The CBS Logo

The CBS Eye is one of the most recognized logos in the world. It was created in 1951 by designer William Golden, who was charged with designing a symbol for the then-new television network. Golden was inspired by old Shaker drawings of an unblinking eye, and designed a logo based on that. It is popular legend that the design was only intended to last one season; however when Golden went to design a new logo he was stopped by CBS president Frank Stanton, who reminded him that “when you’re getting bored by something it’s just getting noticed by the audience”. The symbol has persisted for over 50 years and has become CBS’ corporate symbol.

This… is CBS.

CBS’ most recognizable – and important – piece of continuity occurred every half hour, in the middle of commercial breaks. An image of the CBS Eye would appear, and an authoritative announcer would intone, “This is CBS”. Usually some emphasis or a dramatic pause would be places on the “This”. Usually this was a static image with a staff announcer, but this was not always the case: animated idents would sometimes be used, and in some cases the announcement would compliment a preceding promo (i.e., “Tuesday on CBS”). By 1988, the ident would be consistently animated, and a pre-recorded voiceover was used beginning in 1992. While this was a wonderful branding tool for the network, its primary use was far more practical. The symbol was actually used as a cue to local affiliates to switch away from the network to air local advertising or local content. Advances in technology made the ident obsolete by the mid-1990s; switching could now be more automatic and virtually seamless, while the channel DOG eliminated the need for a constant ident. Regular usage of the half-hour ident ceased by 1998, but a short ident is still available for occasional use.

Below is a selection of CBS idents used from the mid-1970s to 1988. All of these idents follow the same formula – still frames of the CBS eye, and usually the “This is CBS” voiceover, although some use the more promotional variant. We are presenting as many of these as we can in order to help identify the many staff announcers who provided live voiceover. If you can help out with this task let us know!