you're right it was the biggest phenomenon the hip television for big money clothes show what picture won the Academy Award for 1955 I knew that the answer is Marty but he wanted me to miss that question no one knew they were rigged the inside story of the quiz show scandal tonight on the American experience major funding for this series is provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and by the financial support of viewers like you corporate funding for the American experience is provided by aetna for more than 135 years a part of the American experience good evening and welcome to the American experience I'm David McCullough tonight's film the quiz show scandal is about deception mass deception on television in the 1950s photographs don't lie was the old saying the decent educated Americans don't lie went without saying no president had yet lied to us as far as we knew the realization that President Eisenhower had spoken considerably less than the truth when the American u-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union was still to come in 1960 and our own died of liars on television of State Department officials bank officers presidents of the United States all lying through their teeth was far in the future and unimaginable as unimaginable is what happened to the value of the dollar the sixty-four-thousand-dollar jackpot of the big hit quiz show the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question was a fortune back then I just gone to work in 1956 as a trainee at Sports Illustrated a very good job at a salary of 4,500 dollars a year which as it happens was almost exactly what quiz show contestant Charles Van Doren was then earning as a teacher our story is a morality play and as timely and to the point now as then I learned a lot about good and evil Charles Van Doren would later say they are not always what they appear to be that he was not what he appeared to be stunned the country in a way that had never happened before and demonstrated as never before what unprecedented potential for deception lay in the new age of television in the 1950s a powerful new medium took hold of America paving its signposts on almost every rooftop television is replacing the fireplace as the central focus of our phones and our lives television sales soared as did America's fascination of new programs they watched especially the most successful and innovative for the love the first quiz shows with big cash prizes ladies and gentlemen either player stop to the game now this smells will win five thousand five hundred dollars more which means he could have eleven thousand dollars you're just one sixty nine thousand five hundred dollars and the influence of individual shows was suddenly enormous television was both our link to reality and our escape from it the popularity of the quiz shows was unprecedented people lined up around the block to get a look at the winning contestants who were their new heroes and most acclaimed of all was charming and boyish Charles Van Doren a 30 year old English instructor and son of a famous literary family or Charles Van Doren involvement with quiz shows would lead to scandal and personal tragedy that he would hide from for the rest of his life the quiz shows scandals were one of the most bizarre disillusioning chapters in the history of broadcasting the shocking disclosures of quiz show fraud became a signature for an entire decade President Dwight Eisenhower called the deception a terrible thing to do to the American public the audience a medium and the participants themselves would never be the same we've already answered on the program before the program on the air as a consequence of what began to unravel in this grand jury room her ears were destroyed and many went into hiding individually about 100 who is show contestants and producers a cross-section of well-educated decent middle class Americans SAT here and perjured themselves it all began with the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question the innovative staff of producers and technicians had no idea that their creation was about to change television the show had its life camera debut on jun 7th 1955 initially there was no manipulation of the contestants that would come later in slow escalating indirect steps television was new then and this was the most exciting thing that was part of it it was unique to television it couldn't have happened in any other medium it was a new idea a big money quiz you're right for 8,000 I remember one night walking down on a Tuesday night walking down on a summer's night in the streets in New York and the windows were open and out of every window I heard the same sound and the sound was off sixty-four-thousand-dollar question it just swept the country I'm telling it on on the night the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question was on you could shoot a cannon down the street because nobody was on the street everybody was at home watching that show and now the star of our show where knowledge is king and the reward kingsize cowbirds the idea for the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question came from a popular radio show take it or leave it reducer Luke Cowan added three zeros to the program $64 top prize come on the greatest name in cosmetics presents the one true his creation a first big money television game show yes the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question the count is the only man who ever said to me in 40 odd years when he employed me he said the most important thing to me is my good name I'll back you in everything in anything that comes up as long as you don't dishonor my good name