''The Strawhatters'' is an American television summer
variety show
Variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is entertainment made up of a variety of acts including musical theatre, musical performances, sketch comedy, magic (illusion), magic, acrobatics, juggling, and ventriloquism. It is ...
that aired on the national
DuMont network in the 1950s.
Broadcast history
The show aired on the DuMont network from May 27, 1953, until September 9, 1953, and again in 1954, from June 23 until September 8 of that year. Episodes of the program had also been seen on
WABD
WABD (97.5 FM) is an American radio station licensed to serve the community of Mobile, Alabama. The station, established in 1973 as WABB-FM, is owned and operated by Cumulus Media. Its studios are on Dauphin Street in Midtown Mobile, and its ...
, the
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
-area DuMont station, in 1952, before it aired nationally. For 1954, the program was retitled ''Summer in the Park''.
Filmed at
Palisades Amusement Park
Palisades Amusement Park was a 38-acre amusement park located in Bergen County, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from New York City. It was located atop the New Jersey Palisades lying partly in Cliffside Park and partly in Fort Lee. The par ...
in
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...
, across the
Hudson River
The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between N ...
from New York City, ''The Strawhatters'' featured talent shows, musical entertainment, and diving exhibitions. ''The Complete Directory to Primetime Network and Cable TV Shows'' (8th edition, 2003) called ''The Strawhatters'' "essentially an hour-long advertisement for Palisades Amusement Park."
The program was hosted and emceed by
Bob Haymes
Robert William Haymes (March 29, 1923 – January 27, 1989), also known by the stage names Robert Stanton and Bob Stanton, was an American singer, songwriter, actor and radio and television host. He is best remembered for co-writing the song " Th ...
, followed by
Bill Wendell
William Joseph Wenzel Jr. (March 22, 1924 – April 14, 1999), known as Bill Wendell, was an NBC television staff announcer for almost his entire professional career.
Life and career
Born in New York City, Wendell served in the United States ...
[''Brooklyn Daily Eagle'', August 27, 1952, page 17] in 1952,
Johnny Olson
John Leonard Olson (May 22, 1910 – October 12, 1985) was an American radio personality and television announcer. Olson is perhaps best known for his work as an announcer for game shows, particularly the work he did for Mark Goodson-Bill Todman P ...
in 1953, and
Virginia Graham
Virginia Graham, born Virginia Komiss, (July 4, 1912 – December 22, 1998) was an American daytime television talk show host from the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s. On television, Graham hosted the broadcast syndication, syndicated programs ''Fo ...
in 1954.
See also
*
List of programs broadcast by the DuMont Television Network
This is a list of programs broadcast by the DuMont Television Network, which operated in the United States from 1942 to 1956. All regularly scheduled programs which were aired on the DuMont network are listed below, regardless of whether they orig ...
*
List of surviving DuMont Television Network broadcasts
The DuMont Television Network was launched in 1946 and ceased broadcasting in 1956. Allen DuMont, who created the network, preserved most of what it produced in kinescope format. By 1958, however, much of the library had been destroyed to recover ...
References
Bibliography
*David Weinstein, ''The Forgotten Network: DuMont and the Birth of American Television'' (Philadelphia:
Temple University Press
Temple University Press is a university press founded in 1969 that is part of Temple University (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania). It is one of thirteen publishers to participate in the Knowledge Unlatched pilot, a global library consortium approach t ...
, 2004)
*Alex McNeil, ''Total Television'', Fourth edition (New York:
Penguin Books
Penguin Books is a British publishing, publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.[Ballantine Books
Ballantine Books is a major book publisher located in the United States, founded in 1952 by Ian Ballantine with his wife, Betty Ballantine. It was acquired by Random House in 1973, which in turn was acquired by Bertelsmann in 1998 and remains ...]
, 1964)
External links
''The Strawhatters'' at IMDB
DuMont Television Network original programming
1953 American television series debuts
1954 American television series endings
1950s American variety television series
Black-and-white American television shows
Television shows set in New Jersey
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