How is THIS for a television?

Aunt Marg

SF VIP
I've seen plenty of old-fashioned things in my day, but I have never!

Groovy Philco Predicta television from the late 1950s.​


bfc75a9274bf02b6bf3fcaca000e2dd6.jpg
 

That sort of reminds me of the 1st TV I ever saw. It was at my friend's, Billy's place. I used to go over there to watch the Roy Rogers Show (with Pat Grady, Trigger the horse & Dale Evens. Sometimes I would watch Walt Disney Presents with his 4 lands; frontier, adventure, fantasy and I forgot the 4th one. Anyway, this TV has a flourescent light tube around the picture. Oh ya, it was living black and white.
 
I've seen plenty of old-fashioned things in my day, but I have never!

Groovy Philco Predicta television from the late 1950s.​


bfc75a9274bf02b6bf3fcaca000e2dd6.jpg
That's amazing, it wasn't until the mid fifties that my father bought a television. It was nothing like that futuristic Philco, but I would still love to display it today. Compared to that Philco, our TV looked like something that The Romans left behind.

Television 1940s-and-early-1950s.jpg
 
That's amazing, it wasn't until the mid fifties that my father bought a television. It was nothing like that futuristic Philco, but I would still love to display it today. Compared to that Philco, our TV looked like something that The Romans left behind.

View attachment 172375
This is the first one my Mom & Dad got in 1952. Almost like this one but had a round 13" tube, could only get 3 channels. TV signal went off at midnight with the National Anthem.
 
can'r remember ever NOT having a TV?? remember one similar to what horseless carriiage posted. it may have been a philco, but i think its screen was smaller, if that's possible! when it would act up, dad pulled out a box of random tubes. he'd take back of TV and just start swapping tubes... never even bothered to turn set off or unplug.

my late-FIL had a Dumont over the bar in his basement. it still worked.
 
Last edited:
Sometimes I would watch Walt Disney Presents with his 4 lands; frontier, adventure, fantasy and I forgot the 4th one.
Tomorrowland?

Thanks Marg, that is a great TV, wish I had one today!
Thin-screen and large screen televisions were one such prediction going back decades...

My father was an electrical engineer who worked for RCA in the 50s. He used to say that even then they were capable of building larger thinner color TVs, and he was involved in building some prototypes. However the cost was just prohibitive. The new part of the technology is, at least in part, our figuring out how to do it cost effectively.
 
My parents got their first TV sometime in the early 1950s. They had to install one of those tall, antennas with guy wires anchored to the roof to get any kind of signal. It had a rotor so you could aim the antenna toward transmitting stations. There were two stations we could get, one in Chicago and the other in Champaign, IL. Reception from Chicago was spotty with atmospheric conditions being the determinant. The Champaign IL, channel mostly had a clear signal. Being a busy kid with school work and doing the things kids did back then (e.g. studying, swimming, baseball, basketball, fishing, etc.), there aren't many programs that I remember as being particularly interesting other than the historical series Victory At Sea.
 
My Dad was obsessed with TVs and had to have one in every room. What really cracked me up when was when he put one on a pole in the bathroom. I wish I had a picture of it to show you. He said we could watch it and relax while taking a bath.
 
My Dad was obsessed with TVs and had to have one in every room. What really cracked me up when was when he put one on a pole in the bathroom. I wish I had a picture of it to show you. He said we could watch it and relax while taking a bath.
ROFL!

A high school friend of mine, her parents had a TV in the kitchen, and to me that was a serious luxury!

In my world they were living the dream!
 


Back
Top