NBC Monitor was a weekend radio program broadcast from June 12, 1955 to January 26, 1975. Aired in four-hour blocks beginning Saturday morning at 8am and continuing through the weekend until midnight on Sunday, it offered a magazine-of-the-air mix of news, sports, comedy, variety, live music, celebrity interviews and other short segments. Many consider it to have been the most ambitious and dextrous radio program to have challenged the continuing rise of television as America's major home entertainment.

Regular segments included "Celebrity Chef," "Ring Around the World" and "On the Line with Bob Considine." One memorable Saturday evening feature brought live jazz to NBC in the form of on-the-spot remote broadcasts from New York City jazz clubs.

The show was the brainchild of legendary NBC radio and television network president Sylvester (Pat) Weaver, whose career bridged classic radio and television's infancy and who sought to keep radio alive by advancing it from the single-sponsor/strict-block ethic of old-time radio. Believing that broadcasting could and should educate as well as entertain, Weaver fashioned a series that could and would do both for two decades, with some of the best-remembered and best-regarded names in broadcasting, entertainment, journalism, and literature taking part. It was probably Weaver's last great contribution to NBC; he left the network within a year of Monitor's premiere.

Monitor's executive producers included Jim Fleming, Frank Papp, Al Capstaff and Bob Maurer. The many rotating anchors and hosts included Cindy Adams, Mel Allen, , Jim Backus, Red Barber, Frank Blair, , David Brinkley, Ted Brown, , Art Buchwald, , , Bill Cullen, James Daly, , Hugh Downs, Clifton Fadiman, Art Fleming, , , Allen Funt, , Joe Garagiola, Dave Garroway, Ben Grauer, , Monty Hall, Bill Hayes, , , Don Imus, Murray the K, , Durward Kirby, , Hal March, Frank McGee, Ed McMahon, Garry Moore, Henry Morgan, Robert W. Morgan, Barry Nelson, Bert Parks, , Tony Randall, Gene Rayburn, , , , John Cameron Swayze, Tony Taylor, John Bartholomew Tucker, David Wayne, and Wolfman Jack.

Various broadcasting personalities heard delivering reports and segments included Jerry Baker (the Master Gardener), Morgan Beatty, Dr. Joyce Brothers, Al Capp, Paul Christman, Marlene Dietrich, Len Dillon, Chris Economaki, Arlene Francis, Betty Furness, Curt Gowdy, Skitch Henderson, Chet Huntley, Graham Kerr (the Galloping Gourmet), Fran Koltun, Sandy Koufax, Bill Mazer, Lindsey Nelson, Kyle Rote, Gene Shalit, Jean Shepherd, Jim Simpson, Barbara Walters and Ted Webbe.

Jonathan Winters was introduced to listeners on the first Monitor. Many comedy talents appeared through the years, including Woody Allen, Bill Cosby, Selma Diamond, Phyllis Diller, Bob Elliott and Ray Goulding, Bob Hope, Ernie Kovacs, Mike Nichols and Elaine May, Bob Newhart, and Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara. Bob and Ray, who won a 1957 Peabody Award for their Monitor routines, often remained at NBC during the weekend to step in if technical problems developed with remote segments.

In addition to Bob and Ray, several Monitor regulars in its early years helped the show bridge the classic and modern radio eras. Henry Morgan had been a controversial radio comedian in the 1940s; Clifton Fadiman was the legendary host of , the highbrow quiz show; Mel Allen and Red Barber were familiar baseball voices (respectively, the New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers) since the 1940s; Garry Moore had made his bones as Jimmy Durante's radio sidekick; and, Bert Parks had first become famous hosting the radio hits Stop the Music and Break the Bank. Jim and Marian Jordan---better known as old-time radio favourites Fibber McGee and Molly---held down a regular five-minute Monitor segment, and were said to be negotiating a new, longterm commitment to the show when Marian Jordan died of cancer in 1961. And Peg Lynch and Alan Bunce, vintage radio's Ethel and Albert, also performed five-minute Monitor vignettes from 1963-1965; Peg Lynch has made several of the vignettes available on compact disc to old-time radio collectors.

Monitor aired from a mammoth NBC studio called Radio Central on the fifth floor of the RCA Building in midtown Manhattan.

Listen to

• NPR: Liane Hansen talks with Dennis Hart on the 50th anniversary of Monitor (6/12/05)
• Miss Monitor (Tedi Thurman)

External link

• Dennis Hart's Monitor Beacon