Volume 7 , Issue 34

1950's TV Memories...

"As I finished writing the last payment check (over $130) to the local cable company for over 100 channels and high-speed internet service, I started thinking back on the early TV watching days for me while growing up in Alva, Oklahoma.

I remember the day back in 1954, that our first 'set' arrived. It was a huge, blond (remember blond furniture?) cabinet that took quite awhile to warm up. My dad had erected an antenna mast on top of the house with an array of antennas pointing in different directions. That was because we could get Channels 4 and 9 from Oklahoma City; Channel 5 from Enid (later to move to OKC); Channels 3 and 10 from Wichita; and Channel 12 out of Hutchinson (also to move later to Wichita).

If you could afford one, you might have a motorized rotor on your antenna to physically move the antenna to bring in better reception from the various stations. I remember one enterprising Dad who made an antenna mast that could be moved via a lever, while someone in the house yelled when to stop.

TV in those days was black and white. Although, I remember people buying plastic add-ons that gave a blue tint to the top of the screen, a pink tint in the middle, and a green tint to the bottom. Watching shows was a family event (to include TV dinners) with nightly favorites.

I also remember locally produced kid shows such as Danny Williams on Channel 4 as 3-D Danny, a space traveler with a sidekick robot. Incidentally, on a trip with Newman's Boys Choir to perform on Channel 4, we discovered the robot costume sitting in the corner of a studio and were somewhat devastated that he wasn't walking around.

Danny also hosted Saturday Night wrestling, which caused great excitement in my grandparents home when the bad guys would sneak foreign objects out of their tights to do harm to the good guys. Danny would always end the program by saying, 'Watch out for flying chairs!' I remember Gleyre's TV & Radio store having a 'set' displayed in the front window, and locals hauling park benches across the street so that they could watch it from the sidewalk.

This was also an occurrence when Alva Community Television came to town with cable; so that you could get better reception of the local channels, not the hundreds of channels that I pay for today, and only watch maybe ten at the most. Although, I don't remember, I'm sure the monthly cable bill was under $10 in those days.

In those days, we only had one TV in the house, and it was a family affair. Now my wife and I have four televisions in the house, plus two in our cabin at the lake (which also has cable service), and both watch our separate favorite shows. With all of those channels to choose from, we also have VCR and DVD players to watch rented movies on. We have both because we have loads of VHS tapes on hand that, in some cases, we haven't watch since we bought them, and because now the video stores have stopped stocking anything but DVD's. I guess the VHS tapes will sit around a few more years until they find their way to the trash like my treasured '8-track' tapes did a few years back. I'd write more on this subject, but I've got some channel-surfing to do......" -- Terry   |  View or Add Comments (1 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

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