Baughman book traces the birth, growing pains of network TV

What television viewers saw in the 1950s seemed benign enough: Lucy Ricardo planning hijinks with pal Ethel Mertz, a freckled Howdy Doody and the vaudeville antics of Uncle Miltie.

What they didn’t see — and what journalism professor James Baughman chronicles in his new book, “Same Time, Same Station” — is the tug of war that network executives waged in the early days of television for the soul of mass culture.

The corporate decisions made in those early days have dictated what we all see on television in the 21st century — the ad-heavy programming that relies on formulaic sitcoms and reality shows.

Baughman’s book — published by Johns Hopkins University Press — analyzes the choices made between 1948 and 1961, decisions that steered whether television would echo the commercial success of the film and radio industries or chart a course with higher cultural values.

“There was a subset of advertising and film people who realized that television would be what it eventually became, relying on the weekly series and the daily soap opera,” Baughman says. “But there was another body of cultural democrats in the industry who thought television would be different. It’s an alternative that gets pooh-poohed, because it has an elitist tinge. It reminds people of having to watch ‘Hallmark Hall of Fame’ with their mothers.”

Those with higher cultural ideals managed to infuse even popular TV series with fine-arts content. For example, the Sid Caesar hit “Your Show of Shows” regularly featured an opera singer.

“There were cultural aspirations in the 1950s that disappeared,” says Baughman, who confesses to “consuming much more ESPN than C-Span” today.

By the late 1950s, Baughman says, the industry began to coalesce around a new set of rules and practices that also reduced the amount of experimentation in the medium and boost network profits.

Fewer shows were broadcast live, and advertisers eventually ceded control of entire programs as TV’s draw became more attractive. But the advent of multiple sponsorship put pressure on networks to maximize their audiences.

Eventually, Baughman says, what became known as the “Sunday afternoon ghetto” of public affairs and cultural programming also collapsed as networks discovered that more popular programming choices would boost audiences and drive profits.

Baughman also traces the fortunes of CBS and NBC through the period — one in which ABC was seen as a bit player — and compares their strategies and philosophies. In the book, Baughman examines the differences between NBC chief Sylvester “Pat” Weaver and CBS leader William Paley.

“NBC may have been too innovative for its own good and took too many chances. But CBS was more risk-averse and won the day on the way to establishing nearly two decades of supremacy,” Baughman says. “CBS established an inventory of hit shows like ‘The Jack Benny Show’ and ‘December Bride,’ and NBC’s people said, ‘That’s not the future of television. People are going to have higher expectations and aren’t going to accept this.’”

Baughman says his book also underscores the axiom that “all hits are flukes.”

“No one anticipated that Milton Berle’s ‘Texaco Star Theater’ would become one of the biggest single hits in the history of television. People thought ‘I Love Lucy’ was a good show, but no one thought this would be No. 1 for four or five years,” he says.

Baughman, who is director of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, also says his book aims to shed some light on the way television evolved from a beginning that was so full of potential, yet so uncertain.

“A lot of the cultural history of the 1950s has been patronizing and, in that regard, very wrongheaded,” he says. “The men and women I’m writing about are very thoughtful. Some are idealistic. I wish we had more of that today, not just in television, but in journalism and everywhere else.”