Joey Giardello knocks out Willie Tory in round seven at Madison Square Garden in the first televised prize boxing fight shown in colour.
The cameramen didn't know where to point their lenses — they'd never captured blood in color before. When Joey Giardello's left hook opened a cut above Willie Tory's eye in round seven at Madison Square Garden, 5,000 television sets across New York suddenly displayed crimson instead of the familiar grey they'd seen in every boxing match before. NBC had gambled $15,000 on three experimental color cameras, but the real shock came afterward: sponsors flooded the network with calls, not about the knockout, but demanding to know how red looked so vivid through glass tubes. Within two years, every major sporting event negotiated TV rights based on one question. Could it bleed in color?
March 19, 1954
72 years ago
Key Figures & Places
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