American Bandstand/Beechnut Lost Episodes

Hello all, this will be my first post so if I do anything the wrong way I apologize in advance. I wanted to know if anyone has any information on finding out what episodes are actually lost and which ones aren't. I'm specifically trying to find out what episodes that Frankie Lymon performed on and if they still exist.

 

Very few if any pre-1964 episodes of Bandstand survive. According to Clark there was an early '70s fire that destroyed many AB film reels, such as Buddy Holly's only appearance on the show (1957).

Harold Dorman did "Mountain of Love" on the May 28, 1960 episode of Beechnut. This is especially significant as even still photos of Dorman are very rare. Only two show up on a Google Image search.

I don't know if this episode survives.

 

If you find the channel on YouTube NRRarchives, he has a load of the Beech-nut stuff. His story is that he used to work for DC productions and helped transfer the kinescopes to tape in 1979 which is where his copies come from.

 

But apparently no Harold Dorman

 

The only reason any AB shows exist pre-1976 is that they were discovered at a university where the 2-inch tapes were donated as blank tape stock and hadn't been taped over yet. Clark, for all his reputation as a business genius, never bothered to save the videotape masters on AB or on Where The Action Is for that matter. All that seems to exist on that show are crappy kinescopes.

 

That's surprising b/c by the early '70s it was clear these clips had financial value, if only for nostalgia TV specials.

 

If you look at some of the Bandstand anniversary shows, many of the clips are either from the Beechnut show or from other series.

 

Dion/Belmonts and Conway Twitty were the Beechnut clips that always seemed to turn up in those anniversaries.

I'm trying to think of pre-'64 Bandstand clips I've seen. I believe the magnificently lunatic clip of The Trashmen and "Surfin' Bird" is from late '63. But earlier than that, I'm stumped.

 

January 4th, 1964 that's from.

Earliest surviving complete Bandstand is from December 1957.

 

They're out there, mostly in private collectors' hands who knew enough to collect them before YouTube and all that:

 

Hey everyone thanks for having me, or not having me, whichever sits better in your stomach.

I am sitting here with a good friend of mine. His older brothers and sisters had a band called the Allen Family not to be confused with the new Christian band the Allen Family. The Allens were the first Caucasian family band to sign with Motown in 1975, and had performed on Dick Clark's American Bandstand of that same year, the same episode included also a performance by Johnny Bristol. My friend David called ABC to inquire about purchasing a copy of their performance from the 35 mm real or whatever format it was filmed on to see his family band perform and at one time was told that the reels have been burned and then 10 years later inquiring once again was told that a section of the reels had been stolen, so yeah something seems fishy here, we just don't know. If anyone has any information on this performance tape or topic in question or where we can obtain a copy of the Allens on American Bandstand May 17th 1975, please get ahold of me right away. Thanks!

 

ABC certainly wouldn't have them. Dick Clark Productions still exists. I believe it was purchased by Daniel Snyder, the owner of the Washington Redskins. Its changed hands a couple of times since then but if the episode exists, it wouldn't be on film but on 2-inch tape. I believe they have them all from 1976 on but before that its hit or miss. Here's the info. Good luck chasing it down: Dick Clark Productions - Wikipedia

By the way, I have the Allens records (5 songs) and they're very good. I'd love to know if you have any unreleased songs by them.

 

Why did you post and then not reply?

 

...Are there any listings anywhere for AB ogALL the songs that were played on every episode - that is known to survive/there are logs of, anyway - ????????? Including the Rate-A-Records? And a complete log for the Top 10 the show would show on the air?
And, to REALLY swing this into this forum's mainstream.........Does the Rate-A-Record of the Swan issue of Los Fabs' " She Loves You " survive?

