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Originally Posted by Tubejunke
WOW! At first I thought that this thread was in the wrong forum as the opening statement mention "53 DuMont" didn't scream out color set to me.
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Nor to me. That's why I *almost* didn't return the phone call from the guy who contacted me about it. He said it was a color set, but I didn't believe him. I went to see it anyway, and as soon as I saw it, I knew it was destined for the Early Television Museum. On the rare-O-meter, it pretty much pins the needle. Really, it's just too esoteric to even try to display in my living room (some visitors appreciate seeing the Pilot TV-37 but most don't get too excited about the CTC-5, and they're not going to see any difference between that and this set!) This set was even too exotic for me to think about putting in our local antique radio and television museum. (We're going to put a CT-100 on display there, and I suspect that may elicit "ho-hums" from many people.)
The backstory as it was told to me: when it was not longer wanted at the Du Mont labs, the set was rescued by the engineer who had worked on it. The engineer gave it about fifty years ago to the guy who had called me. He tried to get it working, but with no success, and stored it under a blanket in a dry basement since then. We had to disassemble it to get it out of his basement. It includes a pre-production version of the 15G CRT in it, but unfortunately the tube is to air.
Most developmental sets I've seen are in somewhat crudely-constructed cabinets. The engineers didn't care so much about appearance. This set is in a finely-finished cabinet (and it's endured the test of time fairly well; you can still see your reflection in the cabinet!) The only odd thing is that the corners of the cabinet are cut somewhat strangely around the opening for the CRT. Was this because it was a production cabinet from a black-and-white set and they had to modify it to fit in the CRT chassis, or is this how the finish work was intended to look? We haven't found any production DuMont sets that have a cabinet that looks like this one, so it remains a mystery. Maybe the model shop went all-out and made a finely-finished custom cabinet for a developmental set for Mr. DuMont's office? In any case, it's all there. In fact, it came with a spare chassis that is very similar to the chassis in the set.
Here's the fellow talking about how he saved the TV:
https://youtu.be/HJ96ipMkFFQ
The set is now on display at the Early Television Museum.