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Originally Posted by old_tv_nut
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There's a few things in that article that are wrong. One of them is that youtube clip of Don Pardo's voice over the NBC color slide was made up. There is no video of Don Pardo's first two announcements, or of the first three minutes of live camera's in the WNBC newsroom with Bill Ryan and Chet Huntley. I don't think anyone knows for sure what slide NBC used for Pardo's announcements.
A reel to reel audio recording made by a guy named Phil Gries surfaced in the 90's, and that is the only known record.
All of CBS and ABC's coverage through the end of the funeral on that following Monday exist. All of NBC's after the first three minutes exist. Most of it was on youtube until earlier this year when it started disappearing. Apparently each of the networks planned specials and had the footage pulled from youtube.
If you think NBC's coverage is disorganized that day, you should see ABC's! They were totally befuddled. They didn't even have a camera in their newsroom. The first 30 minutes is literally in an empty studio with lumber leaning against the wall and junk around. Ron Cochran is out of breath and sweaty from having to run many blocks from a restaurant where he was having lunch. You see workers behind him hanging up sheets and trying to create a temporary set for him.
CBS was also far less polished than they would have you believe. Dan Rather went to the Dallas Trade Mart on the press bus, and wasn't able to give much info. CBS was relying mainly on wire bulletins that were often confusing and late in details. In fact, NBC beat them by a few minutes with the official announcement of Kennedy's death because they had Robert MacNeil at Parkland Hospital on a live phone hook-up. Cronkite reported it a few minutes later when they got the word on a press wire.
Funny thing is today most people say they remember watching Cronkite on TV that weekend. However, Nielson did continue tracking ratings that weekend and NBC was on top most of the time. And, most people still heard about the assassination on radio, not on tv.
MSNBC is planning to run NBC's coverage of the assassination sometime this weekend. C-SPAN is going to show NBC's rare coverage of the funeral on Sunday.
I wasn't born yet in '63. A few years ago I was at the Air Force Museum in Dayton, OH and toured Air Force One tail number 2600 that carried JFK to and from Dallas that day. In the back of the plane a section of wall was literally cut out with a jig saw to make room for the casket. The wall was put back with the cut mark still there as a reminder of what happened that day.