DuMont Network and the Internet Archive
Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2025 3:44 am
Also lost to history is DuMont’s The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong in 1951, featuring legendary actor Anna May Wong in probably the first American television series with an Asian-American lead. Wong’s character was an art dealer whose investigative art history skills also helped her become a crime solver. There are no known recordings or even scripts of the show still in existence. The only information we have on these programs is what remains of it in schedules and TV listings. For this article, I audited several TV History textbooks from respected scholars, and I could find no mention of either The Hazel Scott Show or The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong.
DuMont Television collapsed in 1955 after clunky UHF (Ultra High Frequency) regulations hammered the final nail in its coffin. These rules limited the reach of UHF stations, putting DuMont at a disadvantage compared to e-commerce photo editing more accessible VHF (Very High Frequency) channels. Still, before its demise, DuMont produced a rich schedule of innovative programs—many of which may never be seen again. According to testimony in a report for the Library of Congress, DuMont’s television archive was intentionally destroyed as a result of the negotiations of a sale in the 1970s. Reportedly, the parties were concerned about who would be responsible for the sensitive archival needs, like temperature control, of such a massive collection. In the report, Edie Adams, a talented performer and a key figure at DuMont, along with her husband Ernie Kovacs—who hosted his own show on the network—shared what she heard about its demise while trying to archive her husband’s career. “At 2 a.m., [one of the lawyers] had three huge semis back up to the loading dock […] filled them all with stored kinescopes and 2” videotapes, drove them to a waiting barge in New Jersey, took them out on the water, made a right at the Statue of Liberty, and dumped them in the Upper New York Bay. Very neat. No problem.” While this is the commonly reported lore of DuMont’s demise, no one really knows for sure what happened. Could some materials still exist? True or not, DuMont’s metaphorical watery grave nevertheless serves as a poignant reminder for how easily traces of our past can vanish.
The Internet Archive is an important repository where saved DuMont programs have been collected and made available to the public. Many of these programs survive from personal collections of performers or producers who kept copies in their personal files. The Internet Archive houses a few surviving examples of DuMont programming, including clips from Cavalcade of Stars, where The Honeymooners and Jackie Gleason made their first appearances in sketches. The archive also includes Okay, Mother, a game show that premiered in 1948, and one of the earliest daytime network TV shows, with one surviving episode available to watch.
DuMont Television collapsed in 1955 after clunky UHF (Ultra High Frequency) regulations hammered the final nail in its coffin. These rules limited the reach of UHF stations, putting DuMont at a disadvantage compared to e-commerce photo editing more accessible VHF (Very High Frequency) channels. Still, before its demise, DuMont produced a rich schedule of innovative programs—many of which may never be seen again. According to testimony in a report for the Library of Congress, DuMont’s television archive was intentionally destroyed as a result of the negotiations of a sale in the 1970s. Reportedly, the parties were concerned about who would be responsible for the sensitive archival needs, like temperature control, of such a massive collection. In the report, Edie Adams, a talented performer and a key figure at DuMont, along with her husband Ernie Kovacs—who hosted his own show on the network—shared what she heard about its demise while trying to archive her husband’s career. “At 2 a.m., [one of the lawyers] had three huge semis back up to the loading dock […] filled them all with stored kinescopes and 2” videotapes, drove them to a waiting barge in New Jersey, took them out on the water, made a right at the Statue of Liberty, and dumped them in the Upper New York Bay. Very neat. No problem.” While this is the commonly reported lore of DuMont’s demise, no one really knows for sure what happened. Could some materials still exist? True or not, DuMont’s metaphorical watery grave nevertheless serves as a poignant reminder for how easily traces of our past can vanish.
The Internet Archive is an important repository where saved DuMont programs have been collected and made available to the public. Many of these programs survive from personal collections of performers or producers who kept copies in their personal files. The Internet Archive houses a few surviving examples of DuMont programming, including clips from Cavalcade of Stars, where The Honeymooners and Jackie Gleason made their first appearances in sketches. The archive also includes Okay, Mother, a game show that premiered in 1948, and one of the earliest daytime network TV shows, with one surviving episode available to watch.