Paley Center For Media (formerly Museum Of Television & Radio)

The Museum of Television & Radio's Mission is to collect, preserve, and interpret television, radio and Internet programming and to make these programs available to the public. The Museum has an international collection of over 100,000 programs covering more than seventy-five years of television and radio history including news, public affairs programs and documentaries, performing arts programs, children's programming, sports, comedy and variety shows, and commercial advertising. The collection, chosen for its artistic, cultural, and historical significance, is catalogued in a computerized library that is easily accessible to the public. Each year the Museum, using radio and television programs from the collection, organizes major screening and listening series, festivals, seminars, and education classes that focus on topics of social, historical, popular, or artistic interest, so make sure to visit their website for up-to-date information.

You may visit the Museum and either attend daily public screenings and radio presentations, or listen privately to programs from their vast collection:

Daily Screenings and Radio Presentations
From noon until closing time, the Museum presents a wide variety of programs from the collection in two screening rooms and two main theaters. Pick up a copy of the daily schedule at the front desk in the John E. Fetzer Lobby to see what's playing.
Also available in the lobby are complete schedules for exhibitions and screening series that have been organized by the Curatorial Department. Programming from current series and exhibitions is shown throughout the day, and the schedule will tell you what's ahead in the coming months.
The Ralph Guild Radio Listening Room (fifth floor), with its five preprogrammed listening series, offers a unique way for visitors to experience the radio collection. The Museum also offers live and taped radio broadcasts throughout the year, where stations from across the country come to the Ralph Guild Radio Studio to broadcast their shows. These events are usually open to the public.


Choosing a Program from the Collection
Access to information on the Museum's vast collection is literally at your fingertips in the Library. (You must make a reservation to use the Library at the lobby front desk when you arrive.)
Using a Macintosh computer, you search the database for the television or radio program of your choice. A Visitor Services staff person will be glad to assist you at any time!
When you find a program you want, you reserve it and then go to a console room, where you watch or listen to the program at a monitor with headphones.

The Museum has a slew of facilities, all available to the public: designated Scholars' Rooms for research utilizing the collection; Listening Rooms for radio programming where visitors select from series developed by the Museum; Radio Studios, which enable radio stations to broadcast from the Museum; galleries for exhibits relating to television and radio; and a Museum shop, offering a wide selection of gifts and books.