I bet you never guessed that Captain Video (mentioned in 'TV or not TV') was a real 'live' show in the 1950s.

Captain Video and His Video Rangers premiered 27 June 1949 on the DuMont Network and was the longest running science fiction show.  The show was live and was done as a continuing serial that appeared every evening from 7:00 to 7:30.  The show ended in April of 1955 (this was the year that DuMont also ended).

The show included not only inexpensive film clips and moral lessons but also capitalized upon the public fascination with science and space.

James L. Caddigan (a DuMont Vice President) created Captain Video. The show was set in the year 2254.  The show took every advantage of new technology; dissolves, superimpositions, and crude luminance effects were utilized to place Captain Video in various surroundings and allow him to travel through time and space. The scripts were written by Maurice C. Brock who was a veteran radio script writer for Dick Tracy and Gangbusters.

The lack of sustained action was the reason given by creator Caddigan for using clips from the DuMont film library. In a typical program, as the conflict subsided for a moment, Captain Video (played by Richard Coogan, who later portrayed U.S. Marshal Matt Wayne on The Californians) would turn to his Remote Tele-Carrier, or inexplicably the show would switch to Ranger Headquarters, to show the exploits of other rangers (often cowboys such as Bob Steele and Sunset Carson in Western films). These clips always involved action-oriented sequences and helped to pick up the pace of the show and as well as allow time for the production crew to change sets and set up special effects.

Other breaks between scenes were filled with Ranger Messages. While messages on other children's programs would focus on children's issues such as safely crossing the street, Ranger Messages dealt with more global issues such as freedom, the Golden Rule, and nondiscrimination. The sophistication of these messages seemed to anticipate an adult audience, but the shifts between space and Western adventures were incomprehensible to many adults. The show was most popular with children and by 1951 was carried by 24 stations and seen by 3.5 million viewers, outdrawing its nearest competitor Kukla, Fran and Ollie.

As the "Master of Science," Captain Video was a technological genius, who invented a variety of devices including the Opticon Scillometer, a long-range, X-ray machine used to see through walls; the Discatron, a portable television screen which served as an intercom; and the Radio Scillograph, a palm-sized, two-way radio. With public concerns about violence in television programming, Captain Video's weapons were never lethal but were designed to capture his opponents (a Cosmic Ray Vibrator, a static beam of electricity able to paralyze its target; an Atomic Disintegrator Rifle; and the Electronic Strait Jacket, which placed captives in invisible restraints). In testimony before Senator Estes Kefauver's subcommittee probing the connection between television violence and juvenile delinquency, Al Hodge, who had previously starred in radio's Green Hornet and became Captain Video in 1951, noted that he did not even use the word "kill" on the show.

In addition to the futuristic inventions, the plots featured sharply drawn distinctions between good and bad science. Although Captain Video, with the fifteen-year-old Video Ranger (played by Don Hastings, who later appeared in The Edge of Night and As the World Turns), battled a wide array of enemies, the most clever and persistent was the deranged scientist Dr. Pauli (originally portrayed by Bram Nossem who could not sustain the grueling live schedule and was replaced by Hal Conklin). The battles were originally earthbound with Captain Video circling the globe in his X-9 jet to thwart the plans of Dr. Pauli who joined forces with other villains, such as the evil Heng Foo Sueeng. However, in response to other newly created science fiction competitors, in 1951 Captain Video began to patrol the universe and battle aliens in the spaceship Galaxy under the auspices of the Solar Council of the Interplanetary Alliance. He encountered such notable villains as clumsy McGee, (played by Arnold Stang) an inept Martian, Norgola (played by Ernest Borgnine) who turned the sun's energy into magnetic forces, and television's first robot, Tobor ("robot" spelled backwards) played by Dave Ballard.

The audience was exceptionally involved in the show, often writing to oppose plot developments or to suggest new inventions. For example, Tobor and Dr. Pauli were destroyed when their schemes backfired; however, the opposition of the viewers was great enough to bring them back in later episodes. Young viewers were also encouraged to join the Video Rangers Club and to buy Captain Video merchandise, including helmets, toy rockets, games, and records although the show not as extensively merchandised as some of its competitors. The show was supported, however, by large sponsors such as Skippy Peanut Butter and Post Cereals. Fawcett also published six issues of Captain Video Comics in 1951. A fifteen-chapter movie serial, Captain Video, Master of the Stratosphere (released by Columbia Pictures in 1951, starring Judd Holdren and Larry Stewart), was the first attempt by Hollywood to capitalize on a television program. DuMont also attempted to build on the popularity of the show by developing The Secret Files of Captain Video, a thirty-minute, weekly adventure complete within itself which ran concurrently with the serial from September 1953 until May 1954.

However, although Captain Video was "The Guardian of the Safety of the World," he was not able to escape the economic necessities of the industry nor prevent the demise of the DuMont network. When Miles Laboratories, Inc., canceled its sponsorship of the Morgan Beatty news program, Captain Video remained as DuMont's only sponsored program between 7:00 and 8:00 P.M. Unfortunately the income was not large enough to justify the rental of the coaxial cable, and Captain Video left the air 1 April 1955, with DuMont folding that same year.