What in the World? (game show)

What in the World? is a 1951 to 1955 television quiz show hosted by Dr. Froelich Rainey in which the scholar-contestants tried to identify artifacts.[1] The objects were primarily archaeological in nature, but also consisted of fossils, ethnographic items and more.[2][3] It premiered on October 7, 1951 on CBS. The first,[4] and one of the most successful shows[5]:21 of its type, it confounded critics by running for 15 years and influenced successors such as the BBC's Animal, Vegetable, Mineral? and others.[4] The music of the opening and closing were taken from Ottorino Respighi's "Fountains of Rome" featuring the dissonant beginning of the Fontana de Tritone section. The music accompanying the beginning of each segment, with the artifact to be discussed emerging mysteriously from a cloud of smoke, was taken from a variety of sources, usually 20th century compositions such as Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring" or Debussy's "Syrinx" (solo flute).[6]

External video
What In The World?, 1952, University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology

Cast

The host, Dr. Froelich Rainey, was a museum archaeologist and director of the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania.[2][3] He was accompanied by a panel of three consisting of Dr. Carlton Coon and Dr. Cammann along with a guest star each week. The announcer and hidden voice was Barry Cassell of WCAU TV Philadelphia. [7]

Origin

The show was filmed and produced in Pennsylvania by Charles Vanda Productions and WCAU Philadelphia, with the first episode airing on October 7, 1951.[7] It ran through most of the 1950s on CBS and was picked up by educational (public) television and continued into the 1960s.[8]

Modern Offspring

In 2010, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology had multidisciplinary artist Pablo Helguera create and install a 'What in the World' interactive exhibition at the museum.[8] In addition to the exhibition the museum website offered guests a chance to participate in a modern-day form of the quiz show by featuring a picture of an object or objects and having viewers submit their guesses as to what it is through social media such as Facebook and Twitter.[8]

References
  1. Hyatt, Wesley (1997). The Encyclopedia of Daytime Television. Watson-Guptill Publications. pp. 458-459. ISBN 978-0823083152. Retrieved 22 March 2020.
  2. Halpern, Paul (2015). "On the Air". Distillations. Chemical Heritage Foundation. 1 (2): 44. Retrieved 23 March 2018.
  3. Lambert, Bruce (October 14, 1992). "Froelich Rainey, 85, A Museum Director And an Archeologist". The New York Times. Retrieved 28 August 2015.
  4. Irving, John (15 October 1992). "Obituary: Froelich Rainey". The Independent. Retrieved 28 August 2015.
  5. LaFollette, Marcel Chotkowski (2013). Science on American television : a history. Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 978-0-226-92199-0.
  6. University of Pennsylvania Museum of Art and Archeology and WCAU-TV: Archived films of six broadcasts from 1952 - 1956 at Archive.org. Retrieved 7 December 2016
  7. McKillop, J.E. ""What in the World?"". IMBD. Retrieved 28 November 2012.
  8. University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. "What in the World?". University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Retrieved 28 November 2012.
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