(From the book, "A Gift of Laughter" by Allan Sherman ©1963.  Allan Sherman died November 20, 1973.)

    There's two sides to every story, but it isn't every day that one gets to hear both sides of a seemingly unimportant story.

Here now is the tale of how the famous runner Roger Bannister came to America to appear on one program, but wound up appearing on another.

    Who's Roger Bannister?  He was the first person to run a mile in less than four-minutes.

     Have you ever heard of Allan Sherman?  Most of us know him because of his funny song parodies.  The song, "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (A Letter from Camp)" was pretty popular back in the sixties, but singing was not his first big career.

     Before his singing(?) career (if you ever heard Allan Sherman sing you know why I inserted a question mark) he was a very busy TV producer.  He, along with friend Howard Merrill, created the long-running game show I've Got a Secretway back in 1951.  They sold the concept of the program to Goodson-Todman Productions, and Sherman was given the title Associate Producer.

    (I read someplace that Philo Farnsworth appeared on I've Got a Secret with the secret "I invented television."  Unfortunately, I cannot find the source of that information.  Stay tuned.)

    Late one afternoon Sherman heard that Roger Bannister had broken the four-minute mile and wanted to get the man on his program.  He created a secret identity for the man to fly under and had his secretary make the arrangments for a guest appearance.

     Come the morning that Bannister was due to arrive at Idlewild Airport (pre-JFK) there were remote TV units from the three networks, three hundred reporters, twenty representatives from the British Information Service, the complete staff of the Amateur Athletic Union,  and at least 500 autograph seekers.

    Bannister never made it onto the show, but the fact that he had come to America to be on the show was on every news broadcast and front page in the nation.

    Now, for the other side of the story...from the book "My Wide World" by Jim McKay.  ©1973 James K. McManus.

     The year was 1954, and Jim McKay was working on 'The Morning Show" at CBS.  The host for the show was some fellow named Walter Cronkite.  [note: yes, I know who Walter Cronkite is...I was being funny!]

     One evening, one of the show's producers noticed that there was an advisory on the teletype that a man resembling Roger Bannister had boarded a BOAC flight out of London.  The ticket had been issued in another name, and the man holding the ticket denied that he was the now famous runner.

     Since there was no videotape at that time, the producers had to gamble on the fact that the man was Bannister, that his plane would arrive on time at 8:00 am, and that he would agree to an interview.

     Jim McKay accompanied his producer out to the airport to see if this was indeed Roger Bannister on the airplane.

     To quote from the book:
      At about 7:30, a round, bustling man hurried into the terminal.  He looked around at the television equipment and blanched.
     "What's this?"
     The news producer smiled proudly, "We are meeting Roger Bannister, the world's first sub-four-minute-miler.  We are going to interview him on live TV."
     The man, a television producer, was astounded and incensed.
     "You can't," he shouted, "you just can't.  How did you know he was coming, anyway?"
     The producer answered, "How did you know he was coming?"
     "Because he is the mystery guest on our show tonight, and because we are paying his way over here, and you will ruin the whole thing if you get an interview with him!"
     The man was the producer of "I've Got a Secret."

     Bannister got out of the customs area at 8:45, and McKay approached him to do the interview.  Bannister talked for the fifteen minutes that was remaining on the program.

     Later on, Bannister went to the studio to do the "Secret" program.  Things were going nicely until Roger noticed a cigarette commercial on the monitor.  When it was confirmed that the program was sponsored by a cigarette company he announced that he couldn't possibly be on a program that contained cigarette commercials and left the studio to go back to England. Since Secret was a live show, that left a few minutes to fill.

     The Morning News program became the only show where Bannister appeared.