When you were a kid, how many TV stations do you remember??
So I'm pretty sure I am correct that circa 1950 there were three networks: ABC, NBC and CBS.
My question concerns the very first local stations you remember. I lived in NW Ohio kinda sorta between Toledo, Ohio and Fort Wayne, Indiana. I can remember when Toledo only had channel, channel 13 and Fort Wayne only had channel 33. That was it folks!! Those two small cities had one channel apiece. Which means, in my home town we had two channels to choose from. Two! Can you imagine trying to explain this to a 20 something?? 🤣
My Great Grampa Pete had the first TV in Bryan, Ohio located in a home. There was one TV that came before GG Pete's in Bryan but that TV was in a bar.
I can well remember when each small city added channels, one each!! Channel 11 and channel 21. So when I was around 10 years old I had 4 channels to choose from covering all three networks. Since we lived quite a ways from each city our TV picture was primarily snow, remember snow??? 😁
So what are your early memories of the infancy of television???
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I had the same channels as varian
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2- ??
4-KMOX
5-KSD
11 - KPLR
then when channel 30 UHF hit whoa boy,,,,
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I remember when Obama gave us cable......
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2
NBC out of Bristol Tn.
CBS out of Johnson City Tn.
Dad had a antenna about three hundred feet up on a hill behind the house. Ran the ole two wire ladder type "coax" to the house. Lighting magnet to say the least. Little fart at the time and mom had set on the kitchen cabinet beside the sink.
Kaboom and the lighting ran the cable to the house, knocked off some house siding and felt like I lost part of my behind. OUCH.
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for many years two channels 2 and 7 our Tv did not have the selector for anything above 12 LOL then we got a uhf vhf new fangled TV and added channel 22 later on, all were out of Dayton Ohio .
as a small kid I remember asking my dad why do have 12 channels but only two work , he just replied depending on where you live in the country you have the other channels .
when cable came along OMG like sliced bread for the first time . when my wife and I married and moved into the country no cable or satellite so back to three channels but we did buy a VHS player
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My earliest memories were in the early 60's. We lived in central Iowa and there were only the three main networks. When we moved to central Illinois in the late 60's we had the three main networks and an independent station...on occasion if everything worked perfectly we could get channel 9 out of Chicago.....
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We got our first TV in 1958. Got two stations out of, Amarillo, Texas, 4 & 10. Added channel 7 a few years later.
By the time we landed a man on the moon we had a color TV (and a telephone!) but still the same three stations/
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montanajoe: 31515846413211/comments/31515872981147
2- ??
4-KMOX
5-KSD
11 - KPLR
then when channel 30 UHF hit whoa boy,,,,
those i had also normally along with the ABC affiliate at Harrisburg Il.. but living out in the open country with a very tall antennae on certain nights we got stations in Paducah Ky and Cape Girauxdeau Mo with a very infrequent Springfield Illinois
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Got our first TV about 1948. Giant 12" screen. Three stations for a long time. First shows I remember were Candid Camera & The Jerry Lester show (I only watched to see Dagmar). I remember we usually had to have someone behind the set most of the time to adjust the vertical & horizonal controls.
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Only had ONE channel until maybe 1983 when I put up a tall TV tower. Then had ONE channel and a couple of sketchy now & then others. Not until mid-90's did we have more than one consistently available channel.
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When I was a child, back in the 60's, growing up in Detroit.
Chl 2 - WJBK CBS (Currently this is Fox and CBS is Ch62)
Ch4 - WWJ NBC (The home of Tiger baseball)
Ch7 - WXYZ ABC
Ch9 - CKLW CBC Windsor Canada (Hockey Night in Canada, eh?)
Ch50 - WKBD
Ch56 - WTVS - NET (National Education TV) the precursor for PBS
Ch62 - WXON
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In the late 60's a small local cable company came to our area of northern lower Michigan. Midwestern Cable IMMIC and for a monthly payment of 12 dollars several new to us channels were received. WKBD Detroit had Bill Kennedy Showtime movies along with some early Japanese cartoons like Speed Racer, Astro Boy, and Kimba the white lion. Also got a couple stations out of Greenbay WI.
It was just the beginning of pay for TV and the rates increased as the cable providers ate each other up with buy outs and name changes.
I had enough several years ago of paying for 200 channels of crap and cut the cord. My indoor antenna now is just like the early days of just a handful of choices. A full circle back to the beginning!
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We had 3 stations in Atlanta, plus PBS. In the late sixties this weird little UHF station, Channel 17 popped up.
