Word: paleys
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...HAPPENED by William S. Paley Doubleday; 418 pages...
Anybody who can flip a TV dial knows what the public wants. But the art of broadcasting, writes William Paley, "is to know what the public is seeking before the public even knows it is looking for something else." As a guide, that advice is about as useful as buy low, sell high. Yet, as the author demonstrates in this often charming memoir, he has been able to follow his own prescription for almost half a century...
...Paley's rise to prominence started from the top. His grandfather owned a prosperous lumber business in the Ukraine and represented the Czar in his provincial town. When he anticipated Czarist pogroms and emigrated to the U.S. in 1888, he brought enough money to think about retiring. The treasure was soon lost through bad investments, but Paley's father Samuel made his own fortune manufacturing cigars. Young Bill joined the family business and quickly proved an adept salesman; one of his special delights was putting together a show called The La Palina Smoker on that new thing everybody...
Even The La Palina Smoker was not enough to keep alive United Independent Broadcasters, the tiny network on which it was heard; in 1928 the owner approached Paley's father and offered to sell. Sam refused, but Bill, who had $1 million in his own account, grabbed the bargain, a measly $503,000, and ran. UlB's problem, he recognized, was that it was not big enough. He reorganized, offering greater inducements to affiliates, and within the space of a few months increased the network from 16 stations to 49. Along the way, it was renamed...
...those innocent days the big names in show business were frightened by radio. Paley set out to win them, and before long such famous names as Paul Whiteman and Will Rogers had been tempted before the microphones, where they found even greater recognition...