Telethon


A telethon is a televised fundraising event that lasts many hours or even days, the purpose of which is to raise money for a charitable, political or other purportedly worthy cause.
Most telethons feature heavy solicitations for pledges by masters of ceremonies or hosts, who are often local celebrities or media personalities combined with variety show style entertainment such as singers, bands and instrumentalists. In some cases, telethons feature content related to the cause being supported, such as interviews with charitable beneficiaries, tours of charity-supported projects, or pre-taped sequences. The equivalent term for a radio broadcast is a radiothon; most radiothons do not include the live entertainment.

History

United States

In 1949, Milton Berle hosted the first ever telethon, raising $1,100,000 for the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation over the course of 16 hours. The first published appearance of the word "telethon" was in the following day's newspapers.
One of the first continuing annual telethons in the United States was the United Cerebral Palsy telethon. Television executive Leonard Goldenson and his wife had a daughter with cerebral palsy, and with the help of other affected parents, launched the UCP Telethon in 1950, with early television personality Dennis James as host. He continued to host New York-based segments on the telethon through the 1980s. The telethon is now defunct, as UCP raises funds through other means, including its website. By 1955 televised telethons had become a familiar enough part of American culture to be parodied that year in the film noir Tight Spot as comic relief.
The oldest continuing annual telethon in the United States on the same channel is Green Bay, Wisconsin station WBAY-TV 's local Cerebral Palsy telethon, which helps provide financial support for equipment for Cerebral Palsy, Inc., that began broadcasting as a 22-hour event on the first weekend of March 1954. As of 2016, WBAY has presented the telethon for 62 years.
Close behind the Green Bay telethon in longevity is the WHAS Crusade for Children in Louisville, Kentucky, which was first broadcast in October 1954 on WHAS-TV and WHAS radio, six months after the first WBAY telethon. The Crusade for Children is still broadcast on the two WHAS stations despite their being owned by different entities for three decades, and it has expanded to radio and television stations in other parts of Kentucky and Indiana, as well as a live stream on the internet. The Crusade is famous for the legions of firefighters who collect money at road blocks at intersections throughout the area each May and June. The Crusade annually collects more than $5 million in donations for a variety of child-related charities and causes, and remains the most successful local telethon in the United States. The Crusade returns 100 percent of all donations to organizations in all 120 Kentucky counties and more than 50 counties in southern Indiana.
The most-broadcast telethon to date was the January 22, 2010 telethon, to aid the victims of the January 10th earthquake. It offered the possibility for viewers to text donations on cell phones, and raised a reported $58 million by the next day. This event reflects a particular relationship between humanitarianism and entertainment that has developed in response to specific historical and economic market conditions. The increasing scope of social outreach efforts conducted online and through social media platforms facilitates the performance of moral responsibility implied by the claim of the telethon's narrative and visual strategies. This fundraising project was designed according to a formulaic pattern that relies on a form of nationalist identification that can be achieved and reinforced in viewers through the functional logic of the spectatorial relationship, that of a stark divide between the viewer and the people surviving a catastrophic event, which is reproduced in the telethon's representational structure.

