Premiering in 1976 and co-produced in Nebraska, “Anyone for Tennyson?” brought poetry to PBS audiences nationwide with classic verse and iconic performers.
Welcome to From the Archives! I’m Alexis Scargill, Media Archivist here at Nebraska Public Media. Each month, I’ll be highlighting treasures from our collection spanning more than 70 years of broadcast history in our great state.
Happy 2026! It’s a year with many significances and anniversaries, but it’s my duty as archivist to highlight one special anniversary: January 5th, 2026 marks fifty years since the premiere of Anyone for Tennyson?
Anyone for Tennyson? was our locally-produced, nationally broadcast poetry program. It was sort of a public television experiment, which is the best kind of experiment. Each episode, co-produced by Nebraska Public Media (then known as Nebraska Educational Television) and the Great Amwell Company of New York featured the First Poetry Quartet (Paul Hecht, George Backman, Jill Tanner, and Cynthia Heckman) plus a special guest. Among those guests are some familiar names… Vincent Price, William Shatner, Jack Lemmon, Ruby Dee, Nebraska’s own Henry Fonda, and many others.
You’ll recognize this guest host, prophetically participating in the episode “Poetry of Youth,” featuring–you guessed it–poetry written by youths. LeVar Burton would of course go on to host another public television show dealing with children and literacy. Reading Rainbow was ALSO co-created by Nebraska Public Media… but that’s certainly a subject worthy of its own post. Here is a baby-faced Burton reading a poem by Melinda Beck of Lake Forest, IL:
Beyond the famous faces and first-of-its-kind approach, Anyone for Tennyson? is notable for shooting on location. Walt Whitman’s poetry is performed at Gettysburg, Robert Frost on a New England farm in the fall, Shakespeare at Mary Arden’s house and Warwick Castle, and American Tribal poetry in the pueblos of New Mexico and the Black Hills of South Dakota.
Though it’s not filmed in a scenic location, I absolutely must highlight this clip of Vincent Price (and others) in episode #118, “A Poetic Feast,” performing the witches’ scene from Macbeth, for reasons that will become obvious once you hit play:
I’m a real trivia head, so I love any opportunity to pop off with a fact like “Backyard Farmer is the longest-running, locally-produced public television show in the country” (it’s true). So, for the uninitiated, here are some facts about Anyone for Tennyson?:
- It was the first poetry program broadcast nationally on PBS.
- It was Nebraska Public Media’s first major program to be produced for national distribution.
- It spanned fifty programs across three seasons.
- It presented 824 poems by 371 poets, including that prolific and enigmatic poet “Anonymous.”
Originally, I had planned a section to discuss the origins of the idiom “anyone for tennis?” (or “tennis anyone?”) that inspired the series’ title. However, my research quickly spiraled out of control when I discovered the answer is murky at best. I spent too much time researching to omit this section entirely, but I lacked the patience to untangle the proverbial Gordian knot.
What would you like to see from the archives?
I would love to hear from you! Send me your feedback at fromthearchives@nebraskapublicmedia.org. I’ll see you next month!