Lenny event blues idea was that the contestant would go home think about for one week but they'd like to try or where they would prefer to take his money and run tonight he's back with his wife to tell us whether he will take his sixteen thousand dollars and go home or leave it and try for thirty two thousand dollars it was a very interesting notion of spreading it over a five week period it also meant that you could build cumulative interest in a single contestant he didn't become interested in someone on the show then he's often finished so that if he became interested you could bring him back it was a novel idea for a television show and Lou had written it up and I don't think it ran more than a third of a page just the scoring device the notion of bringing back and he asked me to produce run-throughs to develop the show and we tested the language what the host would say we tried different variations on the format would you like to win some money no mo I don't know that you needed especially but if you'd like to like you thank you revlon's category board which defect like to present the initial questions in a dramatic way producer Joe Cates placed an IBM sorting machine on stage it gave the illusion that there was a random selection of questions when in fact all the cards were identical didn't matter what but your breasts they all they're all on one line and they just served to distribute all the cards and stagehand behind lit up the box so questions came from the IBM machine when we got up to eight thousand dollars or four thousand dollars we wanted to make a change one of the changes was obvious instead of going from stage left to the IBM machine let's go to stage right and let's have somebody produce out of a safe and out of that evolved the banker would have two guards kind of funny when you think about it two guards on stage with guns the questions on which I'm about to break the seal have been carefully guarded in the lock safe-deposit force of manufactures trust company in New York manufactures Trust Company certifies that these envelopes were received directly from the editors and in no one has had access to their contents now mr. March not even I the most memorable innovation was the isolation booth it prevented contestants from hearing answers from the audience and it became the single most dramatic symbol of the quiz shows again the idea came from radio now along the way and it happened quite by accident there was a radio announced both in a radio studio they would sometimes isolate the announcer by putting him in a little booth just barely enough room for him in a microphone and I set up that booth and then when a condensing got to a big money question I put him into the booth and that would have headed drama you ever seen a choice yes I can't ready for your sixteen thousand dollar question have it please now of course the announcers box the box used on the finding the one that was built and designed to 64 valve no question was not soundproof was almost impossible soundproof so they had to feed in a little music the music would block out anything look and if your audience said we use the seat that the people related to the contestants in a special pre lit area we would shoot close-ups of the mother or the Sun or the father and the close-up literally was from the bottom lip to the eyes it was an incredible reaction people were moved it was a fake citing program the ex was a numeral number for the time and mine was for permit commercial to be thrown into jail in Texas you're right for thirty two thousand dollars and that's how these things evolved we decided to analyze everything that went into a quiz show from how the contestant appeals to our questions are gotten and devised a new way on a space stage of presenting it I distinctly remember the the evening of the very first show on air Charles rebson who owned Revlon who stood in the booth behind me I heard him say to Walter Craig of norman break and crumble the advertising agency well Norman that's another stiff he have bought on my account this thing is terrible and they walked out of there mumbling and grumbling and of course Charlie was wrong and he was the greatest of beneficiary the sponsors probably quadrupled their sales in one year you're talking about hundred million dollars his family on the block yet all right right good respectful Luke on but who called me and said I have a very interesting idea for a show which i think is there a startled America and I examined the plot to the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question how was going to work so I told you I felt that it was so interesting idea in theory but i think i said in practice i don't think that little people average people are ever going to reach for those high stakes and risk your money or they're going to fail along the way if i don't think you're right i said Lou the only way the show is going to work is if it's rigged if you fix it luke allen disagreed that the show would have to be raked but after the program's initial success and the departure of cowan the producers began to feel enormous pressures from a sponsors and the subtle process of manipulating contestants would soon begin good night everybody producer mark Goodson happened to be in the show's production office when a call came in from a sponsored Charles rebson and somebody came in today he had a call from Charlie Rev she had to leave the meeting and when he came back he said listen that's Charlie Charlie once he said he thinks the Lincoln expert is boring he wants you to stiff him I remember that lon he thinks the Lincoln expert is boring he wants you to stiffen and we'd sit in the sponsors