| CBS Television Quiz | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Game show |
| Created by | Gil Fates |
| Developed by | Gil Fates |
| Presented by | Gil Fates with Frances Buss |
| Country of origin | United States |
| No. of episodes | 47[1] |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Gil Fates |
| Producer(s) | Gil Fates Worthington Miner |
| Running time | 60 minutes (1941) 55 minutes (January/April–May 1942) 50 minutes (February–March 1942) |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | WCBW (CBS) |
| Picture format | Black-and-white |
| Audio format | Monaural |
| Original run | July 2, 1941 – May 25, 1942 |
CBS Television Quiz was the first live television game show ever to be broadcast regularly, running from July 2, 1941 to May 25, 1942 on the fledgling CBS Television network.[2] Quiz was an in-house network production and broadcast in black and white. The host was Gil Fates, with Frances Buss as scorekeeper.
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Not much is known about the format of CBS Television Quiz, however it has been noted for giving the contestants the answers and requiring the questions, which would predate the 1964 debut of Merv Griffin's Jeopardy![3] As Griffin was a teenager in San Francisco at the time Quiz was airing, it is unlikely he was aware of it, although his future wife Julann may have seen it. According to Griffin, she had originally suggested the "answer-and-question" idea to him.
Televised game shows prior to the debut of CBS Television Quiz were "test episodes" for experimental purposes; one of these was Truth or Consequences (NBC Radio, July 1, 1941), while a show called Spelling Bee was broadcast (BBC, 1938). Quiz was the first regularly scheduled quiz program, but not the first to be sponsored, and aired on Wednesdays at 8:30 PM EST.
On October 2 the series moved to Thursdays, and on January 8 the show was reduced to 55 minutes for the network to present a five-minute news summary at 9:25 PM. Quiz moved to Mondays on February 2 and was now preceded by a civilian-defense program (later an American Red Cross program), which along with the news summary required the show itself to decrease to 50 minutes. The Red Cross program ended on March 30, allowing Quiz to re-expand to 55 minutes.
The series ended after 47 episodes on May 25, 1942 following a mandate two weeks earlier by the War Production Board to cease building television stations. Most of the shows then airing on both WCBW and WNBT, including Quiz, were removed in favor of war-related programming.
Fates would later produce and/or direct many Goodson-Todman game shows on the network (most notably What's My Line?), while Buss (later Frances Buss Buch) became CBS' first female director.
CBS Television Quiz was aired live, prior to the adoption of kinescopes for recording programs and long before videotape. The show does not have any extant audio recordings or photographs, making it one of the few game shows to be completely lost.