Fake color TVs and 1950s Hollywood

[MRX37]

Oh I missed that. I haven't picked up a hint of channel 9 since they cut off analog in Canada.

Channel 78 was way, way before my time.

In a related gripe, I hate that you have to scan for channels and can't input them manually. If it's not on the list you can't change to it. I could probably DX and find 9 if I had a DTV box that would stay on 9 and allow me to adjust my antenna!

[Electronic M]

Originally Posted by MRX37

In a related gripe, I hate that you have to scan for channels and can't input them manually. If it's not on the list you can't change to it. I could probably DX and find 9 if I had a DTV box that would stay on 9 and allow me to adjust my antenna!

Look for older Zenith/LG/Insignia boxes. IIRC the model is DTV-900(or 901). Those have great reception and can manually tune in the menus.

[Tom9589]

Channels 70 through 83 were turned over to the cellular telephone industry sometime in the late 90s. We had channel 69 in Atlanta and that is the highest channel number still in operation.

Hopefully channel 78 was re-located rather than have the plug pulled on it. At least that's what the FCC said they were going to do.

[TVTim]

Originally Posted by zeno

Lavern & Sherly had
a 12 B&W panasonic made about '75

73 Zeno

When I watched Laverne and Shirley last week and wondered about the TV. It does look way too new for the era.

[zeno]

Our highest UHF was 68. IIRC it started as a pay TV as was
ch 27 out of Worcester ( Zenith system) for a while.
IIRC there was an airborn UHF in the Ohio area in the 60's
that may have used channels above 69.

Missed the TV in TV & I agree its a Maggy. I dont remember
the style so was is an industrial model ??? Looks abt 1960 vintage.

73 Zeno

[Carmine]

Originally Posted by Tom9589

Hopefully channel 78 was re-located rather than have the plug pulled on it. At least that's what the FCC said they were going to do.

Channel 78 was broadcasting from Canada, so hopefully they could tell the FCC to pound sand. Canada is still broadcasting in analog (I checked again, 42 is still on the air. I'll put a real antenna on a set and do a screen shot.)

Of course, I think 78 was long gone before the age of cell phones.

[magnasonic66]

The TV set in the Martin-Lewis movie was a Magnavox, most or all of Dean Martin's movies had Magnavox products in them after the breakup. I'm pretty sure the Jerry Lewis picture "The Lady's Man" had a couple of Magnavox consoles in it too. "Visit to a Small Planet" from 1960 has Jerry as a being from outer space. There is a top of the line Magnavox console in the living room of a TV personality who claims there is no life in the universe but us.

[Carmine]

I was thinking Magnavox, but hoping it might have been a Zenith prototype. I believe they mentioned a rectangular screen color set in an early 50s shareholders report. Of course we know they never sold it to the public. The control panel does look a bit like their other color prototypes.

[Robert Grant]

CBET Windsor is still on Channel 9, though they went DTV on 9/1/2011 (IIRC). Their virtual channel is 9 and they actually transmit on 9.

CBEFT began on Channel 78 in 1976. They moved to 54 several years later (1982, IIRC). This was to make room for cellular telephone, but it also improved reception in my Eastside Detroit neighborhood. To do this, the FCC took vacant channel 54 away from Toledo to give it to Windsor, and gave channel 36 to Toledo as a replacement. CBEFT was moved again, to Channel 35, with much less power, and that did not last a year (CBC decided that if you did not live in a large city AND speak the dominant language, you'll have to pay a premium price for it).

Several American UHFs were on the higher channels in the early days of UHF. Youngstown had a channel 83, Lima a 73, and Bowling Green a 70 - all the way to the mid-1970s, when they moved to 57 (and further to 27 in the mid-1980s). The higher UHF channels proved to be "naturally unattractive". Transmitters were not as efficient, tuners had a higher noise figure, attenuation from trees (especially needleleaf) greater, and multipath worse than on the lower UHF channels.

[Carmine]

Thanks... That's good info. I remember channel 54, mostly French language nature documentaries as I recall.

[cbenham]

Originally Posted by Carmine

I've been watching a lot of older movies on the free subchannels (Movies!, This, Grit, and so forth). One re-occurring theme seems to be re-coloring B&W sets into color.

The best movie for seeing B&W TV equipment making GLORIOUS TECHNICOLOR PICTURES is called "My Blue Heaven." Shot in Technicolor in 1950, there are shots of RCA B&W TK-11 Studio cameras and control room equipment making great color "video" images, and even a shot of an RCA 9PC41 B&W home projection set with really nice moving color images on it.

There is another film I saw in the 1950s with similar color TV effects, so
Hollywood must have been trying to lampoon B&W TV with these films

[Hawkwind]

Check out the movie. Will success spoil rock hunter. Lampoons television very well

[cbenham]

Originally Posted by Tom9589

Channels 70 through 83 were turned over to the cellular telephone industry sometime in the late 90s. We had channel 69 in Atlanta and that is the highest channel number still in operation.

Hopefully channel 78 was re-located rather than have the plug pulled on it. At least that's what the FCC said they were going to do.

In the mid to late 1950s a channel 82 or 83 transmitter was used to re-transmit the harbor radar images near Boston [as I recall] for small boat users. All the owners needed was a small portable B&W TV on his boat and he could see a real time radar image of the entire harbor and watch his boat and all others whether it was foggy or not. Very inexpensive way to make boating safer without having to install his own radar set on his boat.

[David Roper]

The 21" rectangular color set that Zenith made in 1954.



I couldn't even guess what that might sell for if it ever turned up.