Quote:
Originally Posted by bgadow
The first TV I remember was my parents GE color console, KE chassis.
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Like Bryan, that was our first color TV too, a GE 21" KE chassis tabletop on a cart, circa 1969. Complete with Alliance Tenna Rotor. Unlike Bryan, I'm a 1958 model, so I remember TV all the way back to about 1962 or 63.
My first TV memories are sitting on the couch watching Amos & Andy and the Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour on my parents' 27" B&W Philco consolette, a 1955 model. Specifically the episode where Fred MacMurray gets stuck up in tar in a 1957 T-Bird. That chase scene at the end is a masterpiece, where they all race to get the uranium discovery claimed, and I was a car nut at a very early age and that scene was memorable.
I have B&W Polaroids of me and my sister sitting next to that same TV during John F. Kennedy's funeral procession. It was replaced with a GE 19" portable and then with the 21" color TV. My parents were frugal and never bought a console version of anything.
Like Bryan, I remember looking inside the back of that GE color TV and seeing all the glowing Compactrons inside. It lasted a long time and I eventually fixed it several times before it was replaced by a cable-ready 1988 Magnavox solid state with remote. I still have the old GE in my living room. It needs some more work.
Dad always ruled the TV viewing as long as he was in front of the TV. So we always got to see what dad wanted to see. We did have two little B&W GE portables elsewhere in the house, and a little Westinghouse B&W portable too. I kept the Westinghouse in my bedroom and it worked a long, long time.
I also remember watching Dark Shadows on that GE since we could finally get Charlotte's UHF station, channel 18, with the outside antenna. It wasn't carried on the local ABC station. Dark Shadows came on after school was out and watching it felt a bit like forbidden fruit. Both my younger sister and I watched it and loved how different it was. It didn't warp our minds. Or I don't think it did.
As a young child I also watched Captain Kangaroo and Romper Room a lot. Sometimes I saw local shows called The Old Rebel and Bob Gordon Theatre and Fred Kirby and the Little Rascals. Mornings we would watch Arthur Smith and The Good Morning Show before going to school.