GBH Openvault

This collection presents the first 31 years of cooking programs produced and broadcast by WGBH beginning with The French Chef in 1962 up until 1993. WGBH was an early adaptor of cooking programs, which fit neatly into the category of "instructional television". The first local cooking program was proposed by Julia Child in 1962 who suggested The French Chef to WGBH management. That program became a runaway hit and was quickly expanded from local to national broadcast and spawned numerous successors.

Joyce Chen Cooks was the next cooking show which was produced starting in 1966. From 1966-1975, WGBH produced Theonie on Greek Island Cooking, The Romagnolis’ Table, and Beatrice Trum Hunter’s Natural Foods which featured short inter-program segments. From 1978-1980, Julia Child "returned" to public television with Julia Child and Company, and Julia Child and More Company. The next Julia Child series, Dinner at Julia’s aired from 1983-1984. In addition, WGBH produced several one-off specials, such as Joyce Chen’s China, Theonie’s Greek Easter and Holiday Entertaining with Martha Stewart. The last WGBH series to air during this early period was Cooks Tour in 1993. Like The French Chef, all these programs first aired locally and then were distributed nationally on public television.

Over 100 episodes of The French Chef can be seen on the official Julia Child on PBS YouTube channel. Dinner at Julia’s can be seen as part of the PBS Living channel on Amazon Prime. Most other programs in this collection can be viewed at the links below.