Sixty years ago, on March 30, 1964, the first quiz show since the scandals debuted on daytime TV. It would be the original version of what would be a game show classic Jeopardy.
The idea came from Merv Griffin's then wife Julann as they were conversing about the absence of quiz shows on TV. She came up with the idea of giving the contestants the answers. Merv liked the idea and when they returned to New York after a trip to Michigan, he went to NBC and developed the show. Network executives felt the show would be too tough but one executive convinced him to but the show. The man would later become president of NBC, Grant Tinker.
The show was originally titled What's the Question? But another NBC executive convinced him that the game needed mor jeopardies. So it was good bye What's the Question? Hello Jeopardy.
As for who would host the show, it would be actor and newscaster Art Fleming. Fleming also did TV commercials. The show's announcer would be a familiar voice to game show fans, Don Pardo. Pardo, an NBC staff announcer was heard on the original version of The Price is Right from 1956 to 1963.
When Jeopardy debuted on March 30, the show replaced one of the few failures from Mark Goodson and Bill Todman Missing Links, which moved to ABC and got a new host Dick Clark. As the show became more popular, in September, 1965 Jeopardy moved to the noon timeslot and it would become extremely popular with college students and people on their lunch break. Even more popular was the Jeopardy home game, which went through 11 editions.
Though Jeopardy was still popular in the 1970s, it's popularity began to wane when NBC's vice president of daytime programming Lin Bolen moved the show out of it's familiar time period in order to bring more flashier shows to the network. She moved the show from noon to 10:30 AM in January of 1974 and in July to 1:30 PM. It was evident that Bolen didn't like Jeopardy because of its older demographics and dated set. The final blow came on January 3, 1975, when Jeopardy aired it's final show. There was also a nighttime syndicated version of the show but it only lasted one season. This version was not shown in the Twin Cities area.
Jeopardy would return to NBC in October 1978 with Fleming returning as host. But the game was totally overhauled. Money amounts increased from $25to $125 in the Jeopardy round and $50 to $250 in Double Jeopardy. Also, the lowest scoring player after the Jeopardy round was eliminated and the two remaining contestants played Double Jeopardy with the highest scoring contestant playing Super Jeopardy where they could win a minimum of $5000 by getting five correct questions in a row. This version ran until March 2, 1979 and was replaced by Password Plus.
Five years later, Jeopardy came back in syndication with Alex Trebek replacing Fleming at the podium. The show returned to its original format with increased dollar amounts. After a slow start, the show's ratings skyrocketed when many stations in the Eastern and Pacific time zone aired the show in access time periods, usually paired with Wheel of Fortune. The show is still going strong to this day with Ken Jennings, the all time leading money winner taking over after Trebek passed away in November 2020.
Happy 60th anniversary Jeopardy!
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