# The origin of the name Nickelodeon (the TV network) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 21, 2013, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885 "2013-12-21T07:50:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![tvguy1979](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/58f4c7/32.png) [@tvguy1979](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tvguy1979)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/1 "2013-12-21T07:50:23Z")
If you grew up watching the kids TV channel Nickelodeon regularly, you may have had this question: What is a nickelodeon? How did they get the name Nickelodeon for a children’s channel? This comes from several early Nick executives (From the Nickelodeon oral history, “Slimed, an Oral History of Nickelodeon’s Golden Age”.) FRED SEIBERT (Creative Consultant): The biggest thing they told us was, “We keep telling everyone that we’re fun, but we’re not. What do we do?” From our perspective, we needed to start all over again. Gerry Laybourne and Debby Beece were so distressed about what Nick was that they wanted to reconsider everything from scratch, including the name of the network, which was not a name that resonated with children. No less adults. SANDY KAVANAUGH (First Director of Programming, Creator of Pinwheel): The name of the network had come from Vivian Horner wanting me to come up with a list of possibilities. Everybody was suffering over what to call it. I came up with a list and Nickelodeon was my favorite. A lot of the other names we came up with were bad. GUS HAUSER (Creator of Nickelodeon): We had an outside firm who counseled us on various names we could use. At the end of that session, I sat in the room and one of the things on the list was Nickelodeon. I said, “Let’s do Nickelodeon.” And that was it. SANDY KAVANAUGH: I wasn’t thrilled with “Nickelodeon.” It was whimsical sounding, though. It had a fun lilt. Then it went to somebody higher up who said okay. I think I’m the person who came up with the name. GUS HAUSER: That’s how things happen. Could have picked something else. Somebody had to make that decision. Everybody’s taking responsibility now. MIKE KLINGHOFFER (Vice President of Production): It was all very thrilling because at one point when Nickelodeon was really at a crossroads, the whole thing was like, “All right: Are we going to change the name? Nickelodeon is a lousy name, this means nothing to children. Can we get this name to mean anything to children?” I mean, no one knows what a nickelodeon is. BOB KLEIN (Original Brand Identity): The biggest issue we had to face at the beginning was what to call it. I said, “There isn’t a kid watching it who knows what a nickelodeon is. Why should we call it that?” #nickelodeon ---
**Author:** ![ataraxy22](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ataraxy22/32/307_2.png) [@ataraxy22](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ataraxy22)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/2 "2013-12-21T08:22:11Z")
Can’t add too much to this other than to say that there is a plaque in downtown Pittsburgh on the street corner where the word Nickelodeon was coined (or was, I last saw it in the mid-1980s). ---
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/3 "2013-12-21T09:12:19Z")
I assumed it was an old-fashioned slot machine, brassy and gilty, with bright lights, stuck in the corner of an old-fashioned drugstore, where all the kids would come around, and lay their money on the ground; doling out random crap. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/4 "2013-12-21T11:19:03Z")
A nickelodeon is a player piano. The tune I associate with merry go rounds has words: “put another nickel in the jukebox nickelodeon.” ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 11:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/5 "2013-12-21T11:30:34Z")
I always thought it was named for the early [movie theaters](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nickelodeon_(movie_theater)). ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/6 "2013-12-21T12:23:09Z")
> [@madmonk28](#): > > A nickelodeon is a player piano. The tune I associate with merry go rounds has words: “put another nickel in the jukebox nickelodeon.” “Put another nickel in, in the [Nickelodeon](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gUNZAmFfKA), all I want is having you and music, music, music.” ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/7 "2013-12-21T13:43:09Z")
> [@tvguy1979](#): > > MIKE KLINGHOFFER (Vice President of Production): It was all very thrilling because at one point when Nickelodeon was really at a crossroads, the whole thing was like, “All right: Are we going to change the name? Nickelodeon is a lousy name, this means nothing to children. Can we get this name to mean anything to children?” I mean, no one knows what a nickelodeon is. > > BOB KLEIN (Original Brand Identity): The biggest issue we had to face at the beginning was what to call it. I said, “There isn’t a kid watching it who knows what a nickelodeon is. Why should we call it that?” Gee, wouldn’t it be a real bitch if kids were, like, you know, motivated to actually look something up in the dictionary? :dubious: :rolleyes: :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Hermione](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/cdc98d/32.png) [@Hermione](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/8 "2013-12-21T13:56:35Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > “Put another nickel in, in the [Nickelodeon](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gUNZAmFfKA), all I want is having you and music, music, music.” In the early days of Nick (the REALLY early ones, in the early eighties) they used to have bumpers featuring a mime, which played [an instrumental of that song.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOHA9pSJQTM) (I leafed through that _Slimed!_ book, and was kind of disappointed that they didn’t make much mention of those really early days. I used to love Hocus Focus and Pinwheel–which was probably where I got my love for all kinds of animation and British/European cartoons. Also where I fell in love with Paddington Bear. I also loved Video Comics, where I first heard the Green Lantern oath.) ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/9 "2013-12-21T14:42:37Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > “Put another nickel in, in the [Nickelodeon](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gUNZAmFfKA), all I want is having you and music, music, music.” Exactly. The nickelodeon was the earliest form of movie theater. Each had rows of kinetoscope machines which had a series of cards. For a nickel, you turned a crank and the cards were flipped – like a flip card – and it gives the illusion of movement. Movies ran for a minute or two. Technically, it was the theater that was the nickelodeon, but the word took on other movies. The song “Music, Music, Music” is referring to a jukebox, even though it uses the term “nickelodon”; by the time the song was written, the nickelodeon as movie theater was long gone. ---
