With today being the anniversary of the birth of legendary Chicago baseball announcer Harry Caray, here are a pair of quick videos of the man. First is Harry Caray singing his signature song "Take Me Out To The Ball game" from the Summer of 1985. Second is the short version of the famous musical Budweiser commercial Harry Caray did for Chicago television.
On September 4, 2011, Herb Kent welcomed into the WVAZ-FM studios his old co-worker from the 1960's Don Cornelius. The men talked about the start of "Soul Train" and Cornelius' old days in Chicago. Also shown are special guests Clinton Ghent and Richard Steele.
This video clip comes from the classic 60s TV show "Batman." It is from the episode called "Ice Spy," which first aired on March 29, 1967. What makes this video clip related to Chicago media is the cameo appearance by WLS-AM nighttime DJ Ron Riley, who played the usher in this episode. You can see Ron Riley briefly in this clip starting at the 36 seconds point and lasting for just eight seconds. Riley was given the honor of a cameo appearance on the show since he was a big Chicago booster of the TV show, hosting the "Ron Riley Batman Club" on the radio and on WBKB-TV (now known as WLS-TV) locally.
Almost seven years after it was first recorded, Chicago broadcasting star Mike North released a brand new music video today for his 2005 parody song "Caucasian Man." The video, done just for fun, was shot on location around Chicagoland, especially in the Edison Park area. In addition to Mike North as the "Caucasian Man," be on the look out for cameo appearances by former Bears coach Mike Ditka and Chicago radio's Dan Levy, among others, in the video.
From the WGN Morning News from December 2007, here is a comedic look at the "dos & don'ts" of company holiday parties. This video clip stars Jeff Hoover & Mike Toomey from WGN-TV, along with famed Chicago comedy writer/performer (Second City, Saturday Night Live, Police Academy) Tim Kazurinski.
Originally airing on Chicago TV in December 1953 on "Garfield Goose and Friends" (then on WBBM-TV, before it moved to WGN-TV), here is the winter favorite, "Suzy Snowflake."
What was on TV 31 years ago today? The Detroit Lions hosted the Chicago Bears and were favored to win the game. The Bears had other plans though. It became one of the most exciting Thanksgiving Day football games in NFL history.
Today is the 24th anniversary of Chicago's most famous incident of air piracy, the so-called "Max Headroom Incident." On November 22nd, 1987 some video pirates using microwave technology, were able to knock off WGN-TV from the air for about 25 seconds and then WTTW-TV later that night for about 90 seconds. In place of the station's regular transmissions, a pirate wearing a Max Headroom mask took over. The video pirates were never caught. This site will have a full-blown, in-depth look at the infamous pirates next year for the 25th anniversary. For now, here is a YouTube video of the WTTW-TV portion of the night, with some of "Max Headroom's" garbled words translated. (Although the video owner got a few words wrong.) The second video is four Chicago TV news reports on the incident from the following night.
Former Chicago radio & TV sports talker "Jim Shorts" (Kevin Matthews) interviews pretend Cubs/Sox broadcaster "Harry" (Jim Volkman) in this video clip. The video is made up from various shows of Keven Matthews' mid-90s cable television show "Cavalcade of Sports For You."
