The
network CBS, traditionally referred to as the "Tiffany network"
among major television broadcasting systems, has in recent years
come more and more to resemble Wal-Mart. Ironically, this often
prestige-laden television institution began almost as an afterthought.
In 1927, when David Sarnoff did not see fit to include any of talent
agent Arthur Judson's clients in his roster of stars for the new
NBC radio networks, Judson defiantly founded his own network---United
Independent Broadcasters. Soon merged with the Columbia Phonograph
Company, the network went on the air on 18 September 1927 as the
Columbia Phonograph Broadcasting Company. Within a year heavy losses
compelled the sale of the company to Jerome Louchheim and Ike and
Leon Levy, the latter the fiancee of the sister of William Paley.
Paley, who had become enamored of radio as a result of advertising
the family's La Palina brand cigars over a local station, bought
the fledgling network, then consisting of 22 affiliates and 16 employees,
for $400,000 on 18 January 1929, and renamed it the Columbia Broadcasting
System.
Relatively
untested as a business executive, Paley immediately showed himself
a superb entrepreneur. He insured the success of the new network
by offering affiliates free programming in exchange for an option
on advertising time, and was extremely aggressive in gaining advertising
for the network. Paley's greatest gift, however, was in recognizing
talent. He soon signed singers such as Bing Crosby, Kate Smith and
Morton Downey for the network. Unfortunately, as soon as some of
them gained famed at CBS they were lured away by the far richer
and more popular NBC.
This
was not to be the case with news. Starved for programming Paley
initially allowed his network to be used by the likes of the demagogic
Father Charles Coughlin. But by 1931, Paley had terminated Coughlin's
broadcasts, and under the aegis of former
New York Times
editor Edward Klauber and ex-United Press reporter Paul White, began
building a solid news division.
CBS
news did not come of age, however, until Klauber assigned the young
Edward R. Murrow to London as director of European talks. On 13
March 1937 at the time of the Anschluss, Murrow teamed with former
newspaper foreign correspondent William L. Shirer and a number of
others to describe those events in what would become the forerunner
of
The CBS World News Roundup
. Subsequently, during World
War II, Murrow assembled a brilliant team of reporters, known collectively
as "Murrow's Boys," including Eric Sevareid, Charles Collingwood,
Howard K. Smith, Winston Burdett, Richard K. Hottelet, and Larry
LeSueur.
In
1948, Paley turned the tables on NBC and signed some of its premier
talent such as Jack Benny, Red Skelton, and Burns and Allen. He
also stole a march on his rival in what they considered their undisputed
realm--technology---when his CBS Research Center, under the direction
of the brilliant inventor Peter Goldmark, developed the Long Playing
phonograph recording technique and color television.
Even with this success Paley was still loathe to enter television
broadcasting. But with prodding from Dr. Frank Stanton, whom he
had appointed CBS president in 1946, and his growing awareness of
how rapidly television was expanding, Paley began increasing CBS
investment in television programming. Indeed with the talent that
CBS had taken from NBC and homegrown artists and programming such
as
I Love Lucy
,
Ed Sullivan
,
Arthur Godfrey
,
and
Gunsmoke
, CBS dominated the audience rating system for
almost twenty years.
The
post-war years were hardly an undisturbed triumphal march for CBS.
The network found itself dubbed the Communist Broadcasting System
by conservatives during the McCarthy era. Nor did it distinguish
itself by requiring loyalty oaths of its staff, and hiring a former
FBI man as head of a loyalty clearance office. These actions were,
however, redeemed to a large extent by Edward R. Murrow's 9 March
1954
See It Now
broadcast investigating Senator McCarthy.
Unfortunately, Murrow's penchant for controversy tarnished him in
the eyes of many CBS executives and shortly thereafter, in 1961,
he resigned to head the United States Information Agency.
More
and more the news division, which thought of itself as the crown
jewel at CBS, found itself subordinate to the entertainment values
of the company, a trend highlighted at the end of the 1950s by the
quiz show scandals. Indeed Paley, who had taken CBS public in 1937,
now seemed to make profits his priority. Perhaps the clearest evidence
of this development occurred when Fred Friendly, one of Murrow's
closest associates and then CBS News division president, resigned
after reruns of
I Love Lucy
were shown instead of the 1966
Senate hearings on the Vietnam War.
