The Tonight Show is a  late-night talk show that has aired on NBC-TV since 1954. It is the longest currently running regularly scheduled entertainment program in the United States, and the third longest-running show on NBC, after Meet the Press and Today. The first host of  the show was Steve Allen(above). Allen departed Tonight after NBC ordered him to concentrate all his efforts on his Sunday night variety program,The Steve Allen Show, hoping to combat CBS-TV and The Ed Sullivan Show’s dominance of the Sunday night ratings. Below is a clip from the first Tonight Show that aired on Monday night, September 27, 1954.