James DeBlois Parker retired in 1980 as a Staff Consultant– Telecommunications, for the CBS Television Network. He began his long career with CBS in 1937 as an engineering assistant, rising to Director of Radio Frequency Engineering in 1957 and his staff consultant position in 1967. Since 1967, his principal work was studying the broadcast applications of satellite technology. As a highlight of his 43-year career with CBS, he developed a shipboard earth station that enabled live television coverage of the first Apollo splashdown in 1968. He also served on a number of national and international engineering committees as an advisor on regulatory and technical matters.
Wallace Johnson was Executive Director of the Association for Broadcast Engineering Standards. He became ABES Executive Director in 1979, an organization founded with the intent to affect AM and FM policy and standards. Previously, he spent 37 years at the FCC, beginning in 1942, rising to the position of chief of the FCC’s Broadcast Bureau, before retiring from the FCC in 1979.
Joining ABC in 1954, Julius Barnathan became Vice President of ABC’s Broadcast Operations and Engineering Department in 1965 and was promoted to President of Broadcast Operations and Engineering in 1978. He was instrumental, along with others at ABC, in developing the technology for closed-captioning for the hearing impaired, and was chairman of the NAB subcommittee to develop the system. ABC won an Emmy Award for this work in 1980. While at ABC, he was involved in covering numerous Olympics, the development of the first color slo-motion recorder in 1967, spearheaded the development of the first broadcast quality hand-held color camera, promoted the use of Triax Cable for color cameras, initiated the first use on US television of an electronic frame-store, and many other innovations. In his award acceptance speech Barnathan said: “I don’t care if you have 10,00 lines of resolution. The quality of the picture is not going to be more important than the quality of the programming.”
Joseph Flaherty began his long career with the CBS Television Network in 1957, designing television networks and plants. He subsequently became Director of Technical Facilities, Planning and then Vice President, Engineering and Development. He received an Emmy Award Citation for the CBS Minicam color camera in 1969 and the 1975 Technical Emmy Award for electronic news gathering. He was also a principal participant in bringing the first demonstration of NHK’s development of HDTV to the US, at a SMPTE conference in 1981. In his award acceptance speech, he made a prescient prediction: “Within the next decade we will see the total digitalization of our present analog television systems.”
Otis Freeman was Senior Vice President, Engineering for WPIX, Inc. and Director of Engineering for Tribune Broadcasting Co. He was employed by WPIX ever since the station began operations in 1948. He is credited with leading the move to erect the 365-foot transmitting tower at the top of the World Trade Center and was president of the TV Broadcasters All-Industry Committee, composed of the ten NYC television stations, since 1965. He is also credited with development of the Genlock system, enabling synchronization of signals from remote locations. He also oversaw development of the Instant Replay which WPIX pioneered in 1959 for Yankees baseball.
Carl E. Smith founded the Cleveland Institute of Electronics in 1934, which grew to be the world’s largest electronics training correspondence school. He started a consulting electronics firm active in developing radio, TV and shortwave stations, consulting for more than 360 stations worldwide, and engineered many antenna system for the Voice of America. His 1936 book on parameters of two- and three-tower directional patterns simplified the design and increased the practicality of construction of directional arrays. He also conducted numerous directional antenna seminars for NAB beginning in 1969.
After earning a PhD in electrical engineering in 1933, George Brown joined the Radio Corporation of America, eventually becoming executive vice president, patents and licensing, over a 40 year career, retiring in 1972. The holder of 80 patents, he was a leader in the research and development of the NTSC color TV system as well as active in the NTSC group itself. His book published in 1979 titled “and part of which I was” recounts details of his many projects and accomplishments at RCA Laboratories, including the battles over color TV standards.
Renville H. McMann Jr. was a research engineer, scientist and inventor. He was also President of CBS Laboratories and Thomson-CSF Laboratories. A holder of 37 patents, he is known for his work in the development of the first portable battery-operated color TV camera, the digital noise reducer, the image enhancer, manual and automatic color correctors, developments in laser film recording, and the development of a two-channel compatible DBS HDTV system, as well as a key role in the development of the color TV camera systems during NASA manned lunar missions. He joined the CBS Technology Center in 1955 and became President in 1972. He was VP of advanced television research at the time the Technology Center shut down in 1986.
Jules Cohen was President of Jules Cohen & Associates. After service in the Navy in World War II, he entered the field of consulting engineering, providing engineering services in the field of broadcasting. In the over 8000 projects carried out by his engineering firm, services included propagation studies, interference studies, frequency allocation surveys, antenna design and adjustment, satellite earth station studies, studio and transmitter plant layouts, and others. Serving as consultant to the Association of Maximum Service Television, he was heavily involved in spectrum sharing criteria between broadcasters and land mobile operators. He also led early investigations and studies on spectrum for HDTV by the FCC Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Services. In addition, he worked extensively in the field of nonionizing radiation effects and was a recognized expert in that field.
William G. Connolly was president and chief executive officer of Sony Advanced Systems. He joined Sony in 1983, following a 23-year career with CBS Inc., where he rose to the position of vice president and deputy director of engineering and development. While at CBS, he received Emmy Awards for the development of the electronic color corrector in 1970 and the electronic still store system in 1981. At Sony he managed Sony’s emerging technologies, such as High Definition Television, and was an advocate for the ATSC/SMPTE 1125/60 production standard. He also was the recipient for Sony of an Emmy for electronic editing systems for film programs in 1986 and in recognition of the component Betacam format recording system.
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