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Looks like some attention was paid to that house back in the seventies, judging by the paneling and trim. To me it just seems empty and kinda sad. On a very slow path to death.
That MGA looks to be one of their "blue tube" sets. I don't know if I've ever seen one in person.
Another old house story (and another repeat) in the late 90s I answered an ad in the classifieds, "old TV sets for sale". Turns out that a 90+ year old gentleman had died and his nephew was settling the estate. He had a farm with an old house and lots of buildings; he lived in an old trailer out by the road. The house and farmstead had been packed with antiques and for 3 straight weekends they had held auctions at the local firehall. What was left were the TV sets, seen as pretty much worthless. I did get some decent stuff out of there, but I had to leave maybe a dozen sets. Mostly bw consoles from the late 50s/early 60s. They were all in the house, which as very close to falling down. Every room had one or two sets in it, along with assorted junk. (trash furniture, old mattresses) I would have liked to spent more time and explored but, 1) I was being escorted by the nephew who kept me from venturing far and 2) the only time I could meet with him was late in the day, just before dusk, and there was no electric in the house. The real gems were on the enclosed front porch; I was basically down on my knees digging in the dark, throwing whatever I could grab into boxes. Tubes, knobs, assorted electronic knick-knacks. There was a 50 year old refrigerator on the porch used to store tubes and such; there were also about a dozen Electrolux vacuums in there which I could have had but didn't have room for. The nephew mentioned that his uncle had never owned a color TV; well, there was an 80s RCA in one shed, in pieces (the newest set I spotted) and inside there was a sad Sylvania tube chassis color set. (I brought that one home and should have saved it, but didn't-had HV issues) The greatest find, and the one that always struck me as peculiar in some sort of way, was a Zenith 25MC30 roundie, a bare-bones metal console. (looks like they made special efforts to build it cheap) The set is clean as a pin inside and out, and I was able to get it working with very little effort. Biggest fault was a bad power switch. Seeing that big "eyeball" in that lonely back room at dusk on a cool April day....strange. For a long time I felt a little uneasy when I watched that set, as if it was going to go "kaplooey" at any point, or something.
That whole place, the house, the TV sets, the farmstead, became a practice session for the volunteer fire company. All long gone now. The nephew and I actually destroyed a shed while we were there-we were able to push what was left of it into a pile. Inside were 2-3 fruit baskets full of globe/ST tubes. Yeah, I got 'em.
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Bryan
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