Russ Morash was a young employee in 1961 at what was then WGBH-TV — known as educational television in those years — when Julia Child called to schedule an appearance to discuss her book “Mastering the Art of French Cooking.’’
He answered the phone at the station and Child insisted she would “require an omelet pan’’ for her segment of the book review program, he recalled in a 2001 Boston Globe interview. “Normally, people came and talked to the interviewer and showed their books.’’
Indeed, Child did make an omelet while hawking her writing, and she soon teamed up with Mr. Morash. The following summer, the 49-year-old chef and 26-year-old producer launched a pilot for a new program, “The French Chef.’’
The show helped catapult Child to lasting international fame, and Mr. Morash went on to apply the kind of on-air, how-to format that made “The French Chef’’ so watchable to other pursuits — notably with the long-running series “Victory Garden’’ and “This Old House.’’
Mr. Morash, an Emmy Award-winning creator of TV’s how-to genre of programming, died June 19 of a cerebral hemorrhage. He was 88 and had divided his time between Lexington and Nantucket. A son of a carpenter, he had learned from his father what to focus on during building projects, and he always lent his own hand to renovating the homes he owned.
“Russell Morash has been called the father of ‘how-to’ and ‘know-how’ television,’’ his Massachusetts Broadcasters Hall of Fame biography reads.
Child was even more direct.
“There would be no public television how-to programs without Russ Morash,’’ she said of her producer and friend in a 1986 Globe interview. “WGBH is lucky to have such a talented and remarkable man.’’
From Child to James Crockett — the first host of what was originally called “Crockett’s Victory Garden’’ — and onward to Bob Vila and Norm Abram of “This Old House,’’ Mr. Morash had a gift for recognizing who could skillfully perform the tasks for each show and be an engaging presence for viewers, said Henry Becton, a former GBH president who was in charge of much of the station’s programming when the gardening and home improvement shows launched.
“And he got the best out of them,’’ Becton added.
Mr. Morash’s wide-ranging intellect helped shape his versatility with disparate topics as he guided hosts who wielded a chopping knife, a gardening trowel, or a hammer as each show dictated.
“It came naturally,’’ said his wife, Marian Morash, who was Chef Marian on “The Victory Garden,’’ an executive chef on Child’s show, and a James Beard Award-winner.
“It was his curiosity,’’ she said. “He wanted to know, and if he wanted to know, other people wanted to know.’’
The stardom of Child, Vila, Abram, and others helped pave the way for the cooking, gardening, and home improvement shows that later proliferated on commercial TV.
“This Old House,’’ which debuted in 1979, went on to become a magazine, too. A PBS ratings powerhouse, it provided a springboard for master carpenter Abram, who in 1988 began hosting a spin-off, “The New Yankee Workshop.’’
The success of those shows owed much to Mr. Morash’s own experience renovating houses, his keen eye as a director and producer deciding where to aim the camera, and his insistence on each set that everyone do high-quality work.
“He had a very sure hand with storytelling and an immense curiosity about how things happened and why, so everything he did was informed by that,’’ said Bruce Irving, a longtime friend who worked for Mr. Morash on “This Old House’’ for years before serving for a time as executive producer.
“The show was completely unscripted,’’ Irving said, “and it pretty much came out of his mouth into the mouths of the people you saw on the set.’’
Mr. Morash’s breakthrough success with “The French Chef,’’ meanwhile, evolved from how well he and Child worked together.
“What was wonderful about the relationship between Julia and Russ is that when he directed her, she totally respected him,’’ said Marian Morash, who is the author of “The Victory Garden Cookbook.’’
“She appreciated what he was doing in his line of work, and he appreciated what she was doing as a wonderful chef,’’ she added. “There was a mutual love and bond there.’’
Born in Boston on Feb. 11, 1936, Russell Frederick Morash was a son of Russell Sr., a homebuilder, and Naomi Grace Lingley Morash, a homemaker and a personal secretary at an aviation business.
He grew up in Lexington with his twin, David, and his sister, Ruth Daniels, both of whom now live in California.
“My father worked around his house all the time,’’ Mr. Morash told the Globe in 1985. “It seems as if I’ve been around housing, property, and construction all my life.’’
In a 1980 Globe interview, he said his father “came from a long line of carpenters and shipwrights in Nova Scotia. So my brother and I just followed in the family tradition and began to work along with Dad from a very young age.’’
At an age when their friends were playing baseball, “we would be working on ‘projects,’ as Dad called them … things like picking up 10,000 square feet of cedar shingles that he had ripped off a house he was remodeling.’’
While remodeling one of the houses he and his wife owned, he had an idea that walking viewers through the step-by-step of home renovation might make for a popular TV series.
“I thought that the same viewers who lapped up sophisticated programming on subjects from microbiology to international diplomacy were often panicked by the simplest problems in the workings of ordinary houses,’’ he said.
Mr. Morash attended Tufts University before switching to Boston University to study theater directing and acting. While there he met Marian Fichtner, who also was in the theater program. They married in 1958.
He was offered a stage-managing job in New York City, but put off going because they were engaged. “He basically walked across the river to GBH and got a job and was there ever since,’’ she said. “That was that.’’
In addition to his wife, Mr. Morash leaves their two daughters, Victoria Evarts of Concord and Kate Cohen of Lexington; his brother, David, and sister, Ruth; five grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.
A celebration of his life will be announced.
In the early years of “The Victory Garden’’ and “This Old House,’’ TV cameras were heavy, hulking, and unwieldy. Mr. Morash welcomed each new technological development that made it easier for him to recognize his producing and directing vision, which brought him 14 Emmy Awards.
“He pushed technology so hard to become free of any constraints at all,’’ Irving said. “He wanted a camera to roam around the way his own eye roamed around a job site. As quickly as he could
Away from the “This Old House’’ set, Mr. Morash practiced what he and the stars of his how-to shows preached. In interviews, he always encouraged homeowners to learn how to do their own renovations, rather than cede control — and potentially lots of money — to contractors.
“We’ve got a little building in Nantucket,’’ he said in a 1985 Globe interview about his family’s second home. “We framed it. The only thing about that project that we didn’t control was the weather. You either do it that way or you write checks and hope for the best.’’