Video Vault: 1955 boxing and protesters at WEWS

CLEVELAND - In the early days of TV, boxing and wrestling were a big part of local programming.

Both sports were easy to stage in a TV studio and they attracted a large audience, both in studio and on the small screen.

But from the old film from July 2, 1955 in our video player, you’ll see not everyone was thrilled with boxing matches being held in the studios of WEWS.

Picketers, representing the boxing managers’ guild, were protesting the amount of money being offered as prizes to the boxers. They were asking people not to attend these TV boxing matches and for the station to guarantee the same purses other boxing venues provided.

The film is silent and was shot outside our studios on East 13th Street. WEWS moved to our current East 30th Street location in late 1956.

You’ll see we rolled the studio cameras out onto the sidewalk to talk to the protesters.

TV cameras from that era did not have zoom lenses, rather they used a turret system. There were four fixed-length lenses built on to a spinning wheel – need a wide shot, spin to the wide angle and so on.

The protest takes up the first minute and 11 seconds, then we head into our studios for the event causing the protest: boxing.

The earliest news film in our archives was shot in 1957. This film exists as management hired a photographer to cover the protest.

Enjoy.