Scenes from NBC News, July 4th, 1972

The Evening News, 35 Years Ago

Here’s something that many (but not all) of you regular Accordion Guy readers might not find familiar — it’s five minutes from an NBC News broadcast from July 4th, 1972:

Some interesting differences between the nightly news 35 years ago and today:

• There were far fewer superimposed graphics, and no “crawlers” at the bottom of the screen
• No network logo in the lower right-hand corner
• Different camera style — note how there’s more of a focus on the anchor (John Chancellor) and reporter, with long shots, starting with a wide shot at the start of their spoken segment, and then zooming in for a close-up as their segment continues
• A more formal, less sensationalistic style of news delivery. Someone commented on this video saying “It’s funny how this shlock is like Pericles speaking to the Athenian assembly compared to contemporary ‘journalism’. “Another commented “This is like Canadian News from last night.” (I’m going to as the Ginger Ninja about her opinions on the different between American and Canadian TV news.)
• When they go to clips of the 4th of July celebrations at the National Mall and Attica Prison, there’s no voice-over commentary. They rely solely on the clips to tell the story.
• In today’s world of digital video and network communications, it’s easy to shoot news segments all over the world and get them back to the studio in time for the evening news. Back in 1972, those segments must’ve still been shot on good ol’ film and then rushed to some place to be processed and manually edited.
• They gave more time for each news segment — even the credits at the end, which are about a minute long, take more time than a lot of today’s news channel stories.
• That’s one fine jazzy theme song at the end.

No Democratic Candidate Yet?

Here’s another difference between then and now that has less to do with the newscast and more about politics back then. Listen carefully to the report from San Clemente by reporter Richard Valeriani: he says that the Democrats are meeting in Miami Beach to choose a candidate for the elections.

What’s so weird about that? It’s that 1972 was an election year. American elections take place near the beginning of November. It’s the start of July at the time of the broadcast. That means that the campaigning would last no longer than four months. That’s quite unlike the current situation.

In case you’re not up to speed on your recent U.S. history, the 1972 presidential elections were a disaster for the Democrats. Ted Kennedy would’ve been a contender, but as I like to say, “that’s water under the bridge”. Ed Muskie was the was mainstream democratic favourite until he cried like a chick during the primaries. Grassroots-boosted George McGovern got the nomination and in the end, they lost by over 23% in the popular vote.

1972 U.S. Presidential Election results by state. Click the map to see it at full size on its original page.

(Check out the pie charts on the map above — note the difference between the electoral vote and the popular vote.)

I must admit that my earliest introduction to that particular election was in the late seventies, from reading back issues of MAD magazine.