Jacksonville television station WFGA began broadcasting September 1, 1957 and was the first TV station in the country designed for color broadcasting. It was also a pioneer with the first “live camera” coverage of space launches at the Kennedy Space Center in 1958 and acted as the designated pool feed for all national TV networks. The station now broadcasts as WTLV.
Anyone recognize the group on stage?
Tags: broadcast, men, studio, television, WFGA, women, WTLV
Cameraman is John Addis….Picture taken during the John Tillotson show late 1950s early 1960s
Thanks for the additional information. From the research that I have done it sounds like WFGA has some significant history that reaches beyond Jacksonville.
Bob, WFGA had lots of TV history. It was the 1st TV station built from the ground up for color TV. Other stations were on the alr in black and whits and converted to color. But WFGA was the 1st built for color.
WFGA’s Crew was the only crew that provided TV coverage to all networks of the aftermath of the Apollo One fire and coverage from the Cape for the 1st Telstar feed to Europe.
Lots of other 1sts, check the WFGA page on FB
That’s my dad, John Addis, just fyi. I was born in Florida. How ya’ll doing back home there? 🙂
David
If you wish you may add any of my WFGA photos to your website
Yes that is Johnny Tillotson when he had his tv show in the late 50;s. The singers were from Paxon Senior High School. And they were in my class of 1958. I dated Johnny until the early 1960,s. I won Miss Paxon in 1958. I sang with 3 local bands in Jacksonville for some time. The Contentinals, The Mardells and Freddy Morris and the Imperials thru the late 1950s. I really miss those days and Jacksonville. Haven’t lived there since 1960. Johnny and I still keep in touch. He still tours and will be 81 in April. Wonderful memories.
Hi, Melanie, I’ve got a Youtube Channel with some WFGA show, can you help me to recognize some person, maybe yourself ?
Many thanks for your help,
take a good care of you,
Regards,
Pascal
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCspAG0-xz35QgjslEj46YDg
I stumbled across this article after searching about WFGA.
There are some videos posted on Youtube recently with Johnny Tillotson and those high school singers. It was from about 1958 according to the person who loaded the videos, under the description.
(The Youtube channel owner is Pascal Jolly).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbysERu338U
Some of them aren’t in the best condition. There are 10 songs with film-footage shots (at the time of this writing).
Melanie Williams Tyler, Thank you for the information!!