meetings and they would say well if that one Alan's got to go on to 64 or I don't like that one let's get rid of and then quite clearly but they would do is put take that man aside and ask him 200 questions in his own field and they would examine his answers and it would then nobody would what he knew you knew you could ask some questions anywhere in that area you don't have to sit down with them and say all right now if I ask you this your answer is that you know that their answer would be this it wouldn't surprise me that the people who are on the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question or the sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge even would deny did they had been given answers because the likelihood is it not hey wassup either the producer knew what they knew and ask them what they had the answers to within months revlon cosmetic sales soared two hundred percent all the sponsor kept a chart comparing contestants ratings with product sales please bear with us on the way thank you very much rebson would always deny any involvement in rigging the program at the weekly meetings according to producers riffs and implied that popular contestants who drew large ratings should be kept on the show a number of steps would be taken to hold on to popular contestants and to get rid of others psychologist dr. Joyce brothers is an example of an honest contestant the producers tried to manipulate unsuccessfully agency story about how Joyce brothers got on sixty-four-thousand-dollar question she went down originally and presented herself as a psychologist she had an expertise in something and I'm not sure I remember what it was but it certainly wasn't boxing and they said to her well you're wonderful as a personality but we're looking for those dramatic juxtapositions the Marine officer who is a an expert cook the shoemaker who knows about opera before I turned her down I said Lord joycie you know if we're something that you shouldn't know about if we were football or if the world if were horse racing or for boxing and she said boxing and she started studying about boxing and she made herself into a boxing experts she did not come on at as a boxing expert she invented herself as a boxing experts and she came on she came back said I'm a boxing expert I'm a psychologist who knows my boxing hello is my bronze next guest how do you know a heavyweight she knew the waterways since she lost a brother and she was very popular except perhaps with the sponsor doc welcome back to the show thank you have I had to face the river get rid of her bed I'm going on a 416 he didn't fit in with their concept of what cosmetics were all of us at about sixteen thousand dollars they thought they would knock her off and this time instead of asking her questions about boxers they ask your question about referees what man referee the comeback attempt of a next champ against Jack Johnson that Reno Nevada hey Rick you're right does she really rode that one discarded in faith whose brothers career as a popular psychologist was launched by her frequent appearances on the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question all the big winners became instant celebrities and household names the first time America's Heroes were intellectuals or experts sake Billy person on art Marine Captain McCutchen on cooking every subject from the Bible to baseball not only have the contestants become rich overnight but they were also treated to a whirlwind of publicity tours Awards endorsements and meetings with dignitaries cobbler Gino Pato whose category was a pro was brought to Italy for a special performance at La Scala and honored by an audience with a port for winning sixty four thousand dollars spelling was Gloria lockerman became a guest speaker at the Democratic National Convention baseball expert Myrtle power was made a sports commentator on CBS 11 year old stock market expert mini Ross was asked to open up the new york stock exchange and with only an eighth grade education supply cord Teddy Nadler and expert on everything one more money than any other contestant there was a new kind of hero in America a common person with the uncommon gift of knowledge a producer's and sponsor of the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question went on to create a second quiz show the new show would push the innovations of the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question to a higher level of fantasy with the sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge the spotlight would be on to isolation booths on the sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge blah revlon had now become the sponsor of the two top-rated shows on television remember the final at a time like sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge was invented to take advantage of the stardom of sixty-four-thousand-dollar question here question had spent all this time making these people stars and then they were just toast nothing to be done with him and that that didn't sit right so they said were women if we bring them back and have them challenged then we have a second crack at them hence sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge it was a way of merchandising if you will and profiting from what happened on question now when challenged went on the air was sunday night at ten live and it was a much awaited event of course in a much sought after hosting Joan and I was part of our soul where challenger meets champion with 64,000 dollars in state money pot after I did the pilot we went out to dinner in Charles Revson the Revson of Revlon who was the chief sponsor at that time along with