Concentration/At a Glance

Broadcast History

The daytime show ran in the following time periods:

8/25/58 - 9/6/63, NBC, 11:30 AM (preceded by The Price Is Right; followed by Tic Tac Dough to 10/30/59, Truth or Consequences to 12/26/61, and Your First Impression to 9/6/63)

9/9/63 - 9/24/65, NBC, 11 AM (preceded by Play Your Hunch to 9/27/63, Word for Word to 10/23/64, and What's This Song? to 9/24/65; followed by Missing Links to 3/28/64, and Jeopardy! to 9/24/65)

9/27/65 - 3/23/73, NBC, 10:30 AM (preceded by Fractured Phrases to 12/31/65, Eye Guess to 12/30/66, Reach for the Stars to 4/8/67, Snap Judgment to 3/28/69, It Takes Two to 7/31/70, and Dinah's Place to 3/23/73; followed by Morning Star to 7/1/66, Chain Letter to 10/14/66 The Pat Boone Show to 6/30/67, Personality to 9/26/69, and Sale of the Century to 3/23/73)

The nighttime editions aired in the following:

10/30/58 - 11/20/58 NBC Thu 8:30 - 9 PM

4/24/61 - 9/18/61 NBC Mon 9:30 - 10 PM

Noted Moments

• In 1963, Ralph Branca was a contestant. Branca was the Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher who in 1951 surrendered the "Shot Heard 'Round The World" home run pitch to New York Giants' Bobby Thomson, sending the Giants to the World Series. Branca won 17 games on Concentration, where in the show's first Challenge of Champions he met another Bobby Thomson in the form a contestant named Art Levine. Mr. Levine defeated Branca in the finals of the tournament, four games to one. The outcome was in a bit of a question when Levine responded to a puzzle ("The Statue Of Liberty") in game three and it was ruled after the buzzer (the board had been cleared, thus there were no matches left to be made at this point). Branca solved the puzzle correctly and was given the game. In the next show, as game five was about to start, Hugh Downs said that a check of the tape showed that Levine did answer before the buzzer. He was given the game, making the score three games to one, but Branca was still allowed to keep the prizes he matched. Branca was a very good sport about the whole thing, commending the show for its honesty and integrity.

• Ruth Horowitz was the show's first 20-game winner. Her stint ran from July to August 1966.

• There were a couple of times that the show was halted as the mechanical game board would sometimes catch fire. During the days of live television, this left the emcee in a lurch, stalling for time while technicians effected repairs.

• Concentration was the last existing NBC show to transition from black-and-white to color. The transition took place in 1966. Show producer Norm Blumenthal agreed to the transition under the condition that the puzzles remained in two-tone white against a gray background as he felt color puzzles would give clues away too easily.

• One of the funniest moments came in 1971. The first match of a game took places on squares 17 and 19. As the squares revolved to show portions of the puzzle, each portion was an eye. It looked like the board was staring at us!

• It has been said that Concentration was canceled because NBC daytime head Lin Bolen was trying to get rid of shows with obsolete boards and middle-aged hosts. It was actually during a confrontation Bolen had with producer Norm Blumenthal over an audience member shouting out the answer to a puzzle. Norm awarded that person the car that was on a contestant's side of the prize rack, and Bolen quipped about giving a car to the opponent. Norm looked at Lin Bolen and told her to "shut up. You're in my control booth." The relationship was tenuous at best up until the show's demise.

• Original host Hugh Downs told how the show's staff hired a security agent from Scotland Yard to ensure no unauthorized persons were in back of the board while a puzzle was assembled while NBC hired their own. The two agents were always trying to eject each other from the studio. Downs also told that Herb Stempel, the Twenty-One contestant who took an ordered dive, blew the whistle on that show the week Concentration premiered. Also told was how the show could not be rigged in any way as a contestant could not have enough prizes racked up before solving the puzzle, nor a contestant could have all the prizes and not know the puzzle while another contestant could know the puzzle and have no prizes racked up.

• The very first puzzle was "It Happened One Night." The last puzzle was "You've Been More Than Kind." On the final show, the second game ended in a draw due to time running out, so one of the prizes--$1400, constituted as $100 for every year Concentration had been on the air--was divided between the two contestants.

Existing episodes

The following telecasts are known to exist on kinescope and running either on YouTube or are available on the trading circuit:

• October 15, 1958 (Puzzles: "Walter Slezak," "Misery Loves Company")

• February 9, 1959 (Art James guest hosts; puzzles: "An Irresistible Force," "Footprints On The Sands Of Time")

• September 12, 1963 (games 1 and 2 of the first Challenge Of Champions; puzzles: "A Slight Discrepancy," "The Barretts Of Wimpole Street")

• September 13, 1963 (games 3 and 4 of Challenge of Champions; puzzles: "The Statue Of Liberty," "Olivia DeHaviland")

• September 16, 1963 (game 5 of Challenge of Champions; start of game with two returning players; puzzle: "Chest Out, Shoulders Back, Chin In")

• March 29, 1966 (resumption of an interrupted game with the start of the game from the day before spliced on; puzzles: "Right Here And Now," "On A Full Time Basis," "Down The Road Apiece," "The Pleasure Is All Mine")

• October 2, 1967 (games 3 and 4 of Challenge of Champions; puzzles: "I'm Not A Mind Reader," "Time And Time Again")

• October 3, 1967 (games 5, 6 and 7 of Challenge of Champions; puzzles: "At Last My Love Has Come Along," "You're Stretching A Point," "As Big As All Outdoors")

• December 24, 1968 (Christmas show--Bob Clayton and Victor Borge "Secret Santas"; Downs announces that Clayton will become the show's new host. Puzzle: "We Wish You A Merry Christmas")

• October 2, 1969 (games 5, 6 and 7 of Challenge of Champions; puzzles: "Variations On A Theme," "Curses, Foiled Again," "Sold To The Highest Bidder")

• December 24, 1969 (Christmas show--Hugh Downs and Joe Garagiola "Secret Santas." Puzzles: "Sleigh Bells Ring, Are You Listening?," "The Ghost Of Christmas Present")

• Spring 1971 (selected telecasts archived at the UCLA Library of Radio and Television)

• July 23, 1971 (ten minutes of a color videotape broadcast; puzzle: "Don't Overstay Your Welcome")

• Fall 1971 (selected telecasts archived at the UCLA Library of Radio and Television)

• March 23, 1973 (Series finale; puzzles: "You Are What You Eat," "You've Been More Than Kind")

• The site Vimeo has a feature called "Thanks For Playing Concentration," with Norm Blumenthal telling his history with the show and in show business outright. His son, Howard Blumethal produced it.