It wouldn’t look all that elaborate today, but for 1928, it was amazing. And it happened twice in the same day.
On September 11, 1928, WGY in Schenectady, New York, and its short wave stations aired television’s first live drama. The play was broadcast from 1:30 to 2, Eastern Daylight Time, then done all over again from 11:30 to midnight to see how reception would be on the West Coast. Feature stories about it were written in the papers as well as radio publications of the day. We bring you one version below, penned without a byline for the Associated Press.
WGY, in essense, became the first flagship station of a TV network. Two other stations picked up the 10:30 p.m. Tuesday plays from WGY, for a time, anyway, and re-broadcast them.
In the Midwest, there was interest in television from owners of radio stations WIBO, which was airing picture programming; WENR, licensed as W9XAG, and WMAQ.
Radio Fairs were big things in the 1920s. Television got notice at fairs in New York, Los Angeles and St. Louis in September 1928. It seems the sets didn't work according to plan in the latter two cities. The Los Angeles set-up was courtesy of W6XF, licensed to Calvin J. Smith, general manager of KGFJ, owned by Ben McGlashan, who had his own television license for W6XAM from September 1928 to the following August. The station engineer, Ken Ormiston, had worked for (and apparently slept with) mega-church evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson, and was a central figure in her "kidnapping" in 1926. The Radio Commission struck W6XF off its list of stations in September 1929.
Newly-inaugurated WRNY added more television broadcasts in September 1928. TV listings don’t reveal what was broadcast.
Philo Farnsworth’s backers kept shilling his electronic television system, and articles appeared in the papers in September.
For historical interest, we add an overseas story—John Baird’s colour TV demonstration. The papers didn’t say exactly when it happened.
Below are a selection of stories about television in September, including when and where someone could pick up TV signals on a regular basis.
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 1928Picture Schedules in Broadcast Band
Two stations within the broadcast band and their associated short wave transmitters are maintain regular schedules of television signals. One is WGY at Schenectady, picked up within a 24-hole scanning disc and the other is WRNY, New York, picked up with a 48-hole scanning disc. The Eastern Standard Time schedule of these stations are as follows:
WGY, 379.5 meters—Tuesday, Thursday, Friday from 12:30-1 p. m.
WGY and 2XAF, 31.4 meters—Tuesday from 10:30-11 p. m.
WGY and 2XAD, 21.96 meters—Sunday 9:15-9:30 p. m.
WRNY, 326 meters—2XAL, 30.91 meters—First five minutes of each hour of broadcasting as follows:
Monday, 6, 7, 8, 10 and 11 a. m. Twelve noon, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 p. m.
Tuesday morning schedule as above. Evening 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11 p. m.
Wednesday same as Monday save that 7 and 8 p. m. are added.
Thursday same as Monday with no television broadcasts after 12 noon.
Friday same as Monday save the 7. 8, 9 and 10 p. m. are added.
Saturday same as Tuesday save the last broadcast is at 9 p. m.
Sunday 6, 7, 8, 10 and 11 a. m. Afternoon at 1:30, 2:30, 3:30, 4:30 and 5:30 o’clock.
WIBO, Chicago, has been testing television transmitting apparatus, while WMAQ, Chicago, is planning to come on the air later with pictures. In the short waves WLEX, Boston, has been active, while 3XK, C. Francis Jenkins station at Washington, transmits silhouettes on 46.72 meters at 8 p. m. Eastern Standard Time on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
New Television Station
Station 9XAG, the Aero Products, Inc., Chicago, is the latest station to receive a license for television.
No regular schedule has been arranged, but it is expected that the station will present a regular picture schedule this winter.
At present engineers of Aero are experimenting with a new and as yet unproved method which, according to reports, shows much promise. (Cincinnati Post)
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 1928
WCLB SEEKS LICENSE TO USE SHORT WAVES
Even Television Tests Are Contemplated at Seaside.