Kent of the program said we may have to change your name because nobody will believe a man named Sonny just giving away all that money and I think I said something like well for the money you're prepared to pay you call me anything you want anyway the first night of sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge the announcer said and here is your host Bill Fox I still get from them until somebody said that's you good evening good welcome good evening and welcome well we've got son of his mother is best doing this it was alien to him what happened was intelligent bright funny wonderful sunny fox in person but he can when he came on-screen became a bumbler he became a bum rode a bumbler and he made mistakes and so you're cooking i cooking our book i mean you're making a cookbook and i'm chillin over at any other he misheard he called questions correct but were not correct and in an effort to help him but on the i don't know when the fourth or fifth week we actually put in authority up on stage so that he could refer to that authority and say is that correct etc I left the shot I didn't think the shot was fired let's face it I was fired because I did have a predilection for asking the answers and now let's all of our soul our challenger leaks champion well story the sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge moved beyond subtle manipulation even the host was unaware that this new show would take the first step towards outright fraud I think I sure has real punch in it tonight so let's get going some contestants such as the river and Stoney Jackson were indirectly given answers in advance without realizing it Jackson didn't know he had been briefed until he was on the air the Reverend Jackson a now destitute Colorado preacher 14 thousand dollars on the sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenged by answering questions about the world's great lovers I came to New York for the challenge they had a producer a name was Charlotte Bernstein she's used a sister of the late leonard bernstein when i was in the office she looked me and said do you know who wrote a poem similar tomorrow's on the hero and Leander I said no I do not as I walked out of the office she yelled at me it was Thomas hood and that booth I was totally surprised when the question turned out to be Thomas hood there was the temptation to say the ralphs toreano lancers of this because surely Bernstein gave it to me it's a con game that's all scam start to finish well I was furious about the whole thing I refuse to take the check at the time i contacted Time magazine The New York Times they didn't want to talk to me that consensus of most everyone I knew was why not it makes no difference I'd you can put on a good show you can help yourself you can help those with what with Homer you're associated let them be proud of you and never mind the fact that there was any fault involved who care Tic Tac dough and here is your host hey Jackson more and more producers copied the quiz show formula newspapers and magazines began to publish weekly tallies of quiz show winnings as if they were the latest baseball scores repelling that period of time saying the 50s there was a tremendous proliferation of games he wouldn't do a lot of game shows on the edge of days not true they were there must have been 30 on the air in the 15th the dead imagine the ten-year-old go boy inherited bottner hey John Glenn jr. the main card yet balan quiz shows in the 1950s probably the biggest thing alone every hit television in sixty percent of the entire country or watching quiz shows at one time of the top five rated shows on television all the more Christian Mike I think we have to realize a hundred thousand dollars in the late fifties hundred-thousand-dollar you come on somebody going on tolerance a wedding let's say six hundred thousand talk with our first big supply of star so it's getting over half a million laws topia so it's not when I were talking about the transformation of people's lives monetarily becoming almost million years returning with 140 thousand three hundred dollars for all the contestants you made hundreds of thousands of dollars and the networks made millions of dollars and the sponsors made tens of millions of dollars and the producers were getting quite wealthy and and I was riding along with a group of youngsters if you want our I'm sorry i took the tough question said the easy one here it is 21 would take the ultimate step in quiz show wigging most contestants were cast as though they were actors every detail carefully orchestrated contestants were now full partners in the deception america's number one panic event 31 21 no question that was our main stage it was the most impactful sure we've ever had the shore done here in 1956 and we felt that it has such great quality and content to it that we will not have to rig it in fact the first shore 21 was not rigged and the first show of 21 was a dismal failure it was just plain though blank I'm sorry teason I'm sorry it on store and that puts you right back to zero what we're going to do these two fellows both for the initial turning out to be the greatest comedies on the air it lacked all drama lacto suspense and next morning the spots are called my part in jack barry and me and tolls in no uncertain terms that he never want to see a repeat of what happened the previous life and from that moment on we decided to rig 21 more ability yard that the Herbert Stempel and it's simple was a young men who my head coaches appearances in 21 we applied to the show and he took the test he scored a very very high score he was the type of contestant who could very well antagonize viewers