See yourself on Color TV at the Museum in Chicago, 1959

[old_tv_nut]

In the late 50's, the Museum fo Science and Industry in Chicago had a color TV exhibit sponsored by RCA (who else?). (It had been preceded by a black and white TV exhibit also sponsored by RCA.)

In 1959, Queen Elizabeth visited North America including Chicago and the Museum. (The Queen and her party came to Chicago via the St. Lawrence Seaway and the Great Lakes.)

As has been posted elsewhere here, this exhibit used the very insensitive and high-lag three-vidicon RCA color camera that otherwise saw use only as a closed circuit camera for medical operations.

The following two black and white shots are scanned from newspaper negatives that were recently sold on ebay.

I have posted straight scans and also with the shadows boosted so the images on the TV set are more visible. In the image where the prince is walking across the stage, you can see how much the TV image is smeared by the vidicon lag.


Queen Museum negative1 by old_tv_nut, on Flickr


Queen Museum negative1 shadow boost by old_tv_nut, on Flickr


Queen Museum negative 2 by old_tv_nut, on Flickr


Queen Museum negative 2 shadow boost by old_tv_nut, on Flickr

Here for reference is a scan of an old museum guidebook showing the exhibit in color. Note tht for this image a lot of light was added to the foreground and walls to make the models visible as more than silhouettes. Also, the picture on the TV was faked by copying cutting and pasting part of the direct image of the scene.

MSI Color TV crop by old_tv_nut, on Flickr