Where can I find a Capeheart/Farnsworth?
 

Hello,

My grandfather's cousin was Philo Farnsworth. I'd like to buy a piece of our history, but the Capeheart/Farnsworth sets are pretty rare.

Anybody know where I'm most likely to find one?

thanks
Tom

The Early Television Foundation website has a Classified page, which includes a "TV sets wanted" section:

http://www.earlytelevision.org/classified_page.html

You could also place a WTB ("want to buy") ad in the VideoKarma Classified section.

Harry Poster is another possibility:

http://www.harryposter.com/vintagetelevision.htm

Here are two eBay categories where old TVs show up:

http://www.ebay.com/sch/Television-Sets-/3638/i.html

http://www.ebay.com/sch/Televisions-/73374/i.html

Most of the TVs you'll find are unrestored (not working). TV restoration is not something the average Joe can learn overnight. If you don't find one that's already fully restored, you could buy an unrestored one and then pay someone to restore the electronics. This article has some advice about finding repairmen:

http://antiqueradio.org/howfix.htm

Regards,

Phil Nelson
Phil's Old Radios
http://antiqueradio.org/index.html

P.S. The name is spelled Capehart, without the extra "e."

I've got a Farnsworth table radio, and the matching phono. Not sure of the exact year, but it is probably pre-war as the rear audio input is for a phono or TV attachment. Several companies offered lower priced TVs before the war that did not have an audio amp or speaker, and instead connected to a radio set and used part of the radio for those circuits.

I can post photos if you want to see it. Just don't ask me to sell it, I'm quite attached.

They're available fairly often on eBay and other places online. I've seen a Capehart console TV (maybe two), within the past week or so. But the Capehart name was sold some time in the late 50s, if I'm correct, and was no longer part of Farnsworth. There is another Farnsworth family member active in the Mormon Church in West Los Angeles, if he's still with us... Philo C. Farnsworth of Pacific Palisades, CA. I talked to him on the phone about 25 years ago, and he had little interest in the company, but acknowledged his connection to it.

Charles

The Capehart-Farnsworth company was sold to IT & T in 1949. Here's a 1949 ad announcing the acquisition:

http://antiqueradio.org/art/Capehart...rth-ITT_Ad.jpg

You can read a little more company history here:

http://antiqueradio.org/CapehartFarn...Television.htm

1950s Capehart-Farnsworth TVs bear the names, but I suspect that Philo Farnsworth and Homer Capehart had little or nothing to do with those products. Capehart was pushed out of his own company in the 1930s, years before Farnsworth bought it. Farnsworth spent the 1950s doing unrelated research, as I understand it.

Postwar Farnsworth radios are not difficult to find.

Phil Nelson

Where are you located?

I got a '50 Capehart-Farnsworth console TV model 322 RAMX with 1/2 doors on this beautiful cabinet..which is mahogany and oak...when i obtained this set
the original CRT was busted.neck broken off..a 17AP4,now a 17BP4 replaced
now needs a flyback/HV Doorknob cap; Merit HVO-8...i hope the yoke is still good..have replaced all of the E-caps in the power supply... has excellent B+ now...need to replace all of the paper foil capacitors...love to hear about your family tree:banana: