
Sign up to save your podcasts
Or


In the beginning, experts swore television would never matter. Viewers would tire of “staring at a plywood box.” Baseball could never be captured on one screen, and no one would trade the color of their imagination for grainy black-and-white flicker. And yet, one messy, chaotic, barely-watchable baseball experiment in 1939 sparked a revolution. In this episode, I trace the improbable origin story of baseball on television, from the fuzzy “little white flies” of the first broadcast to the national shared experiences that made America rush to buy a set for themselves. This is the story of how a single game, and a single swing, helped sell a country on an idea that would transform the future.
By bendavidorlando4.9
159159 ratings
In the beginning, experts swore television would never matter. Viewers would tire of “staring at a plywood box.” Baseball could never be captured on one screen, and no one would trade the color of their imagination for grainy black-and-white flicker. And yet, one messy, chaotic, barely-watchable baseball experiment in 1939 sparked a revolution. In this episode, I trace the improbable origin story of baseball on television, from the fuzzy “little white flies” of the first broadcast to the national shared experiences that made America rush to buy a set for themselves. This is the story of how a single game, and a single swing, helped sell a country on an idea that would transform the future.

43,853 Listeners

38,793 Listeners

9,743 Listeners

5,287 Listeners

113,368 Listeners

14,061 Listeners

59,579 Listeners

16,474 Listeners

681 Listeners

50,981 Listeners

58,448 Listeners

2,204 Listeners

10,932 Listeners

3,588 Listeners

442 Listeners