominating committee will recommend to NAB’s joint boards that the job be split. Lane added. If one thing about the NAB succession is sure. Lane told us, it’s that no selection will be made during the April 3-6 convention. He hopes to call his committee into its first formal meeting April 3 to begin sifting possibilities. Meanwhile, Lane called for general participation by NAB members in the hunt. He urged them to come up with ideas and telephone or write him (Mt. Hood Eadio & TV Bcstg. Corp., 140 S. W. Columbia St., Portland, Capital 8-3333) or nearest members of the selection committee: Payson Hall, Meredith Publishing Co., Des Moines, la., Atlantic 8-8511. Thomas C. Bostic, Cascade Bcstg. Co. Inc., Box 702, Yakima, Wash., Glencourt 2-9111. John E. Fetzer, Fetzer Bcstg. Co., 590 W. Maple St., Kalamazoo, Mich., Fireside 5-2101. John S. Hayes, Washington Post Co., 40th & Brandywine Sts. NW, Washington, D.C., Emerson 2-9300. Dwight W. Martin, Modem Bcstg. Co., Box 2671, Baton Rouge, La., Dickens 4-8571. William D. Pabst, San Francisco-Oakland TV Inc., Jack London Sq., Oakland, Cal., Templebar 4-2000. W. D. (Dub) Rogers, Texas Telecasting Inc., 7400 College Ave., Lubbock, Tex., Sherwood 4-2345. >): 4: Name-droppers are having a field day with the NAB presidency by keeping the rumor mill busy with highly imaginative speculations. Some of the oft-mentioned candidates: President Eisenhower, Richard M. Nixon, Adlai Stevenson, Treasury Secy. Robert B. Anderson, Eric Johnston, Red Cross Pres. Gen. Alfred Gruenther, ex-NAEB Pres. Fi*ank Schooley, FCC secy. Mary Jane Morris, Madison Ave.’s Oliver Presbrey, ex-Secretary of State Dean Acheson, ex-FCC Chmn. Paul A. Porter, CBS-TV program practices vp Joseph H. Ream, ex-WDSU-TV New Orleans exec, vp Robert D. Swezey, ex-FCC Chmn. John Doerfer. * * >•> Tribute to Harold E. Fellows, NAB pres, who died March 8, has been paid by 3 religious charity organizations for “his willingness, along with his industry, to render a public service.” A joint statement by the Bishops’ Relief Fund (Catholic), One Great Hour of Sharing (Protestant) and United Jewish Appeal pointed out that one of Fellows’ last acts was to send out letters to all broadcasters urging cooperation in the organizations’ fund-raising campaigns. Redundant Block-Booking Testimony: Fewer witnesses will be called by the govt, in its block-booking anti-trust suit against a half-dozen leading TV feature film distributors (Vol. 16:11 pl4 et seq.). Govt, trial attorney Leonard Posner and U.S. District Court Judge Archie 0. Dawson reached agreement on this point last week, after Judge Dawson complained that the prosecution was putting “repetitious” testimony on record. The March 25 court session was postponed to give the prosecution a chance to trim its wtness list, which originally numbered 126. Heard in testimony last week : Roger Clipp, TV operations vp of 'Triangle Publications, Inc., w'ho said he had purchased the AAP (now UAA) Warner Bros, library but was pleased with the deal and didn’t feel he’d been pressured; Jack Harris, vp of KPRC-TV Houston, who said he’d bought a large NTA feature package because he wanted “to beat opposing stations to the features;” Samuel Gifford, program dir., and Charles McDaniel, film dir., of WHAS-TV Louisville; George Patterson, program mgr., WAVE-TV Louisville; Charles Vanda, ex-gen. mgr., WCAU-TV Philadelphia, now exec, of J. Walter Thompson; and Morton Cohen, film buyer, WCHS-TV, Charleston. * * * Restraint-of -trade trial against Screen Gems brought by the govt, in N.Y. Federal District Court is, like the other govt, film suit (see above), moving at a crawl. After 2 days of testimony on behalf of Screen Gems by economist John J. Corson, who stated that feature films are only “one of a number of important factors” in local-level programming, govt, attorneys asked that his testimony be stricken from the record. Judge William B. Herlands took the move under consideration. Earlier, Herlands had denied a govt, motion to block future sales of the Universal-International backlog (distributed in TV by SG) until the anti-trust suit, under Sec. 7 of the Clayton Anti-trust Act, is completed. Just to make things even, he also denied a motion by the defendants to dismiss the suit on the basis that the govt, had failed so far to prove anti-trust violations. United Artists Associated has created a new national ' sales div. to aid stations in obtaining “full sponsorship for UAA features & cartoons already purchased, on a national, regional and local basis.” Leonard E. Hammer has been named dir. of the new UAA div., reporting to national sales mgr. Donald Klauber. Add payola charges: FTC’s anti-payola campaign (Vol. 16:11 pl3) has approached the 70-case mark with filing of complaints against these record manufacturers & distributors, each accused of making under-the-table payments to TV & radio disc jockeys: Decca Distributing Corp.. 446 Park Ave., N.Y., Decca Records subsidiary which distributes Decca, Coral and Brunswick records. Southern Record Distributors Inc., 147 Lafayette St.. Nashville, and Pres. John Richbourg. Hull Records Inc., 1695 Broadway, N.Y., and Pres. William Kaslin & secy. Blanche Kaslin. Field Music Sales Inc., 1480 Howard St., San Francisco, and Pres. Richard Field. Dolores Enterprises Inc., 1674 Broadway. N.Y., and Pres. Dolores Fuller & secy. Irving Spice. Carlton Record Corp. & Carlton Record Distributing Corp., 346 W. 58th St.. N.Y., and Pres. Joseph R. Carlton, vp Norman Walters and vp Don Genson. Herman Lubinsky (Savoy Music Co.), 66 Ferry St.. Newark. W. S. F. Inc., 1674 Broadway, N.Y., and Pres. Jack Waltzer & vp-treas. Monte Freed. Disc jockeys are “musicasters” at radio WEOK Poughkeepsie. A station announcement said that henceforth use of the term “disc jockey” would be banned on its air because of “unpleasant associations.” “Musicaster” will be the only acceptable title for record spinners. Prescott, Ariz. would get Ch. 7 under rule-making proposed by FCC at the request of radio KNOT Prescott.