Overview
This page deals with the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) network and CBS Corporation.
CBS began as a radio broadcasting network, became a media conglomerate (book and magazine
publishing, records, radio and television broadcasting, games and other interests), was
subsequently part of the Viacom empire (described on a separate profile) and was then spun
off by Viacom as CBS Corporation (themeparks, broadcasting, publishing and some cable tv
interests).
It covers -
- early history
- reappearance of CBS
- studies
Early history
At its height the group encompassed radio and television broadcasting, book and music
publishing, sound recordings, a sports team and a toy company.
It dates from the 1920s, when the Paley family under William Paley (1901-1990) invested
profits from its La Palina cigar business in one of the first US commercial radio stations.
As radio took off the group absorbed the independent Columbia Record company, which dated
from the 1880s, and moved into network television. Diversification was led by Frank Stanton
(1908-2006), the executive responsible for day to day operation of the group.
By the sixties (in retrospect the golden years of the three US networks) CBS embraced -
- radio stations
- television stations
- television production
- record labels
- music recording studios
- record pressing plants and an international distribution operation
- music publishing
- the Columbia Record & Tape Club
- retailing operations (the Pacific Stereo and Discount Records chains)
- musical instrument manufacturing (Fender Guitars, Rhodes Pianos, and Rogers Drums)
- consumer electronics (hi-fi speakers, televisions)
- book publishing (Holt Rinehart Winston)
- magazine publishing
- sports (New York Yankees baseball team).
CBS-Sony Records was founded in Japan as a joint venture with Sony in 1968. Sony went on to
acquire CBS Records for US$2 billion in 1988, moving its broader record interests into a
joint venture with Bertelsmann in 2004. Tri-Star Pictures was formed by CBS, HBO (Home Box
Office) and the unrelated Hollywood major Columbia Pictures in 1982.
During 1985, as performance lagged, broadcaster Ted Turner, politician Jesse Helms and
speculator Ivan Boesky all made unsuccessful bids for CBS. A year later the Loews cigarette,
tobacco, cinema and insurance conglomerate acquired a 25% stake in CBS and dismantling of
the group accelerated. Its book publishing arm and music publishing arms were sold for
US$625 million, followed by CBS Records.
Electrical manufacturer and broadcaster Westinghouse Electric acquired CBS in 1995, absorbed
the Infinity radio broadcasting and outdoor advertising group for US$4.7 billion and then
changed its name to CBS (selling off traditional Westinghouse operations such as
power-generation equipment and light bulb manufacturing).
Reflecting increasing concentration among US radio broadcasters, the new CBS acquired the
American Radio Systems chain for US$2.6 billion in 1997 (selling 17% of Infinity
Broadcasting for US$2.9 billion a year later) and engulfed television program syndicator
King World Productions.
Infinity spent US$8.7 billion buying billboard giant Outdoor Systems in 1999. Infinity's
aggregate exposure was around 17,000 billboards, posters, and transit displays in 150
metropolitan markets in North America and transit advertising in the EU, including exclusive
rights in the London Underground and extensive bus advertising interests in the UK and Eire.
In 1999 CBS was acquired by Viacom, discussed in more detail elsewhere on this site, for
US$50 billion.
A chronology for CBS is here.
Reappearance of CBS
In 2005 Viacom, whether because of a lagging share price or picque, spun off its
broadcasting, publishing and theme park interests as CBS Corporation.
At that time CBS Television Network included over 200 affiliated stations. The Viacom
Television Stations Group consists of 34 television stations reaching 15 of the top 20
television markets in the US, through 16 owned-&-operated CBS stations and 18 UPN-affiliated
stations. It included duopolies in six major markets, with CBS and UPN stations in
Philadelphia, Boston, Dallas, Detroit, Miami, and Pittsburgh.
Infinity Broadcasting was one of the largest radio broadcasters in the United States, where
it owned and operated over 180 radio stations. Infinity's outdoor advertising units,
Infinity Outdoor and TDI Worldwide, comprised one of the two largest outdoor advertising
operations in the US, Canada, Mexico and Europe.
Simon & Schuster comprised 38 trade, mass market, children's and new media imprints.
