The Man of Television Firsts, Dennis James

You only needed one hand to count the number of television stars there were 80 years ago. That’s because in 1942, only one station was airing regular live programming—W2XWV in New York, your friendly Du Mont station.

Remarkably, one of those stars was familiar to TV viewers for many years, hosting game shows, emceeing telethons and hawking Kellogg’s Corn Flakes.

He was Dennis James, one of the smoothest, most casual people ever on the small screen. He made hosting look effortless.

A lot of “firsts” have been attributed to James, though it seems some articles expanded the number a bit over time. Research using contemporary reports reprinted on our “Old TV History” blog shows James was the first person on TV with a regular sports show. And he was the host of the first real variety show on the tube, something called Television Roof ¹. This was all back in the war years, not before, when you could legitimately call him Du Mont’s first big star (certainly one who didn’t come over from NBC like Sam Cuff or Doug Allan). When he returned from service, he was the host of the game show, “Cash and Carry,” arguably a first (John Reed King might claim that title, too).

Stories in the early ‘50s claimed James started in television on W2XWV in 1938. That was impossible. The station didn’t exist then. It was granted a construction permit by the FCC on April 13, 1940.² The station made a frantically put-together debut on July 1, 1941³, with test programmes in the evening once or twice a week⁴, though it considered its debut of regular programming to be June 28, 1942.⁵

James’ radio career began at WAAT in Jersey City in 1938. In May 1940 he moved to WNEW in New York.⁶ Meanwhile, the 1940 Census reports his brother Lou, who later directed a number of his series, gave as his occupation an insurance inspector. Dennis jumped from WNEW to television (in 1941, according to Michael Ritchie’s book Please Stand By), went to war, and became an even bigger star when he returned.

The Daily News profiled him in its TV page on November 1, 1953. By then, he had spread his career outside of soon-to-be-dead Du Mont.