he wanted you to react emotionally to a contestant whether you react favorably or negatively is really not that important important thing is that he react you should watch him a contestant hoping that a contestant will push to watch contestant hoping the contestant balloons and her I felt was a type of personality who instilled the latter was a Russian and pray for his opponent to him when they have to learn I received a letter and it said we'd like to to take our tests it is a three a half hour test very very difficult to that of about a hundred different categories and I was told that I would be contacted then I right to producer called me on the phone he said he'd like to see me right away he came with the apartment and then all the sudden he leaned back in the sofa and said how would you like to make $25,000 I set the room who wouldn't brought in like twenty five thousand dollars and he said to me something in essence which was like play ball and we'll make sure you make $25,000 I said fine what do I have to do he says first of all he says you're gonna blend the program tomorrow night how do you take care of them how do you manage to split yourself on your family well I got a hundred and sixty dollars a month from the GI Bill of Rights from the Veterans Administration the whole idea was to make me appear like an ex-gi working his way through college the reason I had been asked to put on this olds ill-fitting suit and deathless marine type haircut which make me appear as what you would call today a nerd a square real professional it sound very very rough what you do if things are not so good but never deployed the master of ceremonies jack barry Jack I was always to call mr. Barry and be very very humble and very sheepish on first program I was on I was fun for possibly four minutes and i won approximately nine thousand dollars i had never had that much money in my life and I was absolutely flabbergasted if either of you want to stop the game you must tell me full right now I'll stop then your weight like been told it's up to my wife gee this is the easiest money I ever made my wife you did 19 thousand dollars i used to go down to win rights office every wednesday afternoon before the show and then ride with brad cards with the questions and answers that would be used that evening i grabbed through that period struck me with the pores went two Motte my brow everything was very carefully choreographed how many of you want to try for 411 the hardest part of the show always not one of them remembering the answers are knowing the answers but rather remembering mati about twice count to ten and breathe heavily this was the hardest part of the show is remembering the stage directions which at which end right at choreograph 21-point we often turn off the air conditioning in the isolation booths so that they would start to perspire and we get cushion in terms of what dramatic pauses to take when to ask for question to be repeated when send us a question with sometimes it would deliberately mr. question in order to hide me from the drama of the moment let's assemble can you come back here next week meet your next opponent Ella for you as weeks went by people began to recognize me more and more I got more and more fan mail my classmates at college were very proud of me my professors were proud of me I just couldn't told us inside of me though because I was overjoyed about being a celebrity winning and so forth as overwhelmed I'm blackberry for six weeks here on 21 a 29-year ODI college student Herbert Stempel at successfully beaten all of his opponent and as when his winnings up to sixty nine thousand five hundred dollars then dan Enright said to me you know herb you're not going to get all the money that you've worked so far are gonna win I said what well you mean he says no he says we have to look out for ourselves so have a paper here what you're gonna have to sign I realize that if I did inside I might not find myself by the program too much longer so I decided to sign even though stemple had agreed to accept less money it didn't matter his ratings had begun to fall and he had to go a new contestant was moved into the challengers booth to knock him off a college instructor with a flair for acting who would become by far the most acclaimed of all quiz show contestants he pair will show everybody responded to him positively he was a kind of guy that you'd love to have your daughter Mary too attractive likeable good sense of humor and just captured everyone's imagination his name was child friend or my father in over his father was a Pulitzer prize-winning poet his mother was a celebrated novelist his uncle a respected American historian mandarins erudition provided parents with a welcomed antidote to elvis presley at a time when Americans feared education was in decline Charles Van Doren presented a portrait of elegant New England charm and his family is symbolized the ideals of integrity and intellectual achievement that seemed beyond reproach at Columbia University into the student at Cambridge Univ written three ball and it currently working and racing the viewers blindness of the inside of Mentor use a hero I thought of your laughter in the fun and I are you related many way through met them during the episode University famous writer yes I am he's my father who is your father the old man knows very well known emulator for any other well known band on the party vendor and the novelist and authors releases the country wife is my mother scene and call them oh and the bog refer sentence I from this science is my awful well you have every reason the world United father your name in your family their minds