ABC Olympic broadcasts

History

CBS had aired both the 1960 Winter and Summer Games, the first Olympics on American television. By 1964, ABC held the Winter Games broadcast rights, secured by Roone Arledge. The program drew on production staff and host Jim McKay from ABC's Wide World of Sports; McKay had moved to ABC from CBS in 1961. In 1968, ABC broadcast both the Winter and Summer Games.

The 1964 Winter Games took place in Innsbruck, Austria. Coverage was taped and flown to the United States, all in black-and-white. Because most Winter Olympic events occurred in the morning local time, most television coverage aired the same day. A portion of the closing ceremony was televised live via the Telstar satellite, which required tracking and offered about a 15-minute transmission window between the U.S. and Europe. Everything else was videotaped and shipped via a Munich-London-New York route. ABC kept a tape of a U.S.-Romania hockey game, played the day before the opening ceremony, as a backup in case a flight was canceled; it was never needed. ABC aired 16.5 hours of coverage, mostly outside primetime.

By 1968, ABC broadcast the Olympics in full color, and satellites enabled live coverage of several events at the Winter Games in Grenoble, France. Only the opening ceremony and the ladies figure skating final were televised live via satellite; most other coverage was sent via satellite to ABC and played from tape in New York. The 1968 Winter Olympics were the first televised in color, except for a few events fed in black-and-white by French television. A highlight was Frenchman Jean-Claude Killy's sweep in men's alpine skiing. For the Summer Games in Mexico City, nearly all ABC coverage was broadcast live because of the minimal time difference and proximity between the U.S. and Mexico. A major highlight was Bob Beamon's world-record long jump, aired live in the U.S.