Emmy Award - Emmy Statuette

Emmy Statuette

The Emmy statuette, depicting a winged woman holding an atom, was designed by television engineer Louis McManus, who used his wife as the model. The TV Academy rejected a total of forty-seven proposals before settling on McManus' design in 1948. The statuette "has since become the symbol of the TV Academy's goal of supporting and uplifting the art and science of television: The wings represent the muse of art; the atom the electron of science."

When deciding a name for the award, Academy founder Syd Cassyd originally suggested "Ike", the nickname for the television iconoscope tube. However, "Ike" was also the popular nickname of World War II hero and future U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and therefore Academy members wanted something more unique. Finally, television engineer and the third academy president, Harry Lubcke, suggested the name "Immy", a term commonly used for the image orthicon tube used in the early cameras. After "Immy" was chosen, it was later feminized to Emmy to match their female statuette.

Each Primetime Emmy statuette weighs six pounds, twelve-and-a-half ounces (3.08 kg), and is made of copper, nickel, silver and gold. The statue stands 15.5 inches (39 cm) tall with a base diameter of 7.5 inches (19 cm) and weight of 88 oz (2.5 kg). The Regional Emmy Award statuette is 11.5 inches (29 cm) tall with a base diameter of 5.5 inches (14 cm) and weight of 48 oz (1.4 kg). Each takes five-and-one-half hours to make and is handled with white gloves to prevent fingerprints. The Regional Emmy Awards are made by Society Awards, a New York based company that also makes the Golden Globe awards. The Primetime Emmy statues are manufactured by R.S. Owens Company based out of Chicago, Illinois who is also charged with manufacturing the Academy Award statues.

As its trademark owners, the ATAS and the NATAS hold firm rules on the use of the "Emmy" image as well as its name. For example, the Emmy statuette must always appear facing left. Any copyright notice for the statue should read "ATAS/NATAS", listing both academies. Academy members must also obtain permission to use the statue image or name for promotional uses even though they are winners of the award. Furthermore, DVDs of Emmy-winning shows may reference the fact that they received an Emmy, but cannot use the statue image unless it is capable of being removed from all copies after one year after the award is presented.

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