TV Exhibit Museum of Science and Industry 1950

[old_tv_nut]

Here are some press photos from the (monochrome) TV exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago.

"MSI TV Exhibit 1950.pdf":

This photo is not identified as the Museum, but I am sure it is because I visited it 3 or four years later at age 9 or 10; also, the photo is marked on the back "Chicago Times" (later merged with the Sun to become the Sun-Times).

This is the RCA-sponsored TV exhibit. Later in the 1950s it was replaced by the RCA color TV exhibit.

I don't know if 1950 was the year the exhibit opened. I believe the museum previously had a radio exhibit, some parts of which were displayed in wall cabinets further down the west wing.

From left to right:

Some sort of CRT exhibit, perhaps showing a scanning raster with different numbers of lines (I don't recall, and I'm guessing).

Obscured unknown display.

A progression of CRT sizes, all showing the local NBC station (of course).

Obscured and unknown exhibit window.

RCA Dynamic Demo - working TV circuit trainer apparatus with the circuits separated into distinct areas. This is referred to in the caption on the back of this photo.

Complete regular TV chassis in a glass or plastic bubble.

The exhibit also had a low-resolution mechanical TV system (not in this photo) with camera disc and receiver disk mounted on opposite ends of the same motor shaft to do away with the need for synchronization. The receiver used a neon plate tube as the modulated light source, and you could look behind the disk to see a uniform glow, and through the disk to see the RCA logo that was being transmitted. When the exhibit was remodeled for color later in the 1950s, the mechanical system went to the museum attic and a transparency of a low resolution picture was shown near the entry to the exhibit to illustrate TV history.

"See yourself on TV April 1951.pdf" shows people seeing themselves on TV. I believe this was also at the museum (they definitely had a see-yourself section, but the photos are not identified, and I do not remember if the background looked like this).

The exhibit also had a projection TV of the type shown in "TV Projector Zworykin Morton 1940.pdf." It showed the feed from the see-yourself camera. It was very dim, and you had to enter through a maze of dark curtains and let your eyes adjust to the darkness to see your friends in front of the camera.