Early color in Canada

[Telecolor 3007]

A topic about eraly color television in Canada.
I have a curisity: why in Canada color televison was introduced later then in Mexico?
About the "Philips" K4, one of the 1st color tv sets salled in Canada:
http://audiokarma.org/forums/showthr...ghlight=Canada

[electroking]

How can such a question be answered? Maybe the assumption behind it is
'Canada is wealthier than Mexico so why would a poorer country have color TV
before a wealthier one'? No harm intended to our Mexican friends of course!

You might as well ask why Mexico had the Olympic Games before Canada (1968/1976).

You seem to have found a date of 1963 for the first color broadcasts in Mexico,
while the few sources available seem to give 1966 or 1967 for Canada. A more
interesting question would be, for instance, at what point in time were there
more color receivers than monochrome receivers in service in each country.

Good luck with your investigation.

[colorfixer]

The majority of Canadians live within x number of miles of the US border, and thus many can receive U.S. television direct from across the border.

This is not unlike those in northern Mexico receiving t.v. from their neighbor to the north (the U.S.) from places like El Paso, TX, San Diego, CA, etc.

Many stations in the U.S. were placed near the border to allow them to serve audiences in Canada, before stations in Canada were licensed. Google "KVOS TV" for example.

Canada was also one of the first countries to develop cable television distribution, to allow for those not "fortunate" enough to live in easy reach of cross border stations to have access to U.S. programming.

Thus, when color t.v. came to Seattle, WA, southwest British Columbia had color programming, even before the Canadian locals were color. The same is true for Windsor, ON, and Detroit, MI.

My grandfather had a CT-100 in the 50's (he was in the t.v. business). My dad vividly remembers watching specials then Disney in color. His home was in a part of Vancouver, BC that one could easily receive broadcasts from the major network outlets from Seattle, Washington (no coincidence, he probably bought there for that reason) with a rooftop antenna.

He and my uncle drove down to Seattle to pick the thing up, and then spent the weekend making the thing work. Apparently when my grandmother vacuumed, it really messed with the set's purity, which they learned to great dismay when they had everyone over to see this marvel of modern technology in action.

After a year or two of "that thing", as my uncle sarcastically referred to it, they moved up to a CTC-4. What I wouldn't do to have the CT-100 now.

From what I gather, the switch to color (colour) in Canada was an economic rather than technical one. Many stations in Canada didn't startup (in B/W) until the mid 50's, and were government owned (CBC).

[old_tv_nut]

It would be interesting to know if the color broadcasts in Mexico started along the U.S. border first. That may have been the case, to serve the Spanish-speaking population in the U.S. near the border. The Mexican broadcasters have been interested in broadcasting in the American digital system recently, too, long before the country of Mexico is prepared to switch entirely to digital. I think perhaps such innovations tend to occur first in Mexico City and near the border and spread from those areas.

[NowhereMan 1966]

Originally Posted by old_tv_nut

It would be interesting to know if the color broadcasts in Mexico started along the U.S. border first. That may have been the case, to serve the Spanish-speaking population in the U.S. near the border. The Mexican broadcasters have been interested in broadcasting in the American digital system recently, too, long before the country of Mexico is prepared to switch entirely to digital. I think perhaps such innovations tend to occur first in Mexico City and near the border and spread from those areas.

IIRC, I think in 1954, WBAP-TV in Dallas, TX was the first or second TV station to go all color in the NBC network. Dallas is some distance away from Mexico, but still it is quite interesting to know that it was the earliest color TV station or almost earliest. I know when I see the NBC tapes of JFK's assassination, WBAP-TV fed the network a color signal while the network itself was in black and white. It took several tries to connect the two but they were successful eventually.

[old_tv_nut]

WNBQ (now WMAQ), the NBC owned and operated station in Chicago, claims to be the first station to go all color (for all local live programs), in Spring of 1956.

I just scanned an ad for them from January 1956 Variety. If I can get the file attachment controls to work, I'll post it.

[ha1156w]

Wasn't the station in OKC the first one to go color? Or were they "partially" color?

[old_tv_nut]

Ed Reitan's site lists WKY in Oklahoma City as first live local color station, on April 8, 1954:

http://novia.net/~ereitan/PION_6m.htm#EarlyPioneers

WNBQ's claim was "first all color [local live] station"

[old_tv_nut]

I just installed Firefox to see if IE7 was the problem - still can't access advanced features - no smilies, no attachments - beginning to bug me!

[old_tv_nut]

it's working!
If the mods did something, thank you! If the gods did something, thank them--

Here's the Variety ad for WNBQ

[dtuomi]

An odd shape for a camera.

David

[old_tv_nut]

I thought I saw a camera like that somewhere - found it in an ad for RKO Pathe films, who made a PR film for NBC in 1947. (had to search through a stack that I haven't filed yet)

The movie at the Prelinger archives:
http://www.archive.org/details/BehindYo1947

about WNBT-TV:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WNBC

brief listing about the movie:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0807744/

The movie in three parts on youtube -
see part three for the television camera pix:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCm4y-62kZ4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LM3GQr8DUU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aowjLt2t5nc

Note the strange viewfinder - all the cameramen seem to be looking into the upper port, but it seems there is a parallel lower port

[Telecolor 3007]

Oh, here we are talikng about early color television in CANADA.