The World`s Oldest Television Channel.

I have lived just 10 miles away from a small and growing privately-owned museum of television and television history and found it fascinating. I've listened to stories form older folks that went home one day after elementary school to hear strange people talking in the living room, only to find the new-fangled TV set sitting there, the center of attention.

In childhood, I found in the attic on one of my explorations, a television from the 1930s with a 6-inch diagonal screen set into a 4-foot tall birch wood cabinet and outfitted with push buttons instead of a dial. I learned a little television development history after that when I asked about it.

Folks I've discussed TV with have different memories of the events surrounding the first commercial broadcasts. However, the big official Grand Opening of the first TV Station after years of experimental broadcasts in America, France and UK was likely on November 2, 1936 in London, England.

Although the development of television foundation technology dates back to 1872, the first television broadcasting station was located at Alexandria Palace in London, Great Britain.

Some folks recall the first commercial broadcast as being aired in February 1936, but this could be incorrect or a memory of an earlier experimental broadcast. It is all documented in a BBC film tilted Television Comes to London, produced by Dallas Bower and Gerald Cock [BBC archives].

The broadcast reportedly lasted for 18 minutes, from 9:05 - 9:23 PM local time on either February 11 or November 2, 1936 depending on the memory. It could also have been 3:00 PM by some accounts. Adela Helena Dixon (from the later film Banana Ridge) performed with the television studio orchestra. She was also a star of Broadway and British stage and played opposite Sir John Gielgud in Romeo and Juliet.

She sang in the 1936 BBC opening on a show called Variety and this is where the term "variety show" originated for TV.

The location of TV station had to be high in the air because the VHF waves used required line-of-sight reception nothing could block them or they would not get through. Some 30,000 square feet inside an old Victorian entertainment complex, Alexandra Palace, in London was ideal.

The BBC mounted a 215-foot mast with antennas for sound and picture vision, along with a sound transmitter. Intended to transmit over a line of 25 miles radius, the signal occasionally reached into continental Europe.

The opening of the BBC Television Service using Marconi-EMI technology held its Grand Opening for about 400 "viewers" who saw and heard speeches by the Postmaster General, the BBC Chairman, and Lord Selsdon.

World War II

Broadcasting was interrupted by the war in 1939, when the station cut off in the middle of a Mickey Mouse cartoon until 1946, when the cartoon supposedly resumed and an announcer apologized for the 7-year interruption.

A mighty maze of mystic, magic rays

Is all about us in the blue,

And in sight and sound they trace

Living pictures out of space

To bring a new wonder to you

 

The busy world before you is unfurled -

Its songs, its tears and laughter, too.

One by one they play their parts

In this latest of the Arts

To bring new enchantment to you.

 

As by your fireside you sit,

The news will flit,

As on the silver screen.

And just for entertaining you

With something new

The stars will then be seen. So...

 

There's joy in store

The world is at your door -

It's here for everyone to view

Conjured up in sound and sight

By the magic rays of light

That bring Television to you.

 

Early in 1930s America, RCA experimented with black and white television broadcasts in the laboratory.

In RCA mounted antennas atop the Empire State Building for commercial TV broadcasts.

In 1928, the US federal government, FCC, issued call letters "W2XB" to what is now WGY Television in New York City. This is the first established Television Station in America, broadcasting on old Channel 1, which is no longer used due to calibrations changing on the TV dials.

However, WX2B did not receive a commercial license apparently until 1942 when it was renamed WRGB.

They claim to be the first TV Station in the world, but seem to base this on experimental laboratory broadcasts back on January 13, 1928. It broadcast only in kHz and not MHz and had limited range, but issued farm reports three times a week.

I think it could be considered as still experimental tellevision broadcasting , but this is open to question.