Meet the Press premiered on television on the Na- tional Broadcasting Company (NBC) on November 6, 1947. This exceptionally successful program was the first to bring Washington politics into American living rooms. It also was a pioneer in color TV. In 1954 it aired in color as a “test” program. Since NBC was ahead in the development of color technology, that test was likely the first color telecast by any network; six years later, Meet the Press became the first NBC program to air regularly in color.

Lawrence E. Spivak first debuted Meet the Press as a 1947 radio program to promote his magazine American Mercury. After Meet the Press moved to television, Spivak continued to serve as producer, regular panelist, and later moderator. He retired from the series in November 1975.

Meet the Press originally aired in a 30-minute, live press conference format, with a panel of newspaper journalists interviewing a political news maker. On September 20, 1992, Meet the Press expanded to a one-hour interview program. According to Kathleen Hall Jamieson, interview programs are successful because neither the follow-up by the reporter nor the length of the candidates’ answers is artificially constrained. Meet the Press’s contemporary format consists of two or three interview segments with guests of national and international importance followed by a roundtable discussion. Interviews are conducted in the studio, on location, or via satellite. (In fact, on September 19, 1965, Meet the Press became the first network television to broadcast a live satellite interview.) In the present-day version, two or three journalists join host Tim Russert during the initial questioning periods and the roundtable discussion.

Russert joined Meet the Press as moderator on December 8, 1991. He came to the program with a thor- ough understanding of Capitol Hill politics, having previously served as counselor to New York Governor Mario Cuomo and as special counsel and chief of staff to U.S. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan. He also is well aware of how journalists cover politics. He has served as senior vice president and Washington, D.C., bureau chief for NBC since December 1988. He also serves as a contributing anchor for MSNBC and as a political analyst for the NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw and for the Today show.

According to a former NBC producer, “Tim has an enormous amount of power right now to make and influence [government] policy on Meet the Press.” On Meet the Press, questions are asked of political personalities in hopes of moving the political process forward or, at least, moving it along. Russert has interviewed almost every major political figure of the 1990s and the early 21st century. As of 2002, Bob Dole had been the most frequent guest on Meet the Press, with 56 appearances over his career as a congressman, senator, Republican National Committee chair, vice presidential candidate, and presidential nominee. Although a topic of frequent discussion on the program, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has never appeared on or accepted an interview for Meet the Press.

Meet the Press emerged early on as a leading program for providing political accountability. In fact, President John F. Kennedy was fond of calling it the “51st state.” Meet the Press has become the most quoted news program in the world. When the show premiered, it aired on Wednesday nights after 10 P.M. Later, it was moved to Monday, then to Saturday. In the mid-1960s, Meet the Press found its niche as a day- time Sunday program. In 2002 it aired via network feed on Sundays from 9 to 10 A.M. The national audience has grown more than 40 percent, making it the most-watched Sunday morning interview program in 2002.

The 2002 executive producer of Meet the Press is Nancy Nathan, with Betsy Fischer serving as the show’s senior producer. The program originates from Washington, D.C., but the show travels when world events become major news. Sites have included the Republican and Democratic national conventions, the 1993 Bill Clinton–Boris Yeltsin summit in Vancouver, the 1990 Helsinki summit, the 1989 United States– Soviet summit on the island of Malta, and the 1989 economic summit of industrialized nations in Paris.

Whether in Washington, D.C., or on location at an event of political importance, the discussions aired on Meet the Press often generate headlines in other media outlets. Today, Meet the Press continues to engage viewers in the political process.