After several weeks of operation, WCLB is already preparing its plans for expansion. The new transmitter building on the banks of Reynolds Channel in the northeastern section of Long Beach will be ready for late fall and winter broadcasting.
Application for increase of power has been filed with the Federal Radio Commission.
An application has also been filed for a short wave license. Television experiments are planned.
The board of directors of WCLB includes William J. Dalton, Mayor of Long Beach.
A feature of WCLB is the Long Beach Junior Police Band comprising 40 boys between the ages of 11 and 17 under the directorship of Police John F. Sweeney. WCLB broadcasts this feature from the Boardwalk and Laurelton Long Beach, N. Y. every Thursday at 7 P. M. (Brooklyn Times)
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 1928
NEW TELEVISION DEVICE OBJECTS REPRODUCED IN GREAT DETAIL, IT IS SAID.San Francisco Inventor Does Not Employ the Scanning Disc or Any Moving Attached to Receivers.
SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 3. (AP)—The Examiner today says Philo T. Farnsworth, young San Francisco inventor, has perfected a new system of radio television which does away with the revolving scanning disc feature, which reproduces objects in great detail and which can be manufactured to retail at $100 or less.
Two San Francisco capitalists, W. W. Crocker and Roy N. Bishop, were said by the newspaper to have financed Farnsworth and assisted him to obtain patents.
A demonstration of the apparatus was represented as having revealed that the new machine would make cigarette smoke plainly visible in reproducing a likeness of a man taking a smoke.
Farnsworth said his machine required no moving parts and could easily be attached to the average home radio set. He asserted it would reproduce pictures at a rate of twenty a second, thus perfectly recording motion.
DEMONSTRATION OF TELEVISION DRAWS
LOS ANGELES’ greatest radio exposition—the sixth annual National Radio Show—flung open its doors to the public today in the Ambassador auditorium.
Thousands of Labor day crowds flocked to the opening. It was expected a record first day attendance for Southern California radio shows would be established by night.
The wonders of television, the most remarkable new achievement in radio, and entertainment by the best of radioland’s entertainers in the Southland proved a double magnet which began drawing the crowds even before the opening of the doors.
More than 1000 persons were at the doors before the order was given to open the show.
Kenneth G. Ormiston, well known Los Angeles radio engineer, had charge of the exhibition of television. While television has been shown before at special gatherings and the apparatus itself has been publicly displayed, this was the first time the public in Southern California had an opportunity of seeing just how television works.
Under Ormiston’s supervision, reception outfits tuned in on the images on the air from Atlantic coast broadcast stations, from Los Angeles’ new television station KGFJ at Washington and Oak streets and from a broadcasting set in the auditorium itself.This auditorium broadcast was provided as a unique feature. Images of persons in one section of the auditorium were broadcast and picked up by the receiving set in another part of the auditorium so that persons standing near the receiving set might see images of their friends far away from them in the crowds near the broadcast set. (Los Angeles Record)
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 1928
Television Pictures Of Hoover Address Planned by Leaders
WASHINGTON, Sept. 6 (AP)—A plan has been undertaken by the motion picture section of the Republican national committee for the national broadcasting by television of a motion picture of Herbert Hoover when he makes his address at Newark, N. J., on September 17.
Under the plan, small receiving screens would be installed in several cities, probably San Francisco, Chicago and Washington, and the nominees friends near his California home, the breadth of a continent away, as well as his wife in the living room of Washington home would be able to see him on the platform and listen to his voice.
TELEVISION IN TRANSMITTED COLOR IS IN A TEST LONDON, Sept. 6 (AP)—Television transmission in color has been accomplished by J. L. Baird, British inventor.
Combining his television equipment with apparatus similar to that for color moving pictures, Mr. Baird demonstrated his latest development in light transmission before an audience of scientists and newspapermen.
The same demonstration witnessed the sending of a moving object illuminated only by sunlight and marked another chapter in the years of patient work Mr. Baird has devoted to television.