Examples

The Americas

United States

In the United States, telethons are held for various Charitable organizations; as of 2012, however, no national telethons currently exist. The longest-running national telethon in the United States was the Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon, which was staged for over 21 hours each Labor Day to benefit the Muscular Dystrophy Association between 1966 and 2010. Over a three-year period from 2011 to 2013, the telecast was trimmed down to six hours, then to three, and then to two hours, by this point no longer serving as a telethon in the traditional sense and effectively becoming a pre-recorded benefit concert; from 2012 to 2014, the event operated under the name MDA Show of Strength. Founder Jerry Lewis also departed the organization amid controversy at the same time these last changes were implemented. The final edition of the telethon took place in 2014, and it was announced in May of the following year that it would be discontinued. In the past, other charities such as the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, United Cerebral Palsy and the Children's Miracle Network produced telethons on a nationwide or regional basis.
Public radio and public television stations, such as those that are members of National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service, as well as independent community radio stations such as WFMU, produce annual pledge drives which are similar in format to telethons, but instead use brief breaks between regular programs to appeal for funds. On PBS member stations, the recent practice of pre-produced pledge breaks has become common. Often during pledge drives, special television programs will air which feature short segments surrounded by extensive telethon-style solicitations that may take more time in a particular hour than the programming itself.
Trinity Broadcasting Network, a religious television network, hosts non-stop, week-long, semi-annual telethons called "Praise-a-Thons". The Christian Broadcasting Network stages a modified form of a telethon thrice yearly, which runs for approximately one week, but is shown for only an hour or so each day. In its early days, CBN's telethons were of the more traditional round-the-clock form; this format ended when the Pat Robertson-founded ministry sold The Family Channel, which no longer gave it access to a round-the-clock outlet for such telethons. However, on the Sunday before the Super Bowl, CBN continues to produce a 12-hour telethon which airs on Freeform and is syndicated to various television stations; the broadcast of the program on the cable channel was a condition inserted in a 1998 deal by International Family Entertainment to sell The Family Channel to News Corporation, and remained in place after the channel's 2001 sale to The Walt Disney Company. Other religious stations and networks hold telethons as well, including West Coast Chabad Lubavitch since 1980.
For a brief time in the early 1970s, beginning in 1972, the Democratic Party even held annual telethons to help it erase a multi-million dollar debt. The telethon idea was created and promoted by John Y. Brown, Jr., the businessman who built Kentucky Fried Chicken into a worldwide chain and later became Governor of Kentucky.
Local telethons, once a common fixture in nearly every major city in the United States, are now rare but still found in a handful of cities, including Louisville, Kentucky, Buffalo, New York ; Green Bay, Wisconsin and Erie, Pennsylvania. New York City also features a telethon of sorts; the WFAN Radiothon, by virtue of its two drive time shows being simulcast on cable television, has portions covered on television. Since 2010, this has included the portion covering Boomer and Carton in the Morning on CBS Sports Network and Mike's On on Fox Sports 1/2. From 2002 to 2007, the shows in question were Imus in the Morning on MSNBC and Mike and the Mad Dog on YES; Imus revived the practice of hosting radiothons on his most recent radio broadcast homes, WABC and Fox Business Network.
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital orchestrates a series of "Radio Cares for St. Jude" radiothons on local radio stations of various formats across the United States each year.
Garden City High School in Garden City, Kansas holds annual telethons to help fund the school's broadcasting, debate and forensics teams.
On December 14, 2012, Univision introduced the first ever Spanish-language telethon in the United States, Teletón USA, which is hosted by longtime Sábado Gigante host Mario Kreutzberger, known by his stage name Don Francisco. The total donation in the first edition was $8,150,625, 16.44% more than the intended goal of $7,000,000. For its 2013 edition, the goal went up to $15,215,029 and the total donation is now $15,313,525, a $98,496 increase.

Canada

There are no annual national telethons in Canada, although as in the U.S., many local children's hospitals operate regional telethons in collaboration with Children's Miracle Network in early June. In addition, due to the proliferation of cable television piping in signals from the United States, a number of American telethons, such as the Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon, attracted donations from Canada due to being broadcast there.
Notable regional telethons include:
Since 1978, the major Chilean television networks hold an annual telethon called Teletón to raise funds to help children with developmental disabilities in Instituto de Rehabilitación Infantil centers. Mario Kreutzberger, who is the symbol of "La Teletón" in Chile, has served as the telethon's host since its inception. The telethon is an event of national unity and is proportionally, the most widely watched telethon in the world.
There is also a local telethon running, the Days for the Disabled Magellanic Children, to raise funds to help disabled children of the Magallanes and Última Esperanza provinces, in an effort led by the local Lions Club. The 2006 Days broadcast raised US$515,000.
During March 2010, a special telethon called Chile ayuda a Chile was broadcast to raise money to help those affected by a devastating earthquake that struck the southern part of central Chile on February 27 of that year. The aim was to raise $15,000,000,000 Chilean Pesos for the construction of 30 thousand emergency homes in the disaster area. In the end, that amount tripled, having been gathered over 46 billion Chilean pesos.

Honduras

Since 1987, all television networks in Honduras hold a 27-hour telethon every December to raise funds to help children with disabilities in support of "Fundación Teleton", a charity under the leadership of businessman Rafael Ferrari. Many international artists, television presenters and journalists participate in the event. TACA Airlines provides free transportation for international invitees. Local banks are open around-the-clock during the Telethon, to enable viewers to donate through their local banks.

