THE FIRST SHOW ON…
Every TV channel or service has to start somewhere. Here’s the first original show for a bunch of them.
CARTOON NETWORK
The Ted Turner-owned service was initially a repository for old cartoons like The Flintstones and The Yogi Bear Show. In December 1993, it aired its first brand-new program, The Moxy Show. It consisted of more old cartoons, but intercut them with brand-new 3-D animation segments starring a dog named Moxy and a flea named Flea.
HBO
The network known for its adult-oriented, hard-hitting dramas like The Sopranos and Game of Thrones first branched out from Hollywood movies and boxing matches (HBO stands for “Home Box Office,” after all) in 1983, with the kids’ show Fraggle Rock, produced by Muppet master Jim Henson.
SHOWTIME
HBO’s biggest competitor has always been Showtime, but that network had original shows first. The premium cable service set itself apart from other nascent cable channels in 1982 with A New Day in Eden, a salacious soap opera in the vein of Dallas or Falcon Crest…except that it offered frequent full-frontal nudity.
AMAZON PRIME VIDEO
To think that Amazon used to just sell books, which it would mail to customers. Now it sells everything, and offers customers a trove of streaming movies and TV shows. It’s earned critical acclaim for its original shows like Transparent and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. The first Amazon Video original series was a 2013 sitcom called Alpha House, co-created by Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau, about four Republican congressmen who live together in a Washington, D.C., townhouse.
THE CW
In 2006 mini networks UPN and The WB merged to become The CW. Several shows from each channel made the jump to the new network, and the first week of programming consisted almost entirely of those shows’ season finales from the previous spring. On September 18, 2006, The CW debuted with a special episode of Entertainment Tonight and a rerun of the 2005–06 season finale of family drama 7th Heaven.
A squirrel’s teeth never stop growing.
Today, MTV airs mostly reality shows, and very few music videos, which comprised all of the network’s content when it debuted in August 1981. By the late 1980s, MTV started moving into regularly scheduled shows. First musical show: Dial MTV, a viewer-request program. First non-musical show: the game show Remote Control in 1987.
ABC
Following CBS and NBC’s jump from radio to television, the American Broadcasting Corporation became the third major TV network with its launch in April 1948. The first show broadcast on its affiliates in Philadelphia, Baltimore, New York, and Washington, DC: On the Corner, a talk show starring comedian Henry Morgan.
FOX
Before the “fourth network” launched its first prime-time lineup in April 1987 (which included Married…With Children and The Tracey Ullman Show), Fox programmed a late-night talk show called The Late Show, hosted by longtime The Tonight Show guest host Joan Rivers.
NETFLIX
More than five years after the online service introduced streaming movies and TV shows, it started making its own exclusive shows. The very first, in 2013: House of Cards. It was an American remake of a British show, starring Kevin Spacey as the ruthless, cutthroat, and murderous politician Frank Underwood.
HULU
The online service was the first internet-based network to win a Best Drama Series Emmy (for The Handmaid’s Tale, in 2017). The first time the network programmed something that wasn’t TV episodes that had previously aired on other, traditional networks was the comedy-laced entertainment/news show The Morning After in 2011.
NICKELODEON
Beginning in the late 1970s as a Columbus, Ohio, area station called QUBE, Nickelodeon went national on early cable systems in April 1979. Into the 1980s, it filled its schedule with kids’ programs and made-for-TV movies imported from Canada. The first original, made-for-Nickelodeon show was a 1980 talk show for kids called Livewire. Host Mark Cordray led discussions of current events issues with kids, and then usually brought on a band. R.E.M. made its American TV debut on Livewire.
Watermelon rind is edible (and full of vitamins).