I don't remember just what programming they did but they were going nowhere. Then in the seventies this billboard guy named Ted Turner bought the station and turned it into the superstation. The first station to use a satellite to broadcast all across the country.
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Brookwood: 31515846413211/comments/31515877134747
In the late 60's a small local cable company came to our area of northern lower Michigan. Midwestern Cable IMMIC and for a monthly payment of 12 dollars several new to us channels were received. WKBD Detroit had Bill Kennedy Showtime movies along with some early Japanese cartoons like Speed Racer, Astro Boy, and Kimba the white lion. Also got a couple stations out of Greenbay WI.
It was just the beginning of pay for TV and the rates increased as the cable providers ate each other up with buy outs and name changes.
I had enough several years ago of paying for 200 channels of crap and cut the cord. My indoor antenna now is just like the early days of just a handful of choices. A full circle back to the beginning!
Can't cut the cord since that &^%* digital TV came in. Before that I could get all the LA stations & often the San Diego stations. Now all I can get is a couple of UHF stations. They just raised my cost $7 this month & in May a $15 discount goes off. Now I have to change providers again. Every two or three years I have to that. I don't understand the business model of forcing your customers to go to your competitors. Are there really people stupid enough to pay the higher prices?
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discusdad: 31515846413211/comments/31515873412763
https://forums.gunbroker.com/discussion/comment/11259595#Comment_11259595
those i had also normally along with the ABC affiliate at Harrisburg Il.. but living out in the open country with a very tall antennae on certain nights we got stations in Paducah Ky and Cape Girauxdeau Mo with a very infrequent Springfield Illinois
Yes, channel 3 out of Harrisburg, with Cactus Pete at 5:00 I believe. Channel 6 out of Paducah and 12 out of Cape. We got channel 11 out of St. Louis of some cloudy nights and watched wrestling at the Chase with the Crusher, Dick the Bruiser, Moose Cholauk, Cowboy Bob Eilis, Black Jack Lanza, ect. ect.😂
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Sam06:
Gordon Solie-
there’s a blast from the past.😁
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That brought back some memories gruntled2 . My dad in Peoria that owned Smith & Applegate sponsored Candid Camera back on the '50's.
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the only three there was 2, 6, 9
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Brookwood: 31515846413211/comments/31515877134747
In the late 60's a small local cable company came to our area of northern lower Michigan. Midwestern Cable IMMIC and for a monthly payment of 12 dollars several new to us channels were received. WKBD Detroit had Bill Kennedy Showtime movies along with some early Japanese cartoons like Speed Racer, Astro Boy, and Kimba the white lion. Also got a couple stations out of Greenbay WI.
It was just the beginning of pay for TV and the rates increased as the cable providers ate each other up with buy outs and name changes.
I had enough several years ago of paying for 200 channels of crap and cut the cord. My indoor antenna now is just like the early days of just a handful of choices. A full circle back to the beginning!
me too..........cut the cord.
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We had 4 channels. ABC Channel, 5, WOI , Ames Iowa; CBS Channel 8, KCCI, Des Moines; NBC, Channel 13 WHO, Des Moines; Iowa Public Channel 11, Des Moines. .
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In Charleston SC
WCSC-Ch5-CBS
WUSN-Ch2-NBC
WCIV-Ch4-ABC
All FREE too. No cable bill either🤗
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lkannes: 31515846413211/comments/31515909613339
We had 4 channels. ABC Channel, 5, WOI , Ames Iowa; CBS Channel 8, KCCI, Des Moines; NBC, Channel 13 WHO, Des Moines; Iowa Public Channel 11, Des Moines. .
Those are the exact stations I had as a kid, also.
But, I'm a couple years younger than you, and we're from the same town...
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We had two in Finland, I remember when we got our 1st color tv 😀
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OK :
Black n White portable w-rabbit ear antenna : ( So. Illinois ) .
I remember 4 channels ( one was PBS )
and one a good lucky day we got a St. Louis channel !
What a time !
Many memories as a kid !
Thanks !!!
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Didn't have any. Lived so far out in the sticks, if we wanted sticks we had to import them.
First TV was when I was in high school.
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Just one station in April of 1948, KSTP (still around). WTCN started in July '49. We didn't get a tv 'til 1954 when there were 3 stations. Don Leary's was a radio, tv & record shop where you could rent a tv for $1 a day in '48.
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3-CBS
5-NBC
8-ABC
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4 the 3 main networks and one PBS station that you had to tune for and it was hit and miss.
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as most have said, the big 3 networks and one pbs station on the old antenna/rabbit ears. and never a lack of something to watch!, unless it was after midnight and the station went off air, now have close to 100 and nothing to watch........
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