Socolow speaks about history of global sports broadcasting on NPR’s ‘Only a Game’
Michael Socolow, an associate professor of communication and journalism at the University of Maine, was a recent guest on NPR’s “Only a Game.” In the report, “Nazis pioneered broadcasting… and made Jesse Owens a star,” Socolow said today’s sports broadcasters owe a nod to an otherwise dark chapter in world history. “Global sports broadcasting, as we understand it today, was really pioneered by the Nazi regime at the Berlin Olympics in 1936,” he said. The Berlin Olympics were the first to be televised, in a way, according to the report. Spectators could watch from special viewing rooms around Berlin. Socolow, who has a book coming out this fall called “Six Minutes in Berlin: Broadcast Spectacle and Rowing Gold at the Nazi Olympics,” said the International Olympic Committee needs to be more honest about its history. “And especially something like broadcasting and worldwide broadcasting — that entire conception was pioneered by those Nazi engineers, by the German engineers. Yes, it’s embarrassing, but it’s also history,” he said.