The idea of sending radio pictures in color has been brewing for some time in the minds of inventors, including American scientists, but it is claimed in England that Mr. Baird's demonstration was the first practical exhibition. In sending colors, there is presented to the eye, in rapid succession first a green image, a blue and then a red. From these three primary colors, any other tint may be obtained. When the three, are combined, they give an impression of white.
Mr. Baird's mechanism consisted of a disc perforated with three spirals of holes arranged consecutively round the disc. With this disc it was possible to traverse the image firstly with a blue spot of light, secondly with a red spot, and thirdly with a green spot.
The transmitter thus sent out first a picture which showed only the blue parts of the scene, then a picture showing the red parts, and lastly, one showing only the green parts. At the receiver all were combined, and gave to the eye the impression of a picture in colors.
The receiver, which in the case of the first demonstration was several floors removed from the transmitter, used a similar disc.
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 1928
SPANISH YOUTH PERFECTS TRANSMITTER THAT PROMISES TO ADVANCE TELEVISION
Machine Enables Broadcasting of Images on Same Wavebands That Stations Use; Coming Shows to See Demonstrations.
CHICAGO, Sept. 8. (AP)—A youth of Spanish lineage has perfected a television transmitter has which perfected he and his sponsors claim has gone far in the art of projecting images by radio.
U. A. Sanabria is his name, and he is only 22 years old. The apparatus will be demonstrated at both the Radio World’s Fair at New York and the Chicago Radio Show. His demonstrations have been conducted in co-operation with A. J. Carter, Chicago manufacturer.
Sanabria says that his machine enables the broadcasting of an image on the same wavebands that broadcasting stations use, and he hopes eventually to broadcast sound and light synchronously. The reduction of interference and a greater leveling of light he names as the apparatus' greatest addition to the advancement of television.
For several weeks station WIBO has been broadcasting test pictures with the Sanabria machine, receivers scattered throughout the city picking up the images. WMAQ also is planning to install the broadcasting appartus. Sanabria four years ago transferred his interest from the wire transmission of pictures to radio. He has devoted all his time to the experiments. A millionaire newspaper publisher who financed him, becoming impatient, abandoned the youth just a few months before his machine was perfected.
The present machine will project only one image. It will, however, show clearly a person talking or singing The inventor hopes to develop it to a point where it will broadcast and pick up any number of images. The image projected is somewhat like a sepia half-tone reproduced in newspaper picture sections or magazines.
The subject to be broadcast stands or sits before a hood like a megaphone. A ray of light from an arc lamp is thrown through a scanning disc and a lens on to the subject. As the disc, in which there are three series of perforations, cut in the form of spirals revolves across rays, the beam becomes a series of shifting bars of light. At top speed the bars merge into a screen of light not, unlike the screen of a photoengraving. Forty-five images are broadcast per second. That is almost twice as many as any other apparatus can broadcast, the inventor said.
Four photo-electric cells are used in the transmitter. Each is 13 or 14 inches in diameter, spherical in shape, clear on the half into which the light rays are reflected and coated with a light-sensitive cathode which covers the entire back on the inside of the glass.
TELEVISION IN GOTHAM Hundreds of Letters and Calls Listed at WRNY Used to Improve Equipment.
BY LEMUEL F. PARTON.
Consolidated News Service
NEW YORK, September 8.—Hugo Gernsback, president of radio station WRNY, estimated today that within the last few weeks between 3,000 and 5,000 persons in or near New York City had begun building television receiving sets. He based this on hundreds of telephone calls and letters received at the station since it began regularly broadcasting moving images by television three ago. As similar experiments are being conducted in many cities throughout the country, it is apparent that a new army of amateur investigators, comparable in numbers to the youthful pioneers of radio, is rapidly being mobilised.
“We find interest and communications increasing day by day,” Mr. Gernsback. “The construction of a television receiving set is simple, and the fans are finding that they can get results commensurate with the present primitive state of development—frankly, television is just in its beginning. With thousands of experimenters on the receiving end, we find that we have a splendid laboratory, from which we hope much valuable technical information can be obtained. Many of the letters which we have received ask for a longer broadcasting period, which we will inaugurate Monday night.”
