Early TV broadcasting?

Would anyone know of sources to learn more about early forms of
televsion broadcasting? For example, how many people had TV sets from

Patrick Joseph McNamara...

There's a documentary about early TV called Empire of the Air. You might be
able to find it at a library.

1940 onward, before the big development of commercial TV in the late
1940s? We know there were experimental stations and TV sets, but were

Allen Abel...

Television History -- The First 75 Years

Early Television Foundation -- Television History

they literall just a handful (ie under 100?) owned by engineers, or
more than that (ie around 1000?) owned by the general public.
Considering the early TV sets were very expensive and there was very
little on, I can't see how that many people would buy them.

Real.Min...

Bookmarked!

Daniel Joseph Min

*Download Min's Banned (Freeware) Books:

*Min's web-search-Archived Home Page On The WWW:

In 1939, consumer television sets were shown at the World's Fair. The
Fair itself was televised.

The New York Times of 1943 and 1944 included a page of TV listings for
Ch 4, W2XWV. The broadcast day was limited to about one hour in the
evening starting at 8:30 pm, with comedy, music, news, and 10 minute
film shorts. Adds for technical schools included mention of training
of "television technicians".

There were also several FM stations serving New York City. These used
different frequencies than used today, around 42.0 to 48.0 MHz. I
didn't think FM was available until after the war. I wonder when the
frequencies changed to modern usage and if FM was available in cities
other than New York.

During the war years itself little was done for TV production as
manufacturers were very busy with the war effort. However, many
companies were actively planning postwar television sets and
advertising heavilly about the future to come. (Many companies in war
time, having no consumer goods to sell, advertised the "future" just to
keep their name fresh in the public's mind. Other companies, like Bell
Telephone, asked that consumers NOT buy their products/services to keep
them available for military needs.)

In 1944 a coaxial cable system was proposed linking several cities for
television, telephone, and even data transmission by IBM.

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