The World According to Moyers

In 1866, Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux delivered a report about laying out Prospect Park in Brooklyn. The “great advantage which a town finds in a park,” they write, “lies in the addition to the health, strength, and morality which comes from it to its people, an advantage which is not only in itself very positive but which as certainly results in an increase of material wealth as good harvests or active commerce.” Olmstead’s spirit and sense of mission, as Roger Starr has noted, were characteristic of the reformers and moralists of his day. There is direct continuity between his view and the view of those who now make public-television programs.

Public television has its origins in a two-sided critique of its medium. On the one hand television is an immensely powerful medium, capable of reaching and influencing tens of millions of people, an avenue of communication the likes of which the world has never seen before. On the other hand, it is a dangerous medium. In commercial television, the imperative is to reach for the largest possible audience, and the easiest way to do this is to make the appeal at the level of the lowest common denominator. Standards erode rapidly, quality does not sell: and the viewing audience is thereby debased.

About the Author

Tod Lindberg

Mr. Lindberg is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and the editor of Policy Review. He is the author of The Political Teachings of Jesus.

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In 1866, Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux delivered a report about laying out Prospect Park in Brooklyn. The “great advantage which a town finds in a park,” they write, “lies in the addition to the health, strength, and morality which comes from it to its people, an advantage which is not only in itself very positive but which as certainly results in an increase of material wealth as good harvests or active commerce.” Olmstead’s spirit and sense of mission, as Roger Starr has noted, were characteristic of the reformers and moralists of his day. There is direct continuity between his view and the view of those who now make public-television programs.

Public television has its origins in a two-sided critique of its medium. On the one hand television is an immensely powerful medium, capable of reaching and influencing tens of millions of people, an avenue of communication the likes of which the world has never seen before. On the other hand, it is a dangerous medium. In commercial television, the imperative is to reach for the largest possible audience, and the easiest way to do this is to make the appeal at the level of the lowest common denominator. Standards erode rapidly, quality does not sell: and the viewing audience is thereby debased.