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For all you Chicago area game show fans

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beatlefreak84:
This show might have aired elsewhere as well, but I distinctly remember it in Chicago, so that's why I'm posting it.

I can remember on Saturday mornings on PBS in I think 1994-1995 (somewhere in there) a show called \"Star Challenge.\"  The show was an academic quiz bowl for prep schools (I think) and it was done in a similar format to that \"Texaco\" bowl or whatever it was called and was hosted by Mark (L.) Walberg.

Does anybody else remember this show?  If so, did it air elsewhere?  Also, do I have the info. right on when and on what channel the show aired here?  (I think, specifically, it was on WYCC-20).

Anthony

ChuckNet:

--- Quote ---This show might have aired elsewhere as well, but I distinctly remember it in Chicago, so that's why I'm posting it.
--- End quote ---

Star Challenge did indeed air elsewhere...here in NY, WLIW (Ch. 21) used to run it Tue. (I think) at 12:30 PM.

Chuck Donegan (The Illustrious \"Chuckie Baby\")

DrBear:
Seeing all of these posts about \"College Bowl\" style high school quiz shows reminds me of two in our area:

WSAW-TV in Wausau had one for several years - name unknown - and WFRV-TV in Green Bay had one in the 1960s (it was on Channel 5) called \"Five High.\" (The phrase \"High Five\" hadn't come into the language yet, obviously.)

Hmmmmm...could be a web page in all these? Maybe if I ever got off my butt and did some research.

Strikerz04:
Oddly enough, I don't remember it. (But then again, I spent that entire 94-95 season on \"lockdown\") =/

-Dave

Matt Ottinger:
What you saw was the final televised season of what's listed in the EOTVGS as \"Texaco Star National Academic Championship.\"  I don't know why the Walberg-hosted year isn't included in the book.   But yeah, you're right, it would have been very similar to the earlier ones.  They may have lost the Texaco sponsorship and tried to go on without it, but I'm not sure.

The mastermind for that operation is a fellow named Chip Beall, whom viewers know as the host of all the earlier versions.  He's actually the operator of a business called \"Questions Unlimited\", one of the first operations that would sell quiz bowl questions directly to schools for their own competitions.  He also franchised a format that was typically known as \"High School Challenge\" (described briefly in the EOTVGS listing)  which popped up here and there around the country.  (Flint, Michigan may be the last remaining market where his game is still televised.)

Beall still holds an annual national tournament, it simply isn't televised anymore.  He's even asked me to take part in hosting some of the preliminary rounds, but it falls too close to the end of our school year for me to get away.  As for the Walberg year, people who were in attendance for some of the games told me that he was spectacularly inept at handling the hard-quiz format (they got the impression he was reading the tricky material cold) and that some of the players became openly hostile with him, showing their frustration when his awkward readings would slow down the games.


--- Quote ---Hmmmmm...could be a web page in all these? Maybe if I ever got off my butt and did some research.
--- End quote ---
Might be a fine idea.  There are a couple of outdated pages of links, but nothing very complete.  As I promised in another thread, I'll be posting a list of fourteen web sites for active high school quiz TV series, but I couldn't even begin to imagine how you could come up with a definitive list of older ones.

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