Watching TV

by Harry Castleman

Published 31 October 2003
"Watching TV" remains the only book about television to go beyond mere alphabetical listings and limited reminiscences about the medium's most popular programs. Harry Castleman and Walter J. Podrazik present a sweeping season-by-season survey capturing the essence of television from its inception to the present. Castleman and Podrazik have dug through mounds of obscure facts, off-beat anecdotes and the complicated network strategies that have made television a multi-billion-dollar industry. By presenting every prime-time schedule season by season, from the fall of 1944, "Watching TV" provides a fascinating reading of how the personalities, popular shows and coverage of key event shave evolved during the past six decades. Full of facts, firsts, insights and exploits, as well as rare and memorable photographs, "Watching TV" is a valuable history of American television, now updated to include the most recent programming and industry developments.