Paramount Parks Inc was one of the largest theme park operators, garnering around 13 million
visitors annually at its five North American parks. Cedar Fair agreed to buy Paramount Parks
for US$1.24bn in 2006.
Studies
William Paley stars in Sally Bedell Smith's breathless In All His Glory: The Legendary
Tycoon & His Brilliant Circle (New York: Simon & Schuster 1990) - enough said - and the less
awe-struck Empire: William S Paley & The Making of CBS (New York: St Martins 1987) by Lewis
Paper.
The Sisters: Babe Mortimer Paley, Betsey Roosevelt Whitney & Minnie Astor Fosburgh: The Life
& Times of the Fabulous Cushing Sisters (New York: Random 1992) by David Grafton offers
another perspective. Paley's As It Happened: A Memoir (New York, Doubleday 1979) is bland
and for us ego-ridden.
David Halberstam's The Powers That Be (New York: Knopf 1979) is a far more intelligent
picture of the Washington Post, CBS, New York Times and LA Times at the peak of the
'television age'. There is an insider's account in Richard Salant's valuable Salant, CBS and
the Battle for the Soul of Broadcast Journalism: The Memoirs of Richard S. Salant (Boulder:
Westview 2004) edited by Susan & Bill Buzenberg
Ken Auletta's Three Blind Mice: How The Television Networks Lost Their Way (New York: Random
House 1991) gives a picture of 'old media in crisis' as the businesses and consumers first
started to head onto the information highway. It is deeper and more original than the
disappointing collection of profiles in his The Highwaymen - Warriors of the Information
Superhighway (New York: Random 1997). The King of Cash: The Inside Story of Laurence Tisch
(New York: Wiley 1995) is a pedestrian account by Christopher Winans of former CBS chair and
cigarette mogul Tisch.
William Boddy's 'Building the World's Largest Advertising Medium: CBS and Television
1940-60' in Hollywood In The Age of Television (Boston: Unwin Hyman 1990) edited by Tino
Balio, Les Brown's Television: The Business Behind the Box (New York (Harcourt Brace 1971)
and Robert Metz's CBS: Reflections in a Bloodshot Eye (New York: NAL 75) are of value for
the network's middle years. They are more incisive than Robert Slater's This ... is CBS
(Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall 1988) or Peter Boyer's Who Killed CBS: The Undoing of
America's Number One News Network (New York: Random 1988). Overviews of the US networks and
broadcasting are highlighted here on the Caslon Analytics site.
For CBS News see Herbert Gans's sprightly Deciding What's News: A Study of CBS Evening News,
NBC Nightly News, Newsweek and Time (New York: Pantheon 1979), Fred Friendly's Due to
Circumstances Beyond Our Control (New York: Random 1968), Bill Leonard's In The Storm of the
Eye: A Lifetime at CBS (New York: Putnam 1987), Peter McCabe's Bad News At Black Rock: The
Sell-out Of CBS News (New York: Arbor House 1987), Manes Sperber's Murrow: His Life & Times
(New York: Freundlich 1987) and Gary Gates's thinner Air Time: The Inside Story of CBS News
(New York: Harper & Row 1978). Bernard Goldberg's Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media
Distort the News (New York: Regnery 2001) struck us as somewhat tendentious but has won
praise elsewhere.
Douglas Gomery's 'Rethinking Television History' in Television Histories: Shaping Collective
Memory in the Media Age (Lexington: Uni Press of Kentucky 2001) edited by Gary Edgerton &
Peter Rollins is of particular value.
For Columbia Records see the discussion on the Caslon Analytics site and Tim Brooks'
Columbia Records in the 1890s: Founding the Record Industry (in the Association for Recorded
Sound Journal of 1978), Norman Lebrecht's When The Music Stops (New York: Simon & Schuster
1996), Fredric Dannen's Hit Men: Power Brokers & Fast Money Inside The Music Business (New
York: Vintage 1991), Tom King's David Geffen: A Biography Of New Hollywood (London:
Hutchinson 2000) and Jory Farr's overheated Moguls & Madmen: The Pursuit of Power in Popular
Music (New York: Simon & Schuster 1994).
Peter Goldmark's Maverick Inventor: My Turbulent Years at CBS (New York: Saturday Review
Press 1973) is a memoir by the under-appreciated wizard.
Oral histories of Frank Stanton are here and here.