were clearly drove my before there was a hero there was a funny and everybody knew him do before and whom they rooting against Varitek ass up you will beg again when vendora was approached to pair on the program and was also told that he would be coached his first reaction was negative he did not want to be part of it and frankly we induced him to do it by convincing him that it would help glamorize information it would help lamb rice intellectualism where things are care what a theory that his name became synonymous with a quiz shows and his impact was immediate we played the games between venturus temple first while a series of ties and the drama crew and attention Rose lines stretched around the studio as the ratings skyrocketed ends of millions gathered in every part of the country to see if their new hero Charles Van Doren would beat herb Stempel week after week the drama and tension grew as unwrite wrote women seem to question what they saw in the 1950s seeing was believing and then finally had a particular moment I tell the rest up that you're going to be losing that right to Charles on door he asked me whether he could not forego losing and where they gonna play against Van Doren clean I said no and I remind him it gave me his word low and i would ask him to Lucy we lose I was absolutely taken aback I was shocked I was horrified well it's celebrity business had gone to my head and I didn't want to lose I felt that I were to play this game honestly if necessary to try to stay out i was willing to take my chances but ever i said no you cannot do it we've decided and you're gonna have to lose what do you think I'm blackberry tonight here on 21 Everett's simple are 29 Euro VI college student can win 1 111 thousand five hundred dollars the highest amount of money ever to be one on television on the day I was due to lose the band or dice at home watching television in the morning every few minutes in an ounce would break in on wnbc saying this herb Stempel going to win over a hundred thousand dollars tonight and I said no he's not going to win hundred thousand dollars he's got to take a dive Catherine Howard like and what happened to her considering him of AP public divorce sir mr. Garcia happy either voices didn't even have gas an hour he did do buddy one of those questions on the final night involved ada 1955 Academy Award winner leopard you are 16 points the category of movies and movie 5 what motion picture won the Academy Award for 1955 I knew that the answer was Marty but ganda and I specifically wanted me to miss that question or do this hurt me very deeply because this was one of my favorite pictures of all times I could never forget this a few seconds before that as I was tried to come up with the answer I could have changed my mind I could have said the answer is Marty instead of on the waterfront out of one there would be no Charles vendor and don't famous celebrity dogs and I would have gone back to teaching college and my whole life would have been changed on the waterfront no and fry the answer of the Marty Marty this man was taken for obscurity came from Revit impoverished circumstances take a bell obscurity and then exposed to the light of celebrity became for some six weeks a celebrity and then just quickly was cast back into obscurity be at the time to move ourselves into believing that what we were doing was not that long and I there at commencement go to coach pepper no sorry should be fun though my foot and follow my sensitive if either of you want to the game in the fill me full right now I'll stop the human twenty thousand dollars the night Charles Lindbergh beat herb Stempel about 15 million viewers applauded Van Doren's trial as the nation's new hero Charlie made the cover of Time a distinction never bestowed on his illustrious father or uncle admiring students at Columbia University where he taught English put up signs directing visitors to the smartest man in the world he received thousands of letters a week including hundreds of marriage proposals Charlie Fenella Goffe a lot of questions about you but whether or not you're married or single I'm single you are are you in the market so to speak I don't know if you put it so commercially I'm in the market designed the 50,000 over a year contract to become a host on the Today Show and gave personal interviews to some 500 reporters as book lecture and movie offers were waived in Van Doren's face a resentful herb Stempel would never forget how he had faded into the shadow of Van Dorn's celebrity that evening has had been rehearsed I took my dive and left the program as I walk backstage two technicians were talking and one said to the other one at least we finally have a clean-cut intellectual on this program not a freak with a sponge memory I was appalled I was heard as if somebody had taken a knife and shoved it right into me there was always a fear it was a film written that somehow the story would be exposed that we would be revealed and that kept gnawing at us but after a while you rationalize that I bring yourself what contestant was revealed that he played a part the rigging and certain you enough reveal that we took an account that contestant might reveal his role in rigging because he might be subjected to such trauma as such shirt that would overcome whatever looked as he had to tell the truth I first contacted Jack O'Brien who is an columnist for The Journal America non-covered television and I told him the story he believed me but he didn't want to print a little tidbits in his column once in a while about different things but he would never come out directly and accuse them of perpetrating a hoax are the people ultimately