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The title card for Little House of a Prairie on a green hill.

50 Years Ago: America Loved a Little House

The beloved family show left a lasting legacy.
Harris on a tv screen.

TV Still Runs Politics

Just about every major development in the current presidential campaign started as a television event.
Gold Dust on the Air: Television Anthology Drama and Midcentury American Culture by Molly A. Schneider. University of Texas Press. 238 pages.

The Myth America Show

The anthology drama provided a venue for discourses on American national identity during the massive cultural, economic, and political changes occurring at midcentury.
Censored stills of a naked man running.

The Decline of Streaking

Naked runners used to disrupt events seemingly all the time. Why’d they stop?
A drawing of a television screen between the fingers of someone framing an image of barbed wire.

The Problem With TV's New Holocaust Obsession

From 'The Tattooist of Auschwitz' to 'We Were the Lucky Ones,' a new wave of Holocaust dramas feel surprisingly shallow.
Harold "Red" Grange, one of the biggest stars of the early NFL.

NFL Television Broadcasting and the Federal Courts

The NFL's control over entertainment.
Frank Shakespeare in 1968.

Frank Shakespeare, Nixon TV Guru Who Redefined Political Ads, Dies At 97

Mr. Shakespeare's team oversaw ads and on-air events that reflected the rising power of television as a political tool.
A man is lying on his side in a hospital bed; Mesha Irizarry sits beside him, a hand on his shoulder.

Deconstructing HIV and AIDS on "Designing Women"

Shows from "Mr. Belvedere" to "Grace Under Fire" fought ignorance and prejudice with more care and passion than many who had been elected to public office
Vintage photograph of two little girls sitting on a mid-century television set.

The Lost Art of Striking a Pose With Your TV Set

In midcentury America, the machine itself became a character.

TV's Rural Craze & The Civil Rights Movement

At the same time that MLK was using TV to brand Southern sheriffs as obstacles to progress, a Southern sheriff was one of the medium's most beloved characters.
Screen frame from the television program Home Improvement, depicting parents chastising their teenage son.

In the ‘90s the U.S. Government Paid TV Networks to Weave “Anti-Drug” Messaging Into Their Plot Lines

These storylines portrayed those addicted to drugs and alcohol as lunatics whose only cure can come from punitive measures, abstinence, and “tough love.”
The full chart of television genres from 1945 to present.

Television Genres Over Time

Here’s how the distribution of genres has changed since 1945 up to present.
The cover of the book Her Stories by Elana Levine

Guiding Lights: On “Her Stories: Daytime Soap Opera and US Television History”

Annie Berke reviews Elana Levine's book on a pivotal genre and its diverse fandom.
Two characters from “Grey’s Anatomy" sit against a wall.

How TV Lied About Abortion

For decades, dramatized plot lines about unwanted and unexpected pregnancies helped create our real-world abortion discourse.
Book cover of "Kathy Fiscus: A Tragedy That Transfixed the Nation"

Wellspring

The classic story of the child down the well played out in Southern California at the dawn of television.
CNN studio with monitor in the foreground and anchor at desk in the background.

From TV News Tickers to Homeland: The Ways TV Was Affected By 9/11

There is a long list of ways America was transformed by the terrorist attacks. But the question of how TV itself was changed is more complicated.
An astronaut on the moon with the MTV flag planted.

Watch the First Two Hours of MTV’s Inaugural Broadcast

MTV's 1981 broadcast was advertised to be as important as the moon landing.
A women in a newsroom covering the election
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Good TV Demands Results on Election Night, but That’s Bad for Democracy

The history of tuning in to televised election returns.

The Mod Squad, Kojak, Real-Life Cops, and Me

What I relearned (about well-meaning liberalism, race, my late father, and my young gay self) rewatching the TV cop shows of my 1970s youth.
From left, actors Bernnadette Stanis, John Amos and Ja'Net Dubois accept the Impact Award for “Good Times” at the 2006 TV Land Awards in Santa Monica, Calif. (Kevin Winter/Getty Images)
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Television Is Already Moving to Address Racism — But Will the Effort Last?

Past network efforts to address racism faded as uprisings stopped dominating headlines.

Come On and Zoom-Zoom

The original “Zoom” burst joyfully out of Boston in the 1970s, and is still beloved by older members of Generation X.
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How Local TV Made “Bad” Movies a Thing

Weekly shows on local TV stations helped make the ironic viewing of bad movies into a national pastime.
Trump through a television camera.

How TV Paved America’s Road to Trump

“A brand mascot that jumped off the cereal box”: a TV critic explains the multimedia character Trump created.

The Definitive Oral History of TiVo

How the original DVR paved the way for Netflix and the cord-cutter movement.

How Mark Burnett Resurrected Donald Trump as an Icon of American Success

With “The Apprentice,” the TV producer mythologized Trump as the ultimate titan, paving his way to the Presidency.

When Televisions Were Radioactive

Anxieties about the effects of screens on human health are hardly new, but the way the public addresses the problems has changed.
A man alone among the rubble of a city

TV and the Bomb

During the Cold War, nuclear weapons were a frequent plot point on television shows. Fearful depictions in the 1950's became more darkly comedic in the 1960s.

When Did TV Watching Peak?

It’s probably later than you think, and long after the internet became widespread.

A Timeline of Working-Class Sitcoms

Over the years, there have been surprisingly few of them.
Donald Trump shaking hands with Mike Huckabee.

Church of The Donald

Never mind Fox. Trump’s most reliable media mouthpiece is now Christian TV.

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