This paper deals with a little known episode of the history of European televisions: its early Americanization, from the fifties to the seventies. It reveals how the big public service monopolistic organizations were more open to foreign, commercial influence than is usually stated. In public, most professionals and heads of television rejected America and referred to the BBC as their model. From the fifties on, some producers went to America and came back with game shows and light entertainment formats which they adapted, often changing the original formula. In the seventies, the news format was Americanized everywhere, including in France. It was organized around the fiture of the anchorman as a star, launching reports signed by reporters. This early and partial professional Americanization went largely unnoticed. But it paved the way for the much stronger political and professional Americanization of the eighties.