Mexico

Like Chile and Honduras in December of every year since 1997 the Mexican television network Televisa, in conjunction with other networks, both public and private, hold a 24-hour telethon with the purpose to raise funds to help children with disabilities. The event is organized by the "Fundación Teletón".
During the transmission of the event especially in the television broadcasting many Mexican media personalities shows testimonies of children and their families who overcame their disabilities. The final act with the Telethon is a concert in the Estadio Azteca with the performance of many national and international artists and singers. Because Televisa programming also airs in the United States on Univision and border city Televisa stations, some additional contributions and pledges come from American viewers.

Brazil

The marathon broadcast under the name Teleton by SBT was conceived by Décio Goldfarb, Clovis Scripilliti and Hebe Camargo who asked the owner of SBT, Silvio Santos, to broadcast the program. The collections are passed on to "Associação de Assistência à Criança Deficiente" – Portuguese for Association for Assistance to Disabled Children.
The first edition was held in 17th an 18 May 1998, and since then, 14 rehabilitation centers, a home school and a hospital for rehabilitation operations and exams are created. Another rehabilitation center was in construction but the same was canceled due the financial crisis Brazil is suffering since 2015, also two rehabilitation centers have closed and another three were municipalized, making the total of centers down to nine.
The edition of 2019 was held on 25 and 26 October. It had a goal of R$ 30 million, and raised R$ 32 450 054 after almost 26 hours of broadcast, making a new record total. In 2018, AACD helped over 8,000 people with physical disabilities.

Haiti

"Hope for Haiti Now" was the most widely viewed telethon event in history. Though the telethon was based in the United States, it was organized as a humanitarian relief effort in response to the 2010 Haiti Earthquake.

Europe

Austria

Licht ins Dunkel is an annual telethon held in Austria to help disabled persons.

Spain

In Catalonia, public television broadcaster Televisió de Catalunya broadcasts an annual telethon for several diseases. In 2018, it raised €15,068,252 for cancer research. €197,340,632 have been collected since the first edition in 1992.

France

In France, since 1987, an annual :fr:Téléthon|Téléthon, for the muscular dystrophy charity in France, :fr:Association française contre les myopathies|L'Association française contre les myopathies, is held by France 2 on the first or second weekend in December, with the support of France 3 and France 5, and the public radio networks. Several events are organized all around France. Donations are made by telephone or at the , or on mobile web portals, as well as through SMS messaging. The 2007 edition earned €96,228,136 during the program and €102.3 million after final collection.

Ireland

In Ireland, the RTÉ People in Need Telethon was held roughly every two years in May, from 1989 to 2007, although there was no Telethon in 2003 due to Special Olympics and the sponsorship/volunteering needed, and it was moved to October 26 in 2007. During the 2004 telethon, over 4,000 fundraising events were organised by people nationwide, and proceeds were subsequently distributed to almost 760 projects in the 26 counties. Since its inception, over €35 million has been raised by the People in Need through the RTÉ People in Need Telethon, supporting a wide variety of charitable organizations nationwide. Eight telethons have been held to date and over €35 million has been distributed in grants, ranging from €150 to €50,000, to thousands of organisations throughout Ireland. Grant applications are assessed by advisory committees in each region before final approval by the Board of Directors of the Trust. Money raised in each county, stays in each county.

Italy

In Italy, since 1990, Telethon is also held by RAI in December, and in 2006 donors had raised €30,740,000 for research into cures for genetic diseases. By 2009, a total of €284,000,000 have been collected since 1990.

