Newly discovered kinescope contains majority of lost What's My Line? episode. (Oct. 1, 1950)

This is a really cool find that I never would've found out about had I not become obsessed with WML a few months back and subscribed to this channel. I love being able to watch something that hasn't been seen in 65 years. The final challenger's game is unfortunately not included, but the rest is there.

 

Perhaps even more amazing for television buffs is that the beginning of the reel included the final minutes of a show called Celebrity Time, which is otherwise completely lost (or so we think). Unfortunately, this clip kinda jumps around, so I have no idea what this is about, but still cool, nonetheless.

 

Probably my all time favorite WML moment:

 

Favsinating. Do you know the story behind the film? Where were they hiding all these years? I wonder what's up with that "Celebrity Time" clip and why it keeps fading to black.

Dan c

 

I'm going to take a guess that someone started the kinescope camera machine too early. The black fades in the Celebrity Time are where someone noticed they started too early. There is a hint of this in the sound - one place has the swish and speedup of the sound, which is actually that the camera was turned off and the film slowed down to a stop (so in playback the sound speeds up). Then someone thought oh the heck with it and turned it back on and left it and crossed his fingers if he cared at all. The film reel then did not have enough film to finish the full What's My Line ep, so it was developed, then found to be incomplete (it was obviously projected a few or many times) and someone took it home, where it was "lost" until turning up on ebay. Further out on the guessing limb, someone told G-T/CBS that the lab ruined it, so they've never even had a record of this one ever existing, although they had ordered kinescopes of every episode.

Just a guess. If someone has a better guess, go for it. Otherwise I win the $50.

I'm very glad this has been "found", even incomplete.

 

It appears that this episode doesn't have a sponsor and is thus "sustaining."