When I first visited UW-Madison as a prospective student, I had the chance to spend some time in the WCFTR. I did not initially realize campus had this wealth of historical content framing the trajectories …
Reflecting on Wendy Clarke’s “New York Tapes” (1990) Three Decades Later
by Lauren Wilks New York City has been in the news lately for a number of reasons, including but not limited to the current mayoral election which has unearthed questions around whether candidates can equally …
Saving & Sharing 15 Hours of Wendy Clarke’s “Love Tapes” from the World Trade Center (1980)
Before the invention of YouTube, Zoom, and Instagram, before a city was transformed by waves of “urban renewal,” the AIDS crisis, and a terrorist attack, hundreds of people took turns entering a video booth inside …
Scanning Film and TV History
by Pauline Lampert At the WCFTR, we are committed to the preserving historic films and making them as broadly accessible as possible. For these reasons, our new ability to scan films in 4K has been …
Marc Blitzstein & Lenny Bernstein
by David Ronis In thinking about research, historic reading rooms in places like London, New York, and Washington D.C. come to mind. But sometimes there are great riches to be found in one’s own backyard! …
World of Giants
by Olivia Riley The 1950s saw an explosion in demand for television content, surpassing what live performances and Hollywood film reruns could provide—enter, the “telefilm.” These pre-recorded programs were made specifically for TV, produced and …
World Radio Day
As we continue to celebrate our 60th anniversary, we also want to celebrate World Radio Day which was February 13. Agnes Moorehead was a star whether she was on the stage, on the big screen, …
Coming Attractions!
The exhibitor book announced some of the films each studio was going to release in the upcoming year as well as films that were planned or in production. Sometimes, between the time the film was …
WCFTR’s Theater Posters
The oldest material at the WCFTR comes from the world of the theater. The Center has some marvelous posters for theater productions and shows dating back to around 1860. Posters helped entice people to buy …
And the Emmy goes to…
And the Emmy goes to…. The television collections at the WCFTR span from the 1940s to the late 1990s. The Center has a number of significant collections documenting the first “golden age” of television – …