Dennis James Is 4-Network Man
By JERRY FRANKEN
QUITE possibly the only performer in TV who appears every week on each of the four networks is an ex-sportscaster gone legit, by name Dennis James. Right now Dennis is doing 13 shows a week, all of which put him in the 90% income tax bracket—not bad for the son of an Italian laborer.
Dennis's chores include "Chance of a Lifetime" on DuMont; "Turn to a Friend," an afternoon, daily ABC-TV series and the Old Gold cigaret commercials for Fred Allen (NBC-TV) and Herb Shriner (CBS-TV). As you can see, Dennis gets around and just in case you’re wondering, he smokes cigarets and believe you me, they're O.G.'s.
Despite all these activities, though, chances are Dennis is best remembered for his announcing accomplishments at wrestling matches. It was through these that he became well known to TV viewers. The wrestling routine started a few years back on DuMont when, out of a clear sky and without any previous experience, Dennis was assigned to cover the sweaty pachyderms.
Well, Dennis didn't know a half-nelson from a potato masher, so he bought a wrestling book by Frank Gotch, a one-time champion, and went to work. For a while he did a straight grip-by-grip description but after a while he started kidding the matches and the wrestlers.
During a seemingly painful grip he'd provide a sound effect that sounded like the cracking of a gigantic peanut shell, or else do his commentary in doggerel or bawl the daylights out of one of the wrestlers for foul tactics.
Rhyming Comment Enchanted Fans
Before long, Dennis' techniques caught on big. People tuned in just to hear him kid the grunt-and groan exhibitions, and to catch his home-made verse, which frequently told viewers what to expect. Once, for example, after two wrestlers had "thrown" each other out of the ring. Dennis rhymed:
"In the ring they'll soon be back
"And then two heads you'll hear crack.
Sure enough, after the two men hauled themselves back into opposite ring corners (with much groaning and feigning of agony) they lowered their heads, bull-fashion, pawed the resin, bellowed and tore towards each other, heads foremost. After the collision both were counted out and the wrestling fans ordained Dennis as a soothsayer. He himself took a less serious viewpoint. "After a while, you just got to know what the next move was going to be," he explains, "so it gave you chance to ad lib about it."
One ad lib proved dangerous though. Happened when a "villain” (wrestlers are generally grouped as "heroes" and "villains") named Tarzan Hewitt objected to a rhyme Dennis made up about him. Hewitt has more than his share of bay-window and when during a match Dennis observed, "Look at the suet on Mister Hewitt,” Tarzan stalked over and threatened Dennis with every hold he knew.
Dennis thought he was kidding until Hewitt grabbed him later on in his dressing room, put hammerlock on him and said, applying the pressure none too gently, "Next time you mention suet, I’ll break the arm."
Hewitt wasn't the only wrestler who objected to being ribbed. Another, a hulk named George Lenihan, once lumbered cut of the ring, walked over to Dennis, lifted him up bodily, held him up in the air, grunting the while, and thee tossed him into the audience, five or six rows back. The TV cameras got all the action.
About the only background Dennis James ever had for his career as an m.c. and announcer was his ability to talk, first demonstrated in a Jersey City, N. J., high school and later at St. Peter's College. He was a champion debater and an outstanding student in elocution. Even today, at the drop of a diploma, he’ll recite the long, sad narrative poem called "Over the Hill to the Poorhouse." His recitation of that tear jerker won him a prize in high school.
In those days Dennis used his real name, which is Demi James Sposa. He dropped the Demi because his friends insisted on changing it to Dummy just about the same time he decided to forego a medical career for radio. He got job as an announcer on a Jersey City station and broke into the big time, on WNEW, New York, after he’d fluffed a commercial.
Instead of saying "I want to talk to you," Dennis said, "I want to chalk to you" and immediately covered it up by ad libbing his entire commercial around the word “chalk." His feat so impressed Bernice Judis, the head of WNEW (she helped launch the careers of Dinah Shore and Frank Sinatra, among others), that she hired him for her own staff.
Dennis got into TV through his brother Lou, who now directs Dennis's own shows. Lou worked for DuMont when it was operating W2XWV, the forerunner of WABD, the present DuMont station in New York. Dennis did every kind of show, from sports to vaudeville and eventually joined the DuMont staff.
Dennis's most hair-raising wrestling experience was provided by Gino Garibaldi, who is known for his spectacular dives in and out of the ring. He casually informed Dennis, one night, that he was going to dive into him and then, equally casually, added, “Don’t worry, though, Dennis . . . my skin is like velvet."
Sure enough, that night Gino took his dive toward Dennis and while he barely grazed Dennis's chest, he knocked Dennis to the floor, splintered his chair into smithereens and terrified everyone sitting near by. Then, to show that there were no hard feelings, Gino commented as he sauntered back toward the ring, "See, Dennis, didn't I tell you my skin was like velvet?" Dennis, still busy pulling himself together, barely managed to nod confirmation.

James continued to keep busy into the ‘70s, and landed a plumb job—host of The New Price is Right. If he had been picked for the CBS version he likely would have achieved legendary status as the show rolled on and on, year after year. Instead, it went to Bob Barker. James simultaneously hosted a syndicated nighttime version for a number of years. James was unflappable and kept each show moving nicely. He showed a sense of humour and affability. The Los Angeles Times profiled him in its issue of September 21, 1972.

