The Forgotten Network: Dumont and the Birth of American Television Hardcover - 2004

From the publisher

During the 1940s and 1950s, the name DuMont was synonymous with the new medium of television. Many people first watched TV on DuMont-brand sets, the best receivers money could buy. More viewers enjoyed their first programs on the DuMont network, which was established in 1946, before ABC and CBS even hit the airwaves. Allen B. DuMont, founder of DuMont Laboratories, became a folk hero for his entrepreneurial spirit in bringing television to the American people after World War Two. And yet, by 1955, the DuMont network was out of business and its founder and namesake was forced to relinquish control of the company he spent a quarter century building. politics, and the cutthroat days of early television. The heart of David Weinstein's book examines DuMont's programs and personalities, including Dennis James, Captain Video, Morey Amsterdam, Jackie Gleason and The Honeymooners, Ernie Kovacs, and Rocky King, Detective. Weinstein uses rare kinescopes, archival photographs, exclusive interviews, contemporary trade journal articles, and corporate documents to tell the story of a forgotten network that helped invent the very business of network television. An original and important contribution to the history of television, The Forgotten Network provides a detailed glimpse into the dawn of broadcasting and the growth of our most ubiquitous cultural medium.