The CBS Broadcast Center is a television and radio production facility located in New York City. It is CBS's main East Coast production center, much as Television City in Los Angeles is the West Coast hub.
The Broadcast Center is also the production base for the CBS Radio Network. The network's Master Control (aka Central Control) on the first floor also serves as the routing center for other programming distributed by Westwood One. The radio network's flagship station, WCBS (AM), moved into the CBS Broadcast Center in 2000, after being located for more than three decades at Black Rock, CBS's corporate headquarters at 51 West 52nd Street.
From the 1950s to 70s, another prominent CBS stage in New York was Studio 52 (now the disco-theater Studio 54) at 254 West 54th Street, around the corner from Studio 50. CBS also leased the Himan Brown studios at 221 West 26th Street (now Chelsea Studios) for several shows in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s.
History
The building in which the Broadcast Center is located formerly served as a dairy depot for Sheffield Farms. CBS, which had been using studios at Grand Central Terminal and other theaters throughout Manhattan, purchased the production center in 1952 and began using it regularly for TV in 1963. The radio network, which had been based in the old CBS corporate headquarters at 485 Madison Avenue, moved to the Broadcast Center in July 1964, while the television network's master control moved from Grand Central to the Broadcast Center in late 1964.
After a 37-year absence, broadcasting's oldest soap, Guiding Light, returned to the Broadcast Center in September 2005, after 17 years at the EUE/Screen Gems studios on the east side of Manhattan and 20 years at the CBS/Himan Brown studios on 221 West 26th Street (now Chelsea Studios). The show had been produced in studio 45 at the CBS Broadcast Center from 1965-1968 before moving to West 26th street. GL currently tapes in studios 42 and 45.
As the World Turns is now recorded at J.C. Studios in Brooklyn, the former NBC Studios, which housed defunct soap opera Another World. As a result of the move, As the World Turns acquired many of Another World's old sets, which can still be seen today.