won the regular phone call for the journal American and the chief operator said that there was a fellow named herb Stempel on the talk to me we talked to me for four hours I first heard other might be a crank I thought it might be a phony but everything hung together in his story sure enough within two days I received a phone call from a newspaper so that they had moved advised by a contestant with para membership that show is Rick I asked him if that person was herb Stempel and they said yes was if we can ever get it printed in flat factual terms because they the lawyers for my newspaper syndicate wouldn't touch it until we have absolute proof it could not be printed because there was no no real corroboration from anybody else who had been on the show when the story finally did come out is because after a while when the dot Oh scandal broke newspapers finding the side of the print story Oh Jack I chuck norris and was unaware of the Ligon became host of the show that would bring down oh the big money play shows and marked the end of an era a very kind welcome to battle brought the Obama the show that I did went on the air 1958 and five weeks later da the show was the highest-rated daytime show in the history of television faith is a strange thing a successful thing like that show to me no more weeks ending in postcards to the show climbing to the heights number one rating nighttime millions and millions of people watching it everything just sailing along fantastically well and then some guy opens up a notebook that's about that big and see some answers and everything ends what happened on this show but I was out standby contestant backstage fellow the name of Hilda Meyer in this dressing room that all the contestants arity saw this lady in the corner making notes in a notebook and keeping rather to herself suddenly somebody came in from the show and said you're on next I introduce turn she became a contestant on show lockers back our new champion from the ark miss Marie win I'm on stage now at this point out there doing the show live it was fellow who was a standby contestant followed her out it's good annoying he noticed that she was giving the answers rather smoothly apart a cask of amontillado you are right foot to pex he went back into the dressing room and they're spotted this notebook that this lady had been writing in he opened it up and or for the answers in a notebook that she was cooking to the questions on stage at that helmet farmed with the pages of the notebook the standby contestant went to the press and told a newspaper reporter the reported called CBS CBS I guess decided to look at a testicle of a show and they matched the answers on the sheet of paper to the answer that she gave on the show and I guess they were a little too fat and they decided well this looks like it's rigged and they took the show off the air immediately that was the end of it Don Ho opened the floodgates now all the quiz shows were subject to investigation the show's fell like 10 pins in a bowling alley one right after the other ratings planted a top-rated sixty-four-thousand-dollar question drop to 70 third place rumors resurfaced about 21 for the first time boobs temples charges would be taken seriously the investigation started by the district attorney in 1958 i believe it was in 1958 was arguin herb Stempel its rise in newspapers that he had been raped I picked up a copy of a newspaper and read in there that district attorney Hogan was planning to launch of prohm about quiz shows this was after the dot o scandal had broken and i went to a telephone with our members as if it happened yesterday made a call to the district attorney's office and i was introduced to an assistant district attorney by name of Joseph stone I interviewed stemple over a period of about five days was very interesting because I really almost didn't have to keep motes of what's temple told me all I had to do it by the newspaper and there was a story he had told the story there were the general American and they had complete notes of what he told them so this is what they published the newspapers were filled with charges the question that dominated the headlines for months was whether these charges could actually be proven by the district attorney a producer of 21 dan Enright moved quickly to deny that any wrongdoing or fraud had taken place and right went on a counter-attack suing the journal American and mounting a campaign to discredit herb Stempel at a sensational press conference dan Enright played a secretly made tape recording of a conversation he had with herb Stempel this tape was presented to the press to demonstrate that stemple was mentally unstable the further discredit stemple and white also produced a letter that stemple had signed at an earlier date saying that 21 was an honest program that Marian and light were beyond reproach and that no rigging had taken place I was a damn fool to have sight such a thing to her grace it's up to such a thing but you can tell that the prospects of jobs and money or listen that to me and I succumb to this dan Enright was the supervising producer of the show and I was the head of programming NBC at the time of the scandal and the course of our investigation dan came to see me in my office at NBC and when I put some very bloody was he involved was the show honest again became quite upset almost the point of tears and denied that he had had any part in fixing Michelle but as the investigation proceeded I began to realize that there was some undercurrent someone was advising of them not to tell the truth not only did some of the producers lie to the grand jury but they also had urged contestants to