Jim Benson's Biography

Although he started out in radio as a young man, for the past twenty years, Jim Benson has been one of the nation's most prominent television historians. A prolific writer and researcher on the subject of classic television, Mr. Benson's work can be found in dozens of publications, including Emmy Magazine, TV Guide, The Twilight Zone Magazine, and Television Chronicles. Jim has also contributed his unique expertise to a wide variety of television programs, including productions for TV Land, Nick at Nite, CBS Entertainment, and The Mystery Channel. In 1997, Jim began his largest classic TV endeavor, co-authoring Rod Serling's Night Gallery: An After-Hours Tour (hailed as one of the finest books ever written about a television series) and later served as creative consultant on the Night Gallery documentary, The Art of Darkness.

Two decades have passed since Jim Benson took a detour into the realm of television, so it's a bit ironic that he's back in radio hosting a show about classic television entitled, TV Time Machine and The Story Behind the Screen. Armed with a wealth of video knowledge, Jim has conducted hundreds of interviews over the past several years with many of the finest stars and behind-the-scenes artists from the golden and silver age of television, including:

John Astin (The Addams Family), Alan Young (Mr. Ed), Pat Boone, Leslie Nielsen (Police Squad! The Naked Gun), Leonard Nimoy, Jayne Meadows, director Jay Sandrich (The Mary Tyler Moore Show), director Sydney Pollack (Out of Africa, Tootsie), Tom Bosley (Happy Days), producer/writer Leonard B. Stern (The Honeymooners, Get Smart), director Jeannot Szwarc (Somewhere in Time), Lindsay Wagner (The Bionic Woman), John Saxon (Enter The Dragon, The Bold Ones), Noel Neill (The Adventures of Superman), Robert Clary (Hogan's Heroes), Ruth Buzzi and Arte Johnson (Laugh-In), director Richard L. Bare (Green Acres), Carol Serling (Mrs. Rod Serling), Phyllis Diller, Michele Lee (Knots Landing), Richard Thomas (The Waltons), and Gary Owens (Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In), just to name a few.