Netherlands

The first nationwide telethon in the Netherlands was Open Het Dorp, which was classic in format, broadcasting for 23 hours on television and radio from 26 to 27 November 1962. Funds were raised to build and open a special village/community for disabled people.
's market square in 2009, in front of its city hall
In 1984 for the first time a number of Dutch humanitarian aid organisations collaborated with a combination of broadcasters, to raise funds through a unified effort: "Eén voor Afrika". With a combination of 10 hours of television and 18 hours of radio broadcast, €44 million was raised. After another such action in 1987, the organisations decided to sign a permanent cooperation agreement as the Samenwerkende Hulporganisaties. Although the campaigns gradually moved away from classic telethons over the years, the SHO raised some €700 million in forty nationwide efforts since it started.
Starting in 2004 an annual multi-day radiothon called Serious Request is hosted by national pop music station 3FM in the week before Christmas. Three popular radio DJs are locked up for six days in a small temporary radio studio, placed in a main square of a Dutch city. Living on a juice-only fast, the DJs make an interactive, themed broadcast around the clock, to raise funds and awareness for International Red Cross initiatives. Regular programming on the station is suspended — instead 3FM and its website are completely dedicated to the event, which is also transmitted as a continuous audio and video live-stream. Additionally there is television coverage, integration with social media, and a dedicated mobile app.

All totalled the eleven editions have raised €76.8 million.
Serious Request spin-off projects have since been adopted in Belgium, Switzerland, Sweden, Kenya, South Korea, Austria, Latvia and Portugal.

United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, The ITV Telethons were three charity telethons organised and televised in the UK by the ITV network. The broadcasts took place in 1988, 1990 and 1992. Each lasted for 27 hours and all were hosted by Michael Aspel.
Regular telethons are held for charitable groups such as Comic Relief's Red Nose Day and Sport Relief, and the BBC's Children in Need. Some of these occur every year, with millions of pounds raised to support various charities. These usually include music artists, sketches, and other various sections, usually with videos in between each section or song to promote the charity that money is being raised for – usually children in either Africa or the United Kingdom.
In 2012/2013 Children in Need raised £26 million and Comic relief £75 million; a combined total of £101 million. This is the equivalent of £1.60 per head of population.
Since 2011, ITV have held their Text Santa telethon in the buildup to Christmas. The telethon lasts for three hours and is hosted by three popular ITV presenting duos, Ant & Dec, Phillip Schofield and Christine Bleakley, and Paddy McGuinness and Alesha Dixon. Each duo hosting an hour each. Text Santa supports six UK charities; these are Alzheimer's Society, The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, Marie Curie Cancer Care, Teenage Cancer Trust, Together for Short Lives and WellChild.
In 2012 and 2014 Channel 4 hosted Stand Up to Cancer. Both telethons were presented by Channel 4 faces; Davina, Alan Carr and Dr. Christian Jessen. The latter telethon also had segments hosted by The Last Leg presenters; Adam Hills, Josh Widdicombe and Alex Brooker. The 2014 telethon came live from Westminster's Methodist Central Hall.

Asia

Japan

In Japan, Nippon Television hosts its annual telethon titled 24 Hour Television: "Love Saves the Earth" during the final weekend of August, broadcast live from the Nippon Budokan arena. Started in 1978, its objective is to raise funds for various charities that aid the sick, the handicapped, victims of war and natural disasters around the world and environmental programmes. Every year, during the live broadcast, a popular television personality attempts to run a 100 km marathon for this worthy cause. Despite its title, the telethon runs for approximately 27 hours.
The 2011 telethon's funds were donated to organizations which will help rebuild the prefectures that were damaged in the 2011 Tohoku earthquake.
FNS Day is an annual telethon hosted by Fuji Television which started in 1987 and air during the final weekend of July.

Hong Kong

In Hong Kong, Tung Wah Charity Show is an annual telethon organised by Television Broadcasts Limited and is held on a Saturday or Sunday in December.

Israel

In Israel, for many years an annual telethon is held for those serving in the Israeli Defense Forces.
A telethon is called "teletrom" in Hebrew, "trom" meaning donate.
Telethons have also been held for endangered children on Israeli channel 2, the broadcast is called "Yom Tov", meaning "Good Day" in English.
Telethons in Israel usually earn high ratings, but have come under criticism for over perceived commercialism.

Singapore

In Singapore, Ren Ci Charity Show is an annual telethon organised by Mediacorp. Other charity shows in Singapore include NKF Charity Show.