 

From the comments:

This is the only 1950's AB episode that can be viewed in any totality on the internet.
The film runs about 45 minutes which is roughly half of what the network broadcast on any given day as some days there might be
a " local'' opening prior to the 2:30pm national start or if required, truncated episodes were broadcast to accommodate ABC schedule changes during AB's usual time slot.
AB proved to ABC that there was gold in daytime programming and,
ironically, as a result of the increased revenue stream generated by AB's instant success, ABC began to cut AB's time slot.
During 1958, ABC inserted a 30 minute game show( starring Johnny Carson assisted by Ed
Mc Mahon, who himself got started in TV on the same station that AB broadcast from.) into the middle of AB's time slot, dividing AB into two segments!
By 1963 before it went to Saturdays only, was down to 60 minutes daily.
A recent YT posting of the 12/18/57 film has almost all of the live commercials, all of the network promos and the WFIL station ID removed.
The previous day's episode, 12/17/57 and the following day's episode, 12/19/57 exist only in museum collections.
The Gene Vincent AB appearance from the previous days broadcast, Tuesday,12/17/57 can be seen on YT.
The debate continues as to EXACTLY what is held in the Clark archives.
ALL of the other 1958-60 clips that post on YT are taken from the "Dick Clark Saturday Night Show",
also known as " The Beechnut Show".
Later AB footage starting in c.August 1963 through the show's final years randomly appears on YT via various posters.
Nearly all of it comes via the archives which has numerous clips available for license and ABC film transfers of whole or excerpted episodes which land on YT and other platforms.
1970s and beyond clips or full episodes generally surface in their video format again via various sources and posted on the net.
Occasionally, complete 16mm film copies of mid 1960s episodes turn up on eBay.
The actual films are not cheap and require 16mm sound film projection equipment to view.
Beyond ONE home videotape release, titled " Best Of Bandstand- Vol.1 "released c. late 1970's, Clark never made any AB footage available for consumer purchase.
As it is, the release is actually comprised of " Saturday Night Show" footage and save for a WFIL station ID clip ( taken from the 12/18/57 film) and a video tape clip of a behind-the-scenes AB pre-show setup from the WFIL days, the compilation has NO actual AB footage nor performances.
It will remain for the current owner of the Dick Clark Media Archives to make whatever else resides in that collection available in the future.

 

There's actually more than one VHS and they were released in the late 80's IIRC, I have digital VHS rips of some of them.

There was Best of Bandstand which had clips from the likes of Sam Cooke, Jerry Lee Lewis, The Fleetwoods, Paul Anka and Chubby Checker (and a few more I forget).

Then there was a second Volume called 'The Superstars' which also included some clips from Where The Action Is (I think the two from that were The Four Seasons 'Big Girls Don't Cry' and on VT The Supremes doing a medely on some sort of log cabin in what Dick introduces as 'Big Bear Lake').

There was also a Syndicated series called Dick Clark's Golden Greats which was released in the early 90's on VHS. If the clip has the 'Year' appear at the start of the clip in orange/yellow that's where those are from, and for some reason, unlike the Best of VHS which contained the original Cameo-Parkway recording of The Twist, the Golden Greats overdubbed the K-Tel/Key-7 re-recording.

 

I still have the laserdiscs of "Best Of Bandstand" 1&2 & would love to put them on DVD.

 

Nitpicking,sure,but AFAIK,McMahon never worked at WFIL,either radio or television. Lots of time at CBS affiliate,WCAU,ch. 10 and some time at WRCV(now KYW ch. 3). McMahon & Dick Clark both lived in Drexelbrook, a semi-private community in the Philly suburbs(Bandstand had pool party and ice skating episodes which originated from there), not far from my Pop's drug store. I'm told McMahon came in a few times(never saw him)but no stories about Dick Clark(though I have a salatious but not verifiable story from someone who babysat the Clark kid).

 

So sorry James, I had some trouble getting back, well couldn't find the page.

 

Hey thanks a lot James for the info, I appreciate it immensely! Ill ask about those unreleased track if any, and get back to you tonight.

 

Still waiting.
According to Discogs, they recorded a single in 1973 on AVI and a later one on Philips. Can you confirm its the same band.

 

Every time this thread comes up, I'm hoping that it's a clip of Harold Dorman singing Mountain of Love on this show.

 

I'm not familiar with the show. Where the performances lip synched or live.

 

They lip synched on American Bandstand. After Dick Clark passed away in 2012, I wrote a web article about a few of the
performances from the show. Actually, one is the reaction to the audience seeing The Beatles for the first time with their Sgt. Pepper
era looks from the Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane promo films/music videos. Unfortunately, the music video portion was taken off YouTube,
but the reaction segment is still there.

One American Bandstand video has Public Image Limited performing Poptones and Careering in 1980. John Lydon barely even attempts to lip synch.

Marshall

Four unique moments from Dick Clark's American Bandstand broadcasts