The amateur television sets now being built are attached to an ordinary radio. The only parts necessary are a small motor, a neon tube and a disk, the total cost of which is under $50. The disk could be conveniently made at home, as it is merely a perforated plate about the size of a phonograph record, the essential of its functioning being a spiral of tiny holes near the circumference.
Neon gas, already a family name through its use for advertising signs and aviation beacons, will doubtless play the leading role in the development of television, until it is replaced, possibly by the cathode ray. It is this gas, filling a lamp behind the whirling, perforated disc, on the receiving end, which translates into light impulses the incoming electrical impulses and makes possible the reforming of the image in light and shade on the scanning disc. Neon is a rare element, constituting one two-hundred-thousandth of the atmosphere. It is an inert gas, resistant to chemical combinations and hence long-lived.
When you decide to build a television set, you just drop into a store and ask for an “oramatron.” That will get you a regular working neon lamp, or sight tube. This is the most essential and most mysterious of the television outfit. D. McFarlan Moore, an engineer of the Edison Lamp Works of the General Electric Co. of Harrison, N. J., is the mentor of the oramatron. With Thomas A. Edison, he first began his experiments in electric tubes in 1891. In 1893, he made a revolving perforated disc quite similar to the disc used in the present television experiments, and he outlined the possibilities of television at that time.
In 1898, Sir William Ramsay, the British chemist, discovered additional elements among argon and several other inert gases. Mr. Moore wrote Sir William for some neon, but was informed no one could make it and it was not until 1939 that he succeeded in producing it, through experiments with George Claude, a Frenchman, who was working with a liquid air in Paris. In 1913. Sir William supplied Mr. Moore with sufficient neon to allow him to complete his experiments and produce the new sight tube.
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 1928
More Television at W R N Y
W R N Y has announced today it will give three extra 20-minute periods of television broadcasting a day, giving as a reason requests from the public for longer periods of televising in order to permit synchronization at the receiving end. Until now the television broadcasting has been for five minutes in each hour on the air. (Brooklyn Eagle)
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 1928
TELEVISION’S FIRST DRAMA
Only Heads of Characters Seen
SCHENECTADY, N. Y., Sept. 11 (AP)—Broadcast television today made its initial appearance as a vehicle of drama. In a one-act play, having a cast of two characters, engineers of the General Electric Company here demonstrated to a party of newspapermen that television, synchronized with the regular form of radio broadcast, can be used to present the radio audience with both the sight and sound of drama.
Range Is Limited
The background and full-length figures, long familiar to the motion picture audience, have yet to come to the broadcast television drama, today's dramatic presentation indicated. The drama shown at the company’s radio studio appeared on a screen a few inches square and displayed only the heads of the characters, with the moving images or small stage proportions introduced as effects. The spoken portion of the drama was broadcast through regular radio channels by the company's station WGY.
The broadcast of television scenes, with figures in full length and background in some detail, is in the not distant future, the engineers indicated. In a demonstration by Dr. E. F. W. Alexanderson, chief consulting engineer of the Radio Corporation of America and engineer for the General Electric Company, the image of two men in action placed against a background of white, was displayed. This apparatus, of larger proportions than the broadcast apparatus, so far has not been adapted to broadcast wave lengths and therefore must remain being as a laboratory demonstration, said the experimenters.
Simplified Set Used
The television apparatus used in the broadcast of was a simplified and portable set developed by Dr. Alexanderson. The broadcast was through the use of three television ouufits, constituting, so far as the receiving apparatus was concerned, a single camera. The three units were connected with a single broadcasting outfit and through the use of a director's control switch the individual action of each character was sent in consecutive order to the receiving apparatus. The action of today's drama dealt primarily with the faces and facial expressions of the man and woman who had been cast in the play. The audience saw on the tiny screen the face of each character as the lines were spoken or as each registered reaction to the words of the other. When stage effect was needed the image of the stage property was flashed on the screen and the moving picture of a hand turning a doorknob displayed the sound of knob's rattle and the creak of hinges familiar to listeners of the older form of radio drama.
