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Town Hall Party' was among the first of the country music shows to be seen on U. S. television, making its debut in early1952 and running until early 1961. Staged every Saturday in a theatre in Compton, a suburb of Los Angeles, the stagewas made up to look like an old barn, thus continuing the traditions of the various live shows that were first heard on theradio airwaves three decades earlier.

Although Nashville was fast establishing itself as the commercial home of country music, the West Coast had a vast,ready audience for such a show. The area had first became the new home for the Dust Bowl migrants of the 1930s and,a few years later during the war years, a further influx was made up of workers seeking jobs in the munitions anddefence plants. These were all people who loved country music and, consequently, a brand new country scene wasborn with its own sound, artists, clubs, record labels, radio shows and, in due course, television programmes.

'Town Hall Party' was created with its own cast of regular performers and musicians, boasting a house that was virtuallya 'who's who' of the West Coast scene comprising such as such as Joe Maphis,
Merle Travis, Skeets McDonald, JohnnyBond and Tommy Duncan. Jay Stewart (who later hosted the TV quiz show 'Let's Make a Deal'), and Tex Ritter were theMCs. The weekly show presented an equally impressive guest list, attracted both by the show's tremendous popularitybut also by the fact that fledgling television was becoming a vitally important media for exposing their talents to brandnew audiences. Among the many guests to appear included Johnny Cash, Patsy Cline, Eddie Cochran, The CollinsKids, Freddie Hart, Wanda Jackson, George Jones, Merle Lindsay, Bob Luman, Carl Perkins, Jim Reeves, MartyRobbins, Hank Snow and Gene Vincent.
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