Oceania

Australia

Perth
The annual Channel Seven Perth Telethon is run by the Channel 7 Telethon Trust, out of Channel 7 Perth, Western Australia and broadcast statewide through TVW7 in Perth and GWN7. Most of the major media are involved in Telethon including W.A.'s two major newspapers The Sunday Times and The West Australian as well as radio stations Mix 94.5 and 6PR. The two major beneficiaries of Telethon have always been Princess Margaret Hospital for Children and the Telethon Kids Institute. However, each year there are numerous other beneficiaries.
During the weekend of October 20 and 21, 2017, Channel 7 celebrated its 50th Telethon in Perth, raising a record A$36.4 million, which amounts to $13.94 per head of population in WA. This makes Perth's Telethon the highest fundraising Telethon in the world. Since 1968, Perth's telethon has raised over A$A$268.4 million. The annual 26 hour continuous broadcast runs on a weekend, usually in October commencing at 6.30pm Saturday until 8.30pm Sunday.
A number of international celebrities have visited Perth to appear on the Telethon, such as Michael Jackson, Celine Dion, Harry Connick, Jr., Stevie Wonder, Phyllis Diller, Bea Arthur, Sammy Davis Jr., Tina Turner, Julian Lennon, Whitney Houston, Def Leppard, Elton John and Hugh Jackman. A number of Australian television personalities and actors also fly across the country for the weekend including stars from programmes such as Sunrise, The Morning Show, 800 Words, Home and Away, The Chase Australia, House Rules and My Kitchen Rules.
Melbourne
HSV7 in Melbourne holds the Good Friday Appeal telethon, which benefits the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne on Good Friday every year. It airs across Victoria all day on Seven Network station HSV and Prime Television. It also has a print and radio component via Melbourne's Herald Sun newspaper as well as radio station Mix 101.1. In 2007, the radio partner was Southern Cross Broadcasting. The event has become an annual part of Melbourne culture, and continues to bring in record fundraising efforts across the entire state. In 2015, the appeal raised A$17.1 million.
Adelaide
in Adelaide aired Telethon broadcasts throughout the 1960s and 1970s including raising money for "The House Of Hope" a home that would be built each year for Telethon. Local television stars from all channels would visit channel 9 across the live broadcast weekend to participate in the Telethon. Musicians from interstate would also travel to Adelaide for the round-the-clock marathon broadcast. It was the only time of the year that an Adelaide television station continued to broadcast during the overnight hours.
In the 1970s, SAS10 created the Children's Medical Research Foundation and the "Channel 10 Christmas Appeal" with stars from the network flying into Adelaide for the weekend live broadcast from SAS10 studios in Gilberton. Stars participating in the broadcast included actors from the popular SAS10 programmes Number 96 and The Box. Game show host Garry Meadows was the anchor for most years. It is this event where the tune "Thank You Very Much for Your Kind Donation" originated, which would be played whenever a major donation was announced during the broadcast with members of the cast forming a conga line and dancing around the studio.
Newcastle
in Newcastle, New South Wales regularly held telethons every two years throughout the 1970s and 1980s for local charities such as children's hospitals and cancer units. However, with aggregation and the station being affiliated in the early 1990s, these went by the wayside but a few have still been held since, the last occurring in 2002.
Sydney
In Sydney, Nine Network station TCN broadcasts the Gold Week Telethon on the second Monday of June, in benefit for the Sydney Children's Hospital. Established in 2010, the telethon serves as a finale for a week of fundraising for the hospital, known as "Gold Week", which generally runs the first week of June.
Award-winning auctioneer James Pratt from McGrath Estate Agents on Sydney's Eastern suburbs was an auctioneer with the 2012 and 2013 Channel Nine Sydney Children's Hospital Gold Week telethon.
The most recent 6th telethon in 2015, is hosted by presenters of the Nine network Today show, with various network celebrities including Darryl Brohman and Miranda Tapsell manning the phone lines, the telethon also features various music performers. A total of $5.2mn was raised for the hospital, breaking expectations and creating a new record.
One-off telethons
Throughout Australia, there have been several national telethons during the 2000s. One was held to aid victims of the 2004 tsunami that hit parts of Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India, which killed over 200,000 people. This telethon was simulcast by all three commercial networks, Seven, Nine and Ten. There were other telethons around the world raising money for that event.
On February 12, 2009, the Nine Network held a special telethon to benefit the victims of the 2009 Victorian bushfires, through the Australian Red Cross. Titled Australia Unites – The Victorian Bushfire Appeal, the event was hosted by Nine Network personality Eddie McGuire, and accompanied by many celebrities, athletes and entertainers. Some of the celebrities to have appeared included Russell Crowe, Nicole Kidman, Keith Urban, Orlando Bloom, Hugh Jackman, Anthony La Paglia, Rachel Griffiths and Simon Baker. Rove McManus from rival Ten Network made a special guest appearance. The telethon raised about A$20.5 million from pledges.
On January 9, 2011, the Flood Relief Appeal: Australia Unites telethon, in response to the 2010–2011 Queensland floods, was broadcast by the Nine Network from Brisbane's Suncorp Piazza raised more than A$10 million in pledged aid.