perjure themselves in lower Manhattan the grand jury was convened for nine months and heard over 150 witnesses a majority of them about a hundred contestants lied under oath as a lone voice herb Stempel continued telling the truth to anyone who would listen but it was stemple's word against everyone else there was still no corroborating evidence temples testimony to the DA into the grand jury implied that Charles Van Doren was part of the fraud but Van Doren still the most acclaimed and respected of all the contestants continued to insist that he and the show were honest of all those involved the stakes were especially high for Van Doren no one wanted to believe that he was guilty everywhere he went he was recognized it was applauded nuns and condoms would pray for a success every week now he had any concept nor even the Prince that in concept how big this was going to be Helen he told me he felt like he was in the middle of this huge bull wreck with hundreds of thousands of the people cheering him on at all he wanted to do is get out but he couldn't go suddenly to everyone's surprise the grand jury testimony was sealed from the public by judge Mitchell Schweitzer an unprecedented move in New York State by a judge whose intentions are still not clear at the time that was feared that the public might never learn what the grand jury had uncovered suspicious of a cover-up Congress called an immediate investigation once just a trivial form of entertainment whose shows were now the subject of Investigation at the highest level of government one of the early witnesses was child actress Patty Duke wit appeared with another child contestant on the sixty-four-thousand-dollar challenge they coached patty to in the answers that's what she was about 12 3 years latest about 15 she was summoned to testify and she was coached again and she went down and she testified and she lied until she was ready to step down when one of the avuncular senators looked at her and said now patty is everything you told us here today the truth at which point she broke down and started to cry and said no they put her back on the stand and then she told the whole story it was the most poignant and startling demonstration of how widespread and deep this sort of a corruption had led us as the investigation was underway a potential star witness Charles Van Doren now a host on The Today Show was under pressure from NBC to testify but to avoid the committee subpoena Van Doren went into hiding it was a relatively obscure 21 contestant by the name of James Snodgrass would finally provide indisputable supporting proof the 21 had been raped snodgrass had documented every detail of the rigging in a series of registered letters he mailed to himself I didn't think it was terribly wrong but something told me that I had better cover my ass on this before each show I sent myself a registered letter with the questions the answers and my instructions as to how to comfort myself in the isolation booth eventually these letters send it up before house investigating committee now there was proof that the show was fixed they handed me the sealed registered letter that I had said to myself and I was asked to open it and I read it may the 11th 1957 the following our questions for the first game on the television quiz program 21 category Amir literature 11 points identify the major American poets who wrote the following lines of poetry i hear america now this was something that they were looking for one month after the hearings began Charles Van Doren emerged from hiding to appear before a congressional committee up until that moment when dawn had been unable to admit the truth to anyone up to his lawyer not even to his family I said to the committee this morning kind of like a child who opposes good but it'll go away unexpected I've been afraid for a long time I've been living in the kind of grid for three years but not been happy for a year but I became almost panicked pic in there and I did not very well in the next week my wife and I went up into the England and I bro aimlessly around from town to town peace with myself trying to come to thank conclusion I will deeply involved I could not bear to the cave my father had been saying to me fella truth he didn't know what it was I don't think he really cared what it was was just something that he knew was the right thing to do I made a very very big mistake I learned about making mistakes I learned what you have to do when you make a mistake I hope you learned a lot about life and about human nature and responsibility eventually and anguish Charles Van Doren one producer and 17 other contestants were formally charged arrested and convicted of lying under oath to the New York grand jury Oh pleaded guilty all received suspended sentences none served time in jail the district attorney estimated that at least 100 others who testified with Van Doren two-thirds of all those who faced the grand jury had perjured themselves the television quiz show scandal had wide-ranging consequences his producers were unofficially blacklisted for years and forced out of television many contestants in disgrace hid from their past networks took control of programs away from the sponsors and federal regulations were enacted against broadcast fraud the scandal left us feeling betrayed television had entered tens of millions of homes and lives in an era of filled with trust and a violation of that trust changed our view of a new medium in an age we still like to think of as innocent hey Oh you Oh Oh you I I major funding for this series is provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and by the financial support of viewers like you
