CINCINNATI, Feb. 13, 2003 (PRIMEZONE) -- In today's world, life is so much more complicated with the Internet, DVDs and plasma screen TVs. It used to be a click of the switch; a whiff of ozone and the fluorescent blue filled the room with a warm glow. How society got from there to here is a whole different story. History of U.S. Television -- A Personal Reminiscence (now available through 1stBooks Library) by Lawrence H. Rogers II gives a first hand account of the favorite family member, the TV, by one of the pioneers of the industry.
Rogers tells how he came into the industry in 1948 and completely got it off its feet and set it to walking. Returning from World War II, he found a job in a radio station in the hometown of his wife, Huntington, W. Va. It wasn't until a sales trip to Toledo that he saw his first TV set. The grandeur of the new invention sparked an idea to build station of his own. At the age of 27, he built his first TV station. Within a few years, his Huntington, W. Va. station was number one on NBC.
The book tracks his career and the history of TV networks. He details his participation in practically every TV institution, like the TV Code, the TV Bureau of Advertising, and AMST. He also covers how he resurrected the Cincinnati based Taft Broadcasting Company from a troubled family business to the largest single group operator. He single handedly brought an end to the FCC's ban on editorializing by broadcast licensees by becoming TV's first editorialist.
The reader also gets involved with the purchase by Taft of Hanna-Barbera Cartoon empire, which led to worldwide exposure as well as an amusement park and franchise merchandising. Overall, Rogers details everything important that happened to the industry in its infant stages through the following thirty years.
Rogers received his bachelor's degree with honors in history from Princeton University. He then served as battery commander of Patton's 3rd Army during World War II. Upon returning to his home on the Jersey shore, he moved to the hometown of his wife in West Virginia. He built the first TV station before he took the position of chief operating officer and president of Taft Broadcasting Company of Cincinnati. He then became president and CEO of Omega Communications, Inc. in Orlando, Fla., which he eventually sold to Meredith Corporation. Earlier he designed and built the first privately owned microwave transmission system in the industry to bring live service and baseball games to West Virginia. After he sold the Orlando station, Rogers and his family sailed a 48-foot boat across the Atlantic living the next 15 years in the Mediterranean. He now resides in Cincinnati, Ohio.
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