The GE PE250 Early Color Television Camera

[John Hafer]

Originally Posted by W.B.

To be sure, WOR-TV did use GE PE-250's for their live studio camera setup, beginning in 1967 . . . it was with their film chains that they were RCA. Same thing with WPIX.

W.B: Actually, here is an ad for GE from August 1965 stating that WOR-TV did purchase GE PE-24 4 Tube color cameras. If they did use RCA film chains, they must have been later on.

[Telecruiser]

I know that WNAC-TV in Boston (An RKO station) had GE PE-24 cameras on their film chains around 1968 or so. As I recall there were three film chains that used RCA projectors and one that used Eastman 285's. The RCA chains also had a black and white RCA vidicon camera, so you could select either color or B&W to put on the air, depending on program content.

[W.B.]

Originally Posted by John Hafer

W.B: Actually, here is an ad for GE from August 1965 stating that WOR-TV did purchase GE PE-24 4 Tube color cameras. If they did use RCA film chains, they must have been later on.

The ad did not explicitly mention that WOR used PE-24's, just that they first used "the 4-V type" starting in late 1964 (apparently an RCA TK-27; kind of like RCA's Broadcast News, whenever they spoke of a TV station's equipment, occasionally failing to bring up videotape recorders which is a tipoff that the VTR's were Ampex). I did read in one of the trade papers (Broadcasting? - no, on second thought, it was an earlier 1965 Broadcast News) that WOR had placed an order for RCA TK-27's in 1965 (those were definitely fully operational by the time the station moved their entire kit 'n' kaboodle - studios, VT, telecine and master control - to 1481 Broadway in 1968). That GE ad mentioned only two RKO stations ordering PE-24's - WNAC and WHBQ. KHJ in Los Angeles, from what I read in another forum, used vintage RCA TK-26's (the 3-V variety) well into the 1980's (and from what I saw of one of the slide replications, apparently a TK-27 or two). As did WOR - at first; besides what they first got in 1960, they also got at least one, possibly two, TK-26's from RCA's 1964-65 World's Fair exhibit after the fair ended. Then CKLW-TV (now CBET) may have also had RCA 4-V's.

RKO's other major GE order, in 1966, was for a huge bank of PE-250 color cameras, the lion's share of which went to WOR-TV (six for use at Shea Stadium for Mets broadcasts, three for their studios), others went to WNAC (five, I.I.N.M.) and WHBQ (two).

No, in terms of film chains, apart from WCBS and the GE PE-240's that were shared with CBS network at the vast Broadcast Center, New York was otherwise generally RCA territory from the mid-'60's and into the '80's.