The attack on Pearl Harbor also produced the very first TV news bulletins. In 1941, TV broadcasting was in its infancy in America, with the number of televisions barely into the thousands. Most of these were in and around New York.
At the time, there was only one station, WNBT, that broadcast on Sunday. The station’s schedule had a film, Millionaire Playboy, playing when news of the attack broke. Stopping the movie, the station announcer, Ray Forrest, announced the attack. Later on the same day, WNBT brought on experts to speak about what had happened, employing maps to show the viewers (however many of them there were) the location of events while a teletype machine in the studio relayed the latest news.
The other New York station, WCBW, although not…