This
tendency was only exacerbated in the sixties when, despite almost
universal critical disdain,
The Beverly Hillbillies
,
Green
Acres
, and
Petticoat Junction
were CBS's biggest hits.
However, an abrupt shift away from these programs occurred in the
early 1970s. Programming executives Robert Wood and Fred Silverman
inaugurated a series of sitcoms such as
All in the Family
,
The Mary Tyler Moore Show
, and
M*A*S*H
.
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These
changes had less to do with any contempt for the rural idiocy of
the "barnyard comedies" than the need to appeal to a younger-urban
audience with larger disposable incomes. But the newer programs,
with their socially conscious themes, garnered both audience and
critical acclaim.
During
these years profits increased to such an extent that by 1974 the
Columbia Broadcasting System had become CBS, Inc., and consisted
not only of radio and TV networks but a publishing division (Holt,
Reinhart and Winston), a magazine division (
Woman's Day
),
a recording division (Columbia Records), and even for a time The
New York Yankees (1964-73). Nevertheless, CBS, Inc. was hardly serene.
Indeed it was quite agitated over the question of who would succeed
William S. Paley.
In violation of his own rule, Paley refused to retire. He did, however,
force the 1973 retirement of his logical heir, Frank Stanton. He
then installed and quickly forced the resignation of Arthur Taylor,
John Backe, and Thomas Wyman as Presidents and chief executive officers
of CBS, Inc. Anxiety about the succession at CBS began to threaten
the network's independence. Declining ratings left the company vulnerable.
The biggest threat came from a takeover bid by cable mogul Ted Turner.
To defend itself against a takeover CBS turned to Loew's president,
Lawrence Tisch, who soon owned a 25% share in the company and became
president and CEO in 1986.
Within
a year Tisch's cuts in personnel and budget, and his sale of assets
such as the recording, magazines, and publishing divisions had alienated
many. Dan Rather, who had succeeded the avuncular Walter Cronkite
as the anchor on the
CBS Evening News
in 1981, wrote a scathing
New York Times
opinion editorial called "From Murrow to Mediocrity."
By 1990, the year of Paley's death,
The CBS Evening News
,
which had led in the ratings for eighteen years under Cronkite,
and for a long period under Rather, fell to number three in the
rankings.
After
what seemed a brief ratings resurrection resulting from the success
of the 1992 Winter Olympics, and the 1993 coup of wresting
The
David Letterman Show
away from NBC, CBS was outbid for the rights
to NFL professional football by the fledgling Fox network and watched
the defection of twelve choice affiliates to the same company. Despite
repeated denials that the company was for sale, Tisch shopped it
to perspective buyers such as former Paramount and Fox President
Barry Diller. In November 1995 CBS was sold to the Westinghouse
Corporation for $5.4 billion, effectively bringing to a close CBS's
history as an independent company.
-Albert Auster
FURTHER
READING
Benjamin,
Burton.
Fair Play: CBS, General Westmorland, and How a Television
Documentary Went Wrong
. New York: Harper & Row, 1988.
Gates,
Gary Paul.
Air Time: The Inside Story of CBS News
. New York:
Harper & Row, 1978.
Goldmark,
Peter C.
Maverick Inventor: My Turbulent Years At CBS
. New
York: Saturday Review Press, 1973.
Joyce,
Ed.
Prime Time, Bad Times
. New York: Doubleday, 1988.
McCabe,
Peter.
Bad News At Black Rock: The Sell-out Of CBS News
.
New York: Arbor House, 1987.
Murray,
Michael D.
The Political Performers: CBS Broadcasts in the Public
Interests
. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger, 1994.
Paley, William S.
As It Happened: A Memoir
. Garden City,
New York: Doubleday, 1979.
Paper,
Lewis, J.
Empire: William S. Paley and the Making of CBS
.
New York: St. Martin's, 1987.
Slater,
Robert.
This--Is CBS: A Chronicle of 60 Years
. Englewood
Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1988.
Smith,
Sally Bedell.
In All His Glory: The Life of William S. Paley,
The Legendary Tycoon and His Brilliant Circle.
New York: Simon
and Schuster, 1990.
Winans, Christopher.
The King of Cash: The Inside Story of Laurence
A. Tisch and How He Bought CBS
. New York: J. Wiley, 1995.
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