Don Pardo or Howard Reig

[DjohnsonCB]

[quote name=\'uncamark\' post=\'79827\' date=\'Mar 29 2005, 06:35 PM\']
[quote name=\'chris319\' date=\'Mar 28 2005, 06:12 PM\']Think now -- when the late Johnny Carson did an interview which ran a little long, what did Ross Tompkins play on the piano to nudge things along?

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Usually when faced with the station breaks--affiliates didn't like going late.  

I recall at least once when Johnny ignored Ross and kept going, Doc cued the whole band to play the chimes melody.  That got his attention.
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That unquestionably happened more than once.  It was first played softly on the piano, then in a higher key if Johnny kept going, and finally by the whole band.

[W.B.]

[quote name=\'uncamark\' post=\'79607\' date=\'Mar 27 2005, 04:58 PM\']
[quote name=\'TwoInchQuad\' date=\'Mar 27 2005, 03:56 AM\'][quote name=\'tvrandywest\' date=\'Mar 26 2005, 09:00 PM\']

And to the earlier comment about Mel Brandt being the voice on the peacock "living color" show open, I know there were several versions of that animation and voice-over before they settled on the one that was burned into our memory. But is anyone familiar with which of those were voiced by staff announcer Bill Hanrahan?

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I don't know about Mr. Hanrahan, but there was also a version of the voiceover of the bird done by Ben Grauer, prior to Mel Brandt, if I'm not mistaken.

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Mr. Hanrahan also announced for both Huntley-Brinkley and "Nightly News" before his retirement and replacement by Mr. Feig.

I wonder what they're going to do with the announcers' lounge in New York, now that there are no more staff announcers...    Are there still staff announcers in Burbank?  (It seems like the guy who does the billboards on "The Apprentice" could be a staffer.)
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I know that, for much of the 1970's and into the mid-'80's, the core West Coast announcing lineup (who handled promos for upcoming programs, NBC News Updates for airing in the Pacific Time Zone, and the network's various movie shows, among others) - indeed, could well have been the entire West Coast announcing staff, for all I know - consisted of Don Stanley, Donald Rickles, Victor Bozeman, and Peggy Taylor.   I read an excerpt of a book on old-time radio in which Mr. Stanley was quoted as saying he was the last of the old-time NBC West Coast staff announcers to leave the network (in or around 1990).  Being as Rickles passed away in 1985 and Bozeman in 1986, when did Ms. Taylor's tenure with NBC end?  And as one of you mentioned Carson, did any of these individuals besides Rickles appear and/or do V/O work on The Tonight Show during Carson's long run?

As to alternate "living color" voices besides Messrs. Grauer and Brandt:  A 1971 clip on YouTube (obviously taped from an affiliate, based on the telco-transmitted 50 Hz-5 kHz audio frequency response) had another New York-based announcer, Jerry Damon, V/O'ing that bumper - preceding a special which preempted two Saturday-morning children's shows on the network at the time, Hot Dog and Jambo.

And other New York announcers:  I figured out Roger Tuttle's voice, based on listening to a 1956 episode of the radio series X Minus One on which he subbed for regular announcer Fred Collins.  (Tuttle, besides being announcer or sub-announcer on many game shows, handled announcing duties for late-afternoon and early-evening editions of WNBC-TV's NewsCenter4 in the '70's, and intros for the station's editorials into the '80's.)  I'm curious if any of you would know offhand what Vic Roby's voice sounded like . . . or who was Hanrahan's sub as V/O for NBC News prior to Reig and Fred Facey coming on the scene.

[W.B.]

[quote name=\'tvrandywest\' post=\'79452\' date=\'Mar 25 2005, 06:58 PM\']Howard is taking credit for being the first and the last staff voice for GE, but not necessarily for NBC. He started at GE in 1943, on their local WGY in Schenectady. But the date of his start at NBC NETWORK is not clear.  

If you are asking about NBC NETWORK, Don Pardo, now 87, likely spent more time and certainly had the higher profile career. Don started as a newscaster at NBC in 1944, and there are airchecks of his early work that survive to this day. Pardo remembers his first assignment involving an individual program. He was "warming up" the network phone lines that stretched through much of the country just before NBC Radio's "Hour of Charm". Don retired last year after 60 years and 6 months with the net. His present work on SNL continues for that show alone. He is no longer on staff.[/quote]
From what I've read, Mr. Reig first joined NBC NETWORK itself in 1952.

[JCGames]

Bill Hanrahan's sub on Nightly News was Bill McCord, who as I said in a different post was announcer on Twenty-One in the 50s.

[BillCullen1]

According to an article I read in www.tvgameshows.net  Pardo now lives in Arizona but flies in
to do SNL.  Of course, he was the announcer on several game shows. most notably the original
Price is Right and Jeopardy.  Pardo annouced five game shows that Bill Cullen hosted, those
being Winner Take All, TPIR, Eye Guess, Three on a Match and Winning Streak.

[SRIV94]

[quote name=\'BillCullen1\' post=\'173112\' date=\'Dec 25 2007, 07:51 PM\']
According to an article I read in www.tvgameshows.net  Pardo now lives in Arizona but flies in
to do SNL.[/quote]

Confirmed.  And a hell of a nice man.

What was it--two hours holding court in the lobby of the Beverly Garland in North Hollywood?

[W.B.]

[quote name=\'JCGames\' post=\'173108\' date=\'Dec 25 2007, 07:28 PM\']
Bill Hanrahan's sub on Nightly News was Bill McCord, who as I said in a different post was announcer on Twenty-One in the 50s.[/quote]
Ah, Bill McCord.  I seem to remember his other game show announcing credits in the '50's included Concentration and the daytime Tic-Tac-Dough.

[uncamark]

Outside of IDs, the only time I remember hearing Peggy Taylor on Carson was a joke revolving around the fact that when NBC aired "The Godfather Saga" (the two films edited in chronological order by Coppola), they ran a disclaimer that more or less stated that the film was not meant to disparage the fine Italian-Americans who have never been in the Mafia.  I don't know if Taylor did the disclaimer when it aired, but she did read Carson's parody of it as it crawled up the screen.

[toddyo]

Randy,

The story about Sarnoff is correct. There is a lot of NBC history knowledge here in Cincinnati, since WLW-T was the first NBC affiliate outside of NYC (also the first color affiliate). The University of Cincinnati (primarily at the Raymond Walters campus) has an archive that is very impressive, including an unique Rod Serling collection of "The Storm" series (scripts, set pieces, artwork, film b-roll, everything), which predates "Twilight Zone" and was done live on WKRC-TV (who's studios are on two separate floors). The director of this program eventually left WKRC and America and founded/started channel 7 in Australia. Anyway, back to the history lesson, Sarnoff also had a patent squabble with Farnsworth, but the patent story with the Navy and Sarnoff, 100 percent true. It was to keep Marconi from entering the States with something called "wireless telephones". Apparently, the Gov't was very concerned about a non-American company wielding too much power in telcom. (Fast forward 70-80 years and ?)

(And we won't start with Crosley using WLW's 500,000 watts as a facsimile machine during WWII)