Jerome Kuehl (widely known as Jerry Kuehl) (1931-2018) was an American-born television producer and historian who made substantial contributions to three landmark documentary television series The Great War, The World at War, and Cold War,Jerome Kuehl 1931-2018, Taylor Downing, IAMHIST, October 2018, accessed 7 January 2022 as well as serving as a director of the production company Open Media from 1986 until his death in London in 2018.New book by Jerome Kuehl, Sebastian Cody, IAMHIST, 26 October 2021, accessed 7 January 2022
Birth and academic background Born in Milwaukee in 1931,Jerome Kuehl 1931-2018, Taylor Downing, IAMHIST, October 2018, accessed 7 January 2022 Kuehl read Philosophy and History at the Wesleyan University in ConnecticutJerome Kuehl, Juliet Gardiner, History Today, December 2018 where he developed an interest in the history of newsreels. After studying at the Sorbonne he moved to the UK in the late 1950s as a post-graduate at St Antony's College, Oxford.Jerome Kuehl 1931-2018, Taylor Downing, IAMHIST, October 2018, accessed 7 January 2022New book by Jerome Kuehl, Sebastian Cody, IAMHIST, 26 October 2021, accessed 7 January 2022Obituary, published by St Antony's College, Oxford, accessed 7 January 2022
Film and TV After tutoring at the University of Oxford and teaching intellectual and German history at Stanford UniversityThe Road to Home, Vartan Gregorian, 2003 Kuehl joined the BBC in 1963 as a historical adviser for its documentary series The Great War.The Great War--my first grown-up job in television, Jerome Kuehl, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 2002, 22:1, 5-6 His subsequent television production career was primarily in the field of film archive research.Jerome Kuehl 1931-2018, Taylor Downing, IAMHIST, October 2018, accessed 7 January 2022 Kuehl worked for the NBC European Unit in the 1960sBiographical catalogue entry held by the BFI, accessed online 7 January 2022 and wrote the documentary Chicago Blues for director Harley Cokeliss in 1970.Chicago Blues, Paul Madden, Monthly Film Bulletin, 1 January 1973 He was then to specialise in writing and producing what he called "visual history" on television. As well as his work on The Great War, The World at War and Cold War, he made significant contributions to, among many other programmes, Auschwitz: The Nazis and 'The Final Solution' and Vietnam: A Television History.New book by Jerome Kuehl, Sebastian Cody, IAMHIST, 26 October 2021, accessed 7 January 2022 The Financial Times dubbed him “Officer Commanding Archive Integrity”.Stories that lift the iron curtain, Christopher Dunkley, Financial Times, 16 September 1998 For France 3 he wrote and co-produced La Grande Aventure de la Presse Filmée (The Great Adventure of Newsreels).Biography published in "This Film Is Dangerous", Roger Smither and Catherine A. Surowiec, Indiana, 2002Too Bold for the Box Office, edited Cynthia J. Miller, Scarecrow Press, 2012
In 1982 Channel 4 began transmission of the first of three series of his programme Today's History,Channel 4 programme synopsis described as looking at "official newsfilm and discover(ing) discrepancies between the way events have been presented and accounts of what actually happened". BFI database, accessed 5 May 2022 These programmes - which ran until 1984 - were a co-production between the magazine History Today and Visnews, with Kuehl as the executive producer.Channel 4 programme synopsis Subjects featured in the first series included: Poland (with Neal Ascherson), Women (with Juliet Gardiner) and Marx (with Stuart Hall). IMDB listing, accessed 5 May 2022 Each month History Today carried a supplement in the magazine linked to the programme.History on Television, Ann Gray and Erin Bell, Routledge, 2013
Another series produced by Kuehl was his follow-up to The World At War called The World At War: Another Look, a Channel 4 series re-examining the original programmes with the benefit of a decade's hindsight. Transmitted at the end of 1983 and early 1984 - one episode a month - it features a number of academic historians and news cameramen who were responsible for filming some of the archive footage used in World At War.Listings The first episode was described in The Times as dealing “with the political, ethical and strategic pressures on cameramen covering war, and asks how much we should believe of what we are shown.”The Times, 9 December 1983
After Dark Kuehl made a considerable contribution to the British television discussion series After Dark between 1987 and 2003. As one of his responsibilities as director of the production company responsible, Open Media, he prepared a job description for potential staff. They would require, he wrote, “considerable experience of current affairs television, versatility, good humour and, above all, sympathy with and knowledge of many different viewpoints and people, not all of them sympathetic.” Jerome Kuehl 1931-2018, Taylor Downing, IAMHIST, October 2018, comment accessed 11 January 2022 The historian Taylor Downing commented:
Other work and later life He was Head of General Studies at the National Film School from 1979 to 1981 and extended his work to write about the role of the television historian, for instance in ‘History on the Public Screen’ in The Historian and Film (1976) and in the first edition of the History Workshop Journal.History on Film: T.V.History, Jerry Kuehl, History Workshop Journal, Volume 1, Issue 1, Spring 1976, Pages 127–135
In 1998 the Observer newspaper quoted Kuehl on what he called the misuse of archive film in British television:
He was a member of the consortium that bought the magazine History Today from Pearson, acting as a director from 1981.History on Television, Ann Gray and Erin Bell, Routledge, 2013, and letter from Hugh Stephenson in History Today, Volume 76, Issue 1, January 2026 In 1986 he was a co-founder of the television production company Open Media. For many years he was a Council member of IAMHIST, the organisation that publishes the Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television. In 2004 he was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award by FOCAL International, the Federation of Commercial Audiovisual Libraries.New book by Jerome Kuehl, Sebastian Cody, IAMHIST, 26 October 2021, accessed 7 January 2022
He died in London on 16 September 2018, aged 86 and is buried on the eastern side of Highgate Cemetery.
The Office Cat In his long-running column "The Office Cat", he wrote:
Juliet Gardiner said of his work: "Jerry stuck firmly to his creed of popularisation without vulgarisation. His mission (was) to make scholarly history accessible."Jerome Kuehl, Juliet Gardiner, History Today, December 2018
Publications Kuehl wrote for many historical, media and general interest publications, including
Broadcast Cineaste International Affairs International History Review The Journal of the Association of Moving Image Archivists The Journal of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts Journal of War and Culture Studies Sight & Sound TLSJerome Kuehl 1931-2018, Taylor Downing, IAMHIST, October 2018, accessed 7 January 2022New book by Jerome Kuehl, Sebastian Cody, IAMHIST, 26 October 2021, accessed 7 January 2022
References
External links Kuehl's Reels, short online lectures by Jerry Kuehl Lies About Real People, Jerry Kuehl, 1996 (later republished in Why Docudrama, edited by Alan Rosenthal, Southern Illinois University Press, 1999)