rquallsins Review of Ted Mack & the Original Amateur Hour

Ted Mack & the Original Amateur Hour (1948–1970)

The progenitor of "Star Search", "American Idol", and other talent shows

[8/10 · 2 November 2006]

This program was one of the highlights of my youth, appearing as it did during that time every Sunday afternoon on CBS. This was in a time prior to the NFL "doubleheaders" and there was lots of time to kill between the end of football and prime time; the most prominent shows to do so were "GE College Bowl", Walter Chronkite's "The 20th Century" (which later was to look to the future and become "The 21st Century", and this one. By this era (the late 1960s) the show was past both prime time and its time; the fact that it was always sponsored by Geritol showed that the producers were well aware of this. My parents both thought that Ted Mack was a pretty pale substitute for the late Major Bowes who was the radio host, but they had always heard that shortly after his show during World War II that American ships were sunk and that somehow it was assumed that coded information was being passed over the air by someone involved with the show who was in league with the Germans. Many other people from that era have confirmed that this was rumored, but obviously there is a great deal of difference in stating "It is true that it has been rumored that ..." and "It is true that...". It has been stated many places that the only truly major stars to come out of this show during the TV era were Pat Boone and Gladys Knight, joining Frank Sinatra from the show's radio days; if that is true, and the above comment is correct about all of the many stars appearing on the show, it should probably be modified to state that they were the main ones to BASE a career on their appearances on the show. The start of the show, "Round and round and round she goes, and where she stops, nobody knows," is one of the most memorable in the history of broadcasting in my opinion. This was one of the last bastions of "vaudeo", or TV vaudeville, on the air; there were often jugglers, dog acts, and the like. After this show and Ed Sullivan were canceled there was very little of that sort of material on TV for many years.