UHF TV in England...

[pgnl]

The UK traditional aerial plug and socket is actually used in the vast majority of countries around the world on TV sets - its often called a PAL connector, but was also used in SECAM countries. The main exceptions to this rule is ex NTSC and North/South American countries where they use the F-Connector.

France actually had a similar slightly smaller plug on their early TVs but changed to the Bulgin Lee type, I suspect in the seventies. The Germans had a special two pin plug. Some Japanese portable sets, had either screw connectors or 3.5mm pin socket similar to a headphone socket today.

Over the years I have looked on the net at the aerial connectors on TVs all over the place, most countries in the fifties, sixties and early seventies used 300ohm flat cables with screw connectors, then converted. We had a 1955 Philips 405 line TV which had a UK Coaxial standard aerial socket, so I think the British may have been forerunners in using coaxial aerial cables on TV sets. Coaxial Cable of course helps prevent break in interference.

As you say, the F-Connector is more secure and better suited for satellite and aerial cables with a copper core and copper braid/sheath along its length. My first device with an F-connector, here in the UK was a Sony ST-3950 Stereo Tuner, I bought it in 1979, a beautiful device. It was supplied with a plug that required a crimp tool to fit. F-Connectors were of course used from the late eighties in Europe on Satellite TV, so F-Connectors are everywhere now, but TV sets outside ex-NTSC countries still use the UK type plug.