New Zealand

Telethons were run nationwide in New Zealand from 1975 to 1979, 1981, 1983, 1985, 1988, 1990 and 1991 by TVNZ and later, TV3 in 1993 and 2009. As with the Australian telethons, the theme song, "Thank You Very Much for Your Kind Donation", was played whenever a large donation was announced.
The 24-hour fundraiser would take place in regions around New Zealand with TVNZ coverage being shown on TV1. Viewers would be shown coverage of the telethon nearest to their location. Smaller regions would typically see coverage of the telethon in one of the main centres. The 1975 telethon was hosted by the then NZBC studios of the four main centres, though only broadcast in Auckland and Christchurch as TV2 was yet to be transmitted in other centers. But after the first telethon, the rest were hosted in large exhibition halls and indoor stadiums as the public soon arrived by the thousands to be seen on television and to watch the entertainment live. International guests from TV shows popular in New Zealand at the time made appearances, including Basil Brush, Bill Oddie, Kamahl and Kenny Everett in 1981; Sorrell Booke, Bruce Weitz, Victoria Nichols, Alan Dale, and Michael Bentine in 1985; and Leeza Gibbons and Christopher Quinten in 1988.
After the first telethon in 1975, broadcast within a week of new channel TV2's launch, and which raised over $585,000 for St. John Ambulance, each telethon outdid the previous total for several years, peaking in 1985 with over $6 million, and a mere one month later TVNZ participated in the LiveAid global telethon bringing in $1.8 million for New Zealand's contribution. The largest undertaking including smaller regional centres with host locations was 1988. However the economic climate at the time saw money raised drop in 1988 and 1990 while hosting costs soared.
In 1991, an emergency fundraising 16-hour telethon was hurriedly arranged after a devastating cyclone flattened most of Western Samoa. The total raised was just over $1.5 million with the Government of New Zealand matching the dollar amount, bringing the total to just over $3 million.
The last nationwide event was to raise funds for the Starship Children's Hospital in 1993, TV 3 being the host. Events focussed on the main venue at TV3's Auckland studios, with roving crews reporting from around the country. The event raised just over $3.5 million.
Since Telethon ceased on nationwide New Zealand Television, some regional stations have operated their own local telethons to fund local facilities and other organizations.
TV3 broadcast a 23-hour telethon to support KidsCan, which aired on August 8 and 9, 2009. The event raised $1,944,225.

Worldwide

For nine years, Armenia Fund held an annual international telethon that was broadcast to all major U.S. cities and across the globe. The 12-hour live program is able to raise millions for humanitarian and infrastructure development programs in Armenia and Karabakh. The annual telethon is held on Thanksgiving every year. During Armenia Fund's 10th International Telethon, held on November 22, 2007, the event raised a record breaking $15.3 million. The program aired from the Hollywood studios of Los Angeles television station KCET and was broadcast in the United States, as well as internationally.
The 2004 Asian tsunami also led to telethons being held in countries such as Canada, United States and Australia.
In 2014, TWiT.tv held an online telethon entitled "24 Hours of 2015" celebrating New Year in every time zone to raise money for UNICEF. Founder and host Leo Laporte streamed live for much of the 24 hours raising over $58,000.

Other types

Similar to telethons, but considerably shorter, are nationally televised benefit concerts following major disasters such as the September 11, 2001 terror attacks, the Indian Ocean tsunami, Hurricane Katrina and the 2010 Haiti earthquake. These are generally three-time broadcasts meant to spur immediate humanitarian contributions, not part of the annual donation drives of the charities involved. Typically a phone number or website will appear on screen during the entire concert for donors to make pledges, though there may not necessarily be a live host announcing.