I didn't set out to share a very special Sunday Showcase this week. It just fell right into my lap as I perused old issues of the Tennessean.
The cover of the December 9-15, 1973 Sunday Showcase features Big Bird and Marcus Welby, M.D. because one of the most momentous television events of my young life was going to be taking place on Tuesday night as Channel 8 and Channel 2 swapped stations (the numbers at least)!!! You can read the details if you blow up the photo. More on this event from me below.
I was 6 for most of 1973 and I watched lots of television. Channel 2 and channel 8 happened to be the ones I watched the most. Channel 2 was the public television station at the time and I was hooked on Sesame Street, The Electric Company, Zoom, and more, while channel 8 was the ABC affiliate which showed lots of cool stuff too. It was traumatic that they would be swapping. I thought the adult world was a fairly unchanging monolith. Sure, new things were created, but I was still at the age when most things seemed permanent. I got over it especially since the public television station came in much clearer. I wonder how many parents let their children stay up until 9PM Central that night to see the switch happen?
There were multiple Showcase pages associated with this swap. I remember the animated A Christmas Carol special from this page vividly as it actually frightened me.
If you read the article about the move you know that not only would the channels swap, but that WSIX channel 8 would get new call letters also becoming WNGE2. The good doctor Welby approves.
Here's the Sunday night TV guide with WSIX-TV Channel 8 and WDCN Channel 2 listed. NBC will have Bing Crosby and Bob Hope Christmas specials on this night.
Marie Osmond & Bob Hope
Tuesday night December 11 is when the change happens at 9PM Central. WSIX becomes WNGE channel 2 and WDCN becomes channel 8. There's ad for the first show aired on the new channel 8 below the guide. It was The Six Wives of Henry VIII with this night's installment about Catherine of Aragon.
This week's Sunday Showcase review is brought to you by the Franklin Road Melrose Business District. Don't let construction keep you away from the great businesses on this road.
There was a time when Harding Mall had it all.
Rivergate Mall has free rides on Santa's rocket sleigh. I love the Rivergate logo.
I tried to find a color version of this ad online, but could not find one. I dig the graphics. I also miss the Holiday Inn signs from the past.
Cain-Sloan has your Christmas records covered at their Green Hills, Rivergate, and downtown location.
This would have a great week to just camp out at the Exit/In with Linda Ronstadt and Jerry Jeff Walker playing multiple nights. I wonder if any of those WKDA broadcasts were taped and saved?
Jerry Jeff Walker live 1973
Linda Ronstadt on the Midnight Special 1973
11-18-1973 Linda live broadcast on KSAN
Johnny Winter was coming in the upcoming year. Brownsville Station would open for him at Municipal Auditorium on January 5, 1974. That must have been a rocking night!
Brownsville Station live 1972
Johnny Winter live 1973
One of the neat things about these old issues of the Sunday Showcase is finding how often country music stars performed benefits for local high schools. One of my favorite country music singer/songwriter of the Seventies was Tom T. Hall and he was scheduled to do 2 shows at Franklin High School to benefit the band boosters.
Tom T. Hall
Muther's Music Emporium was short lived, but it was about to open with a stellar first week's line-up of acts with Wet Willie, Ted Nugent & The Amboy Dukes, and the Bob Seger System among them.
Wet Willie live 1973
Ted Nugent & The Amboy Dukes live 1973
Bob Seger System
There was no music top ten this week. I guess with all of the excitement with the channel 2 and 8 swap they forgot to include it. So let's go see Black Belt at the Loews Crescent instead. Remember when I made a series of posts about the movies that played the Loews Crescent over the years? Sure you do. That's all for this week, but the Sunday Showcase review will return for a few more weeks and then the series will be finished.
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