The Bookworm Sez
When Women Invented Television Terri Schlichenmeyer
Turn it up. several decades into a mere 276 pages of narrative, This is the best part of the whole series; it’s which doesn’t seem enough. a great bit, the funniest one. You’ve seen every Or maybe it’s because few of the stories come episode of this favorite show multiple times, and directly from the women themselves (three of them you know the must-watch scenes, every line, every are deceased). Perhaps streaming the shows or outfit change, new set, and new character. finding clips online might help give a better frame And in When Women Invented Television by of reference. Jennifer Keishin Armstrong, you’ve still got a lot to And yet, if you’re hooked on TV, this is a book learn. for you. Gertrude Berg clearly understood how much The remarkableness of these four women’s power she wielded — still, in the fall of 1948, when history-making achievements is clear when she walked into the Madison Avenue office of the Armstrong puts them into a time-perspective, Photo credit: A. Jesse Jiryu Davis man in charge of CBS, she knew she was taking a and it’s easy to get a bit outraged that their When Women Invented Television: chance. accomplishments have been forgotten. This book The Untold Story of the Female Powerhouses For years, she’d been the writer, casting director, fixes that oversight. Who Pioneered the Way We Watch Today star, and force behind the network’s most popular And so ignore your streaming queue this By Jennifer Keishin Armstrong radio show, The Goldbergs. Berg wanted to take that weekend, turn off the screen, and settle in to c. 2021, Harper popularity to the new medium of television, and watch a good story unfold. When Women Invented 334 pages she told William S. Paley so. Television is must-read TV. Don’t turn it down. He agreed, and by the end of 1949, The Goldbergs The Bookworm is Terri Schlichenmeyer. Terri has been reading since she was 3 years was a hit with a solid sponsor, and Gertrude Berg was a television star. old, and she never goes anywhere without a book. She lives on a hill in Wisconsin It was not quite as easy for Irna Phillips. with two dogs and 14,000 books. Today, we’d tell Phillips to slow down. She was a hundred-mile-an-hour single mother of two adopted children and the creator, solo writer, and daily juggler of multiple radio “soap operas.” She saw the coming of television and its irresistible possibilities, but getting her work there was a struggle. Hazel Scott had no problem transitioning from live concerts to TV: The DuMont Network had approached the piano “genius” with the offer of a primetime show. No more dealing with Jim Crow laws. No more on-tour weeks away from her husband and son. A steady job close to home was a dream for Scott, until the Red Scare of the 1950s targeted this Black woman. Betty White had one motto: “Always say yes.” So when career opportunities were offered, she took them, transitioning from radio to TV easily and moving up the ladder to stardom. But, says Armstrong, White’s decisions affected her personal life for decades to come. For a classic TV watcher, When Women Invented Television is gold. It’s a delight in ink and paper, like reading about the outtakes of your favorite shows. But it seems to be … off. Like something is missing, perhaps because author and journalist Jennifer Keishin Armstrong chose to shrink four stories and
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