DENNIS JAMES’ CAREER
Star in a Crowded Arena
BY DON PAGE
Times Staff Writer
In the crowded game show field, Dennis James leads in gamesmanship. At one juncture in his 32-year television career (which includes early experimental programs), he starred in 13 nationally televised shows every week—a variety of games such as High Finance, Chance of a Lifetime, Stop the Music, Can You Top This, Name's the Same, Two for the Money and First Impressions. About the only thing he didn't appear on was the sermonette.
Dennis James also is one those charismatic commercial announcers with whom you identify certain products. When you think of Kellogg's breakfast cereal, you immediately picture James giving the casual pitch and ending it with his "OK?-OK!" tag line.
And he was closely identified with a leading cigaret for years, an account worth an annual salary of $350,000, which he unflinchingly gave up (along with smoking) when the surgeon general’s report was made public. In the commercial he was supposed to say, "We're tobacco men, not medicine men." "I couldn't do it with a conscience," he says.
After a long lucrative career in the game-emcee arena, Dennis James suddenly found himself phased out along with a number of his veteran colleagues. In recent times he's been doing a lot of independent, spot commercials and playing golf almost daily. The golf alleviated the boredom somewhat, but did not diminish the nervous drive to get back on the network in his familiar role.
"The networks were looking for hosts under 30," James said, sipping a drink at Lakeside Golf Club. "They'd say, 'Yes, you're perfect for the job, but we need a new face.' The trouble was, these young announcers had no place to be schooled and they gradually fizzled out."
Series Revivals
Goodson-Todman Productions this season revived one, of the most prosperous of all network game shows, giving it the new title The New Price Is Right and bringing back sort of a new, slimmed down and remarkably younger-looking Dennis James ("diet, diet and plenty of golf and sunshine").
Why the revival of these old series (I've Got a Secret is back, too)?
"Because they were great shows to begin with," Dennis said. "And with the prime-time access rule, sponsors and networks want to go with the tried and true." (James hosts the syndicated nighttime version of The New Price Is Right on Mondays at 7:30 over Channel 4, while Bob Barker emcees the daytime counterpart on CBS.)
In The New Price Is Right, he explains, the prizes are bigger and better—boats, cars and trips around the world.
Dennis James, one of TV's most identifiable personalities for more than 20 years, had to experience an incredible identity crisis before his face first showed up on kinescopes.
Born Demie J. Sposa in Jersey City, he was told to change his name when he first appeared on variety shows in the late 30s. "It sounds too Italian," he was told by one producer. "Frank Sinatra was working with me at the time," Dennis said, "but he was a star and no one asked him to change his name."
Name Mixup
James complied and upon securing his birth certificate, learned that through a mixup he was officially registered as "Theresa Sposa" (his mother's name). "That wasn't the worst of it. The certificate listed the doctor as Demie J. Sposa, MD. (Over at Lakeside, "Theresa" Sposa hits the ball 230 yards.)
As Dennis James, he bounced colorfully onto the small screen during the birth of the 50s as a sportscaster doing wrestling out of New York's musty Sunnyside Gardens. He described the melodramatic acts of early TV favorites such as Gino Garabaldi, Gorgeous George, Gene (Mr. America) Standlee and Sandor Szabo. He shaded his approach toward the female audience ("they controlled the one-TV set homes in those days") and introduced his Damon Runyon-ish ringside characters to the parlor fans, such as, "Hatpin" Mary (she stuck the wrestlers where it hurt) and "Heckleberry" Finn.
Boxing Announcer
By the mid-50s, James was the announcer for the Wednesday night fights when boxing dominated the ratings as America's most popular prime-time sport event. He still appealed to the female viewer, believing that explaining the obvious in a sports event was an "insult to the male viewer." Whenever he was pressed into the intricacies of sports parlance, he would direct his commentary to "Mother." This phrase led to another of his network game series, OK, Mother. When you're hot, you're hot.
It is interesting to note that two of Dennis James' simple ad libs ("OK" and "Mother") netted him a half-million dollars in network salary.
Before 1960, James had been named sports announcer of the year three times and personality of the year on four occasions.
"I've never been off the air in some capacity a week since 1938,” he said. "I've saved my money and could retire comfortably right now, but I'm too much of a ham and my golf game isn't what it used to be."
Through the years Dennis James always seems to be on top of the game.

On one episode of Chance of a Lifetime in the mid-‘50s, during the public service message at the end, James shouted the single word “cancer” at the camera, and simply urged viewers to send in a donation to fight it. James died of cancer at age 79 in 1997.

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1 The Billboard, July 24, 1942^↩
2 Broadcasting, July 7, 1941, pg. 10^↩
3 Broadcasting, Jan. 19, 1942, pg. 39^↩
4 Daily News, July 21, 1936^↩
5 The Daily Home News, June 27, 1943, pg. 7^↩
6 Broadcasting, May 15, 1940, pg. 52^↩