ABC had Ted Koppel for their late night guy, and Drew Carey became their prime-time guy. Bruce Helford was the show's executive producer from its start in 1995 to its end in 2004, as was Drew.
Samuel Crompton was an English inventor and pioneer of the spinning industry. Building on the work of James Hargreaves and Richard Arkwright he invented the spinning mule, a machine that revolutionised the industry worldwide.
Samuel L. Jackson is perfectly cast a John Shaft- a tough NYC homicide detective who is the nephew of the John Shaft from the original series. The plot (and there's a lot of it, surprisingly), follows Shaft as he investigates a racially motivated murder at the hands of Walter Wade, Jr.- a racist, sociopath son of a construction tycoon.