‘Moments’ for CBS’ 75 years on air

It’s turning out to be a year for gala network celebrations. ABC last March celebrated its 50th anniversary. Now CBS is starting the celebration of its 75th anniversary with nightly highlights from those many years of television and radio.

The network this week and throughout the month will air classic moments from the decades, featuring scenes from news, prime-time series, sports, late night, daytime shows and children’s programming.

Included in the “CBS at 75 Moments” -- to be shown each night between 8 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. -- will be Walter Cronkite’s live 1969 commentary of the historic moon landing of Apollo 11; Cicely Tyson drinking from a water fountain in her award-winning role in the civil rights movie “The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman”; and a scene from the 1983 finale of “MASH,” which was seen by what was, at the time, the largest audience ever to view a single television program.

Each 30-second vignette will be introduced by a celebrity “member of the CBS family.”

“There will be a lot of ‘must-have’ moments, and then there will be some that people will have forgotten,” said Jim McKairnes, CBS’ vice president of network planning and scheduling. He said the project is similar to the “Bicentennial Minutes” CBS aired during the nation’s 200th birthday in 1976.

The anniversary will conclude next month with a gala live TV event to be broadcast from New York that will feature numerous CBS personalities from the past and present.

-- Greg Braxton