From Soupy to Nuts! A History of Detroit Television

Back in the 1940s--before coaxial cable from the East Coast reached Detroit--television was as local as Vernors, Sanders Hot Fudge and Hudson's. There was room for clowns, bowlers, philosophers, journalists, adventurers, movie mavens, wrestlers and magicians.

The people who put these shows on were drunks, geniuses, thugs, heroes, artists, craftsmen, hustlers, and poets. Some were all of these things at times. A few were all these things before lunch.

As the medium grew, thousands of Detroiters visited Channel 4 to see Milky the Clown, danced on Channel 62's The Scene or tuned in to watch bombastic anchorman Bill Bonds. With the evaporation of distinct local television, a piece of Detroit's character disappeared.

From Soupy to Nuts! is a snapshot of Detroit TV history--from Sonny Eliot, Bozo the Clown, Bill Kennedy, Lou Gordon and Gil Maddox to Al Ackerman, Sir Graves Ghastly, Dick the Bruiser and Mr. Belvedere.

Tim Kiska covered the television industry for The Detroit News between 1990 and 2002. A native Detroiter, he worked at the Detroit Free Press between 1970 and 1987, where he covered courts, the automotive industry and held various other reporting assignments. He joined The Detroit News in 1987. Kiska completed work on a Ph.d in history at Wayne State University in 2003 and currently teaches journalism at the University of Michigan-Dearborn and producer at WWJ News Radio 950.