Hubbell Robinson was active in American broadcasting as a writer, producer, and network programming executive for over 40 years. As the CBS executive who championed the 1950s anthology drama Playhouse 90, his efforts to develop high-quality programming that he described as “mass with class” contributed to CBS’s long-lived reputation as the “Tiffany” network.

Robinson’s broadcasting career began in 1930, when he became the first head of the new radio department at the advertising agency Young and Rubicam. In the era of early commercial broadcasting, when corporate clients sought new radio programs to sponsor, many advertising agencies helped develop program genres, such as the soap opera, that encouraged habitual listening. At Young and Rubicam, Robinson created and wrote scripts for General Foods’ soap opera The Second Mrs. Burton. The program’s success was based, according to Robinson, on “four cornerstones”: simple characterizations, understandable predicaments, the centrality of the female characters, and the soap opera’s philosophical relevance.

During the late 1930s and early 1940s, Young and Rubicam became an important radio program provider, simultaneously producing The Jack Benny Show, Fred Allen’s Town Hall Tonight, and The Kate Smith Hour, among others. As did other radio executives at the agency, Robinson wrote many scripts and commercials, in addition to producing programs.

By the time Robinson joined CBS Television in 1947, his extensive background in radio programming had prepared him well for the new medium. Indeed, in his autobiography, As It Happened, then-CBS chairman William Paley referred to Robinson as “the all-around man in our programming department.” As executive vice president in charge of television programming at CBS, Robinson championed and oversaw the development of such popular programs as I Love Lucy, You’ll Never Get Rich (with Phil Silvers as Sergeant Bilko), and Gunsmoke.

However, according to Paley, “Culturally, [Robinson’s] interests were levels above many of his colleagues. . . . His special flair was for high-quality programming.” Robinson organized and championed the 90-minute dramatic anthology series, Playhouse 90, which featured serious dramas written by Paddy Chayevsky, Reginald Rose, and Rod Serling, among others. During its run from 1956 to 1961, Playhouse 90’s plays included Requiem for a Heavyweight, A Sound of Different Drummers, The Miracle Worker, and Judgment at Nuremberg. Robinson was credited with bringing serious television drama to its peak with Playhouse 90.

For Paley and others at CBS, however, the anthology drama format was a drawback: its lack of continuity from week to week did not seem to encourage regular television viewing habits. But the networks’ increasing reliance on filmed episodic programs was disparaged by many admirers of live anthology drama. Referring to critics’ concerns that network programming quality was declining, Robinson openly criticized the television industry’s “willingness to settle for drama whose synonym is pap.” Paley, on the other hand, expressed concern that, as a network executive, Robinson “may have lacked the common touch.” Still, it was Robinson’s stance that helped CBS deal with federal regulators when questions were raised about whether CBS programs served the (loosely defined) public interest.

Robinson returned to CBS briefly from 1962 to 1963 and later joined ABC as executive producer of the Stage 67 series and the on-location series Crisis! from 1966 to 1969. In the early 1960s, he was credited with helping erode stereotyping of African Americans on television by distributing a memorandum calling for producers to cast blacks in a greater variety of roles. Robinson’s contributions as a producer and programmer spanned the crucial decades of radio’s maturity and television’s early growth. As the executive responsible for the programming of both popular and innovative television programs in the 1950s, he helped CBS establish and maintain its reputation as the network with the highest ratings and best programming, a reputation that endured for several decades.