No Subject

Subject: A Past TV Scandal.

With Jerry Springer suddenly the subject of a possible scandal ("Springer-
 gate"?) because of staging and faking of fights on the show, perhaps the
 members of this newsgroup might want to read this brief look at another
 major TV scandal.

In the late 1950's, big-money game shows were the rage. At one point, three
 of them ("The $ 64,000 Question, "The $ 64,000 Challenge", and "Twenty-
 One") were in the top-five of the Neilsen prime-time ratings.

It turned out several game shows were rigged. On "Twenty-One", it eventually
 turned out rhat contestants were given answers to questions they'd be
 asked on the show in advance--this inspite of viewers seeing each week an
 armed guard strolling (with escorts) into NBC's studio 8-H with a sealed
 envelope containing the questions that had been just removed from a secure
 bank vault. This, and the isolation booths the contestants stood in (a
 gimmick on both "$ 64,000" shows as well), led viewers to believe that
 the only person to have seen the questions before they were read/asked
 on-air by emcee Jack Barry was the man who wrote them, who then put them
 into a sealed envelope and put that envelope in the bank vault, and
 thus, the contestants would have no idea what question they'd be asked
 until their headphones were turned-on and they could hear the hosta sking
 the question.

(For more on "Twenty-One", rent "Quiz Show", an excellent dramatization
 of what went-on behind the scenes of "Twenty-One")

However, "Dotto" was the first show caught. Originally airing as a daytime
 show on CBS beginning in early 1958, it immediately shot to the top of
 the daytime ratings, and within a month surpassed Art Linkletter's
 "House Party" and Dick Clark's "American Bandstand" (who during late 1957
 dueled for the # 1 position in the overall daytime ratings) to become the
 highest-rated daytime show (to that time) in network history. "Dotto"'s
 daytime success led to a once-a-week primetime version on NBC during the
 summer of 1958 which was to have continued in the 1958/59 fall season.

"Dotto" wasn't as glamorous as the big money prime-time shows; contestants
 answered questions; for each correct answer, a series of dots on a drawing
 were connected; the object of the game was to be the first to identify the
 person or object the drawing was to represent. The daytime version supp-
 osedely gave away more money than any other daytime show, but the prime-
 time version, while giving away more than the daytime show, didn't give
 out as much as the "$ 64,000" shows or "Twenty-One".

In August of 19568, a part-time butler (and aspiring actor) named Ed
 Hilfilinger was waiting to go on the show, when he noted on a table in
 the "green room" a notebook belonging to a contestant named Marie Winn
 who was on-stage playing the game on the air. (Ms. Winn was barely over
 the minimum age limit of 18 to be a contestant, had just graduated from
 high school, and in later years would go on to write a series of best-
 selling books about TV's affects on children, including "The Plug-In
 Drug") Reading the notebook, Hilfilinger found the questions Ms. Winn
 was being asked and their answers!

Hilfilinger approached the contestant who had played against Winn (and
 lost) and showed him Ms. Winn's notebook. The defeated contestant told
 Hilfilinger he had not been given any help. They approached the producer,
 and the producer paid the two off to keep quiet and to retrieve Ms. Winn's
 notebook. 

Hilfilinger discovered he had only been paid $ 1,500, while the defeated
 contestant was paid $ 4,000, the same anount Ms. Winn had won on the air.
 Disgusted, Hilfilinger decided to talk. He called the New York Post and
 gave them the story.

The Post got Hilfilinger's story on August 14th. It didn't print the story
 immediately (today, it would be out as soon as the next edition was
 printed), but instead, sent telegrams to the FCC, CBS, and New York
 District Attorney's Office (as "Dotto" was taped at CBS' studios in
 Manhattan) and perhaps most importantly, "Dotto" sponsor Colgate-Pal-
 molive.

The telegrams arrived on Friday, August 15th, and before the end of the
 day, Colgate-Palmolive decided to end sponsorship of the show, both the
 daytime and nighttime versions (since Colgate also sponsored the prime-
 time edition). Since in those days, sponsors often dictated what enter-
 tainment programming aired on the networks, Colgate brought back "Top
 Dollar", a game show they had earlier sponsored (and which they believed
 to be more honest and rig-free) to fill the gap. 

Of course, the Herbert Stumpel/Charles vanDoren bit on "Twenty-One" had
 occured 18 months earlier (early 1957), and after learning vanDoren had
 been coached, Stumpel approached the newspapers. Before printing the
 story, the papers got a denial from both Barry and "Twenty-One" producer
 Dan Enright, and the story was dropped.

However, after the "Dotto" revealations, Herb Stumpel's story finally made
 it on page 1 of many of the nation's newspapers on August 29th, 1958. It
 is said that Barry, on vacation from his show (I would think that either
 there was a guest host filling-in for him on "Twenty-One", or that he
 might have taped several shows in advance of his vacation) was in Chicago
 where he was trying a nightclub routine as a standup comedian when a
 friend rushed into his dressing room after the show holding up an early
 edition of a newspaper with a banner headline: "TV's 'TWENTY-ONE' RIGGED
 TOO! TOP-RATED QUIZ SHOW UNDER SUSPICION!" (This would be the wee hours
 of August 29th).

"Twenty-One" got cancelled by NBC, but for a time, it was replaced by 
 anothetr game show produced by the Barry & Enright company that had
 premiered in daytime on NBC earlier that summer to strong ratings--
 "Concentration". Reportadely, the network put "Concentration" on as a
 stoggap in "Twenty-One"'s timeslot because an internal network invest-
 igation determined the show wasn't being rigged. Barry hosted the night-
 time version for awhile, but before it's brief run had ended, he was
 dropped by the network (when it became apparant he may have had a direct
 rold in the "Twenty-One" scandal) and replaced by Hugh Downs, who had been
 hosting the daytime version. (NBC, incldentally, purchased "Concentration"
 from Barry & Enright and held ownership of the show for a few years,
 eventually selling it in the mid 1960's to Goodson/Todman)

Charles vanDoren, the man whjo defeated Stumpel, maintained for over a year
 that he wasn't given the answers, but made a dramatic reversal in na
 nationally-televised Congressional hearing in late 1959 when he admitted
 he was being coached. vanDoren had at the time of the scandal been a
 regular on NBC's "Today" show and at one point was supposedely to replace
 Chet Huntley and David Brinkley as anchorman of the evening news. The
 combination of the quiz scandal, plus a rapid uptick in the ratings for
 Huntley/Brinkjley (going from a poor # 2 to a dominant # 1 in just a few]
 months in 1959) saved Huntley and Brinkley their jobs, and of course,
 they'd go on to dominate the news ratings for most of the 1960's.

Today, it's a felony to rig any game show, quiz show, or other TV or radio
 show where prizes are given away in games of chance, luck, or answering
 questions. It WASN'T illegal in 1958!

While "Springergate" will probably bring talk shows under scrutiny, at
 least now you have a little information about a scandal that "Springer-
 gate" may in time be compared to.

Joseph Gallant

<notquite@hotmail.com>

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