**Author:** ![qubed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f07891/32.png) [@qubed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/qubed)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/10 "2013-12-21T15:40:33Z")
As a kid that grew up during Nickelodeon’s golden era, I had no idea what a Nickelodeon was. It didn’t matter; I just thought it was a made-up word. It wasn’t until well into my late teens that I learned it had an actual meaning. ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/11 "2013-12-21T15:55:02Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Gee, wouldn’t it be a real bitch if kids were, like, you know, motivated to actually look something up in the dictionary? :dubious: :rolleyes: :smack: It would be a bitch to rely on the willingness of kids to look up words in the dictionary when you’re trying to attract them to your fledgling TV channel. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/12 "2013-12-21T17:12:25Z")
> [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](#): > > I always thought it was named for the early [movie theaters](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nickelodeon_(movie_theater)). That’s what I thought, too. Nickel + odeon, early five-cent movie theaters. Apparently, it does refer to a player piano or jukebox, too, though. I did not know that. The movie theatre meaning seems to be the the original one. ---
**Author:** ![tvguy1979](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/58f4c7/32.png) [@tvguy1979](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tvguy1979)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/13 "2013-12-21T18:46:56Z")
Not to mention the word is hard to spell! ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/14 "2013-12-21T18:50:00Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > “Put another nickel in, in the [Nickelodeon](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gUNZAmFfKA), all I want is having you and music, music, music.” This. My parents were both born in 1913, and I remember my mother singing this little ditty. But according to her, it wasn’t actually a “movie theater,” but a machine that you’d put a nickel in, and see a short movie. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/15 "2013-12-21T19:41:56Z")
> [@qubed](#): > > As a kid that grew up during Nickelodeon’s golden era, I had no idea what a Nickelodeon was. It didn’t matter; I just thought it was a made-up word. It wasn’t until well into my late teens that I learned it had an actual meaning. I felt the same way about Bravo. Well, not really. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/16 "2013-12-21T19:44:58Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > This. My parents were both born in 1913, and I remember my mother singing this little ditty. But according to her, it wasn’t actually a “movie theater,” but a machine that you’d put a nickel in, and see a short movie. As I recall they have (or had) that kind of machine on Main Street USA in Disneyworld. Here’s some pictures of old time nickelodeons [The History of The Discovery of Cinematography - 1890 - 1894](http://www.precinemahistory.net/1890.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Penfeather](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penfeather/32/384_2.png) [@Penfeather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Penfeather)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/17 "2013-12-21T20:00:44Z")
They really needed a porn channel called [What The Butler Saw.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutoscope) And I just found some Mutoscope reels on [Youtube.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpWzeFtWJfw) ---
**Author:** ![tvguy1979](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/58f4c7/32.png) [@tvguy1979](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tvguy1979)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/18 "2013-12-21T20:03:37Z")
Nickelodeon DID use an actual nickelodeon at one point in their promos… [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/-tBFmMkQxs8/hqdefault.jpg "Nickelodeon Promos- 1979! (by Joseph Iozzi Inc.)") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tBFmMkQxs8) ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2013, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/19 "2013-12-21T22:48:46Z")
It makes me think of the 1970s band [Sailor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailor_%28band%29) who invented, and built and played, a special, multi-keyboard musical instrument (it took two people to play it) that they called a nickelodeon: [The Old Nickelodeon Sound](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bI4DEWPqotQ). (Their first, eponymous, album was very good, but they hit big in Britain just before the punk revolution, and got swept away by it.) ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2013, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885/20 "2013-12-22T00:27:08Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > It would be a bitch to rely on the willingness of kids to look up words in the dictionary when you’re trying to attract them to your fledgling TV channel. Ignorance justified! :rolleyes: [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-origin-of-the-name-nickelodeon-the-tv-network/676885.md?page=2)