The image on the television screen possessed the clarity of the average newspaper photograph. This degree of clarity was obtained when the screen was viewed from a dozen feet, but at closer range the Image appeared in the form of cubist design. The Jumpy action peculiar to earlier television broadcast was smoothed out in today’s presentation and the movement of the head, lips and eyes registered as natural motions.
Three Sets Employed
The play chosen for the broadcast was J. Hartley Manners' "The Queen's Messenger." The auditorium was a darkened reception room, having for its stage three television receiving sets mounted atop standard radio receivers.
The cabinets housing the sets were of octagonal shape, of the material used ii standard radio receivers and bearing on their faces three control dials. The images appeared on the screen in a reddish cast, a result of the Neon lamp used in the conversion of the broadcast electric impulses into visible light waves.
The limited range of the camera made necessary the "framing" of the actors, that is keeping them within the small pickup area of the camera. The actors worked in front of white screens to give the proper background to their features. It was found that the makeup of the actors must be accentuated even beyond that used on the stage. The mouth, nostrils and eyebrows of the characters were sharply defined with heavy colors and the skin shaded and blended to bring out the contrast.
Prelude to the play was given by a radio announcer, the characters then being presented and the action of the drama started. The business of an electric torch playing across a door brought the opening scene of the play. Then across the screen a hand appeared to insert a key and, this close up scene fading out, the face and voice of the first character came to the audience.
The director turned to the tricks of the motion picture studio presenting his drama. To avoid sharp and confusing changes of faces and scenes, "the fade-out” and "fade-in” common to the motion picture was used.
The motor's mental and visual impression of dizziness was conveyed to the audience through the wobbling of the director’s control knobs sending the image of a waving path across the screen while the actor's voice became thick and husky.
The three units of the camera outfit consisted of a cabinet containing a 24-hole scanning disc and a 1,000-watt lamp as a light source and two smaller cabinets each containing a photo-electric tube and amplifying unit. Through the whirling holes of the disc poured the light of the thousand watt lamp, flooding the face of the subject with its wavering gleam. The actor kept in focus of a photo electric cell whose mechanical eyes picked up the play of light and shadow across the subject's face and transmitted them into electric impulses. The impulses, passed through the amplifier, were carried to the company's experimental station, three miles away and broadcast in a wave length of 379.5 meters.
Go Through Amplifiers
Across the three-mile gap the radio receiver in the laboratory picked up the impulses, passed them through amplifiers; converted them into light waves through the use of neon tubes and registered them on the receiving screen through the scanning disc. Upon the perfect synchronization of the scanning discs in the transmitting and receiving sets depended the clarity of the image.
The second and larger television apparatus demonstrated projected its reproductions on to a cloth screen in the manner of motion pictures. The images so produced measured more than a foot across as against the few inches of the smaller receiving outfit. The primary difference between the larger unit and that used in television broadcasting is in the scanning disc, engineers explaining that the scanning disc of the larger machine contains 48 holes to the inch, while that of the broadcasting apparatus contains but 24 holes.
Parts of the television drama were repeated on the experimental apparatus for comparison. The detail of the faces were sharper and the appearance of some objects not registered in the broadcast was noted in the production by the experimental machine. Laboratory workers sparred and walked across the field of the camera to demonstrate the range of the camera. The faces of figures standing at ten or twelve feet from the camera were not clear, but their clothing and figures were entirely visible to those watching the screen.
To Repeat Drama
The drama was to be repeated tonight, with the broadcast made on both the regular wave lengths and on the short waves used for the benefit of experimenters. Company engineers were watching with interest the attempts of Pacific coast experimenters to pick up the television broadcast.
Dr. Alexanderson, questioned prior to the television exhibition, said he believed that ultimately there would be television theaters, devoting their entire program to this form of entertainment.
Through the course of development, the television screen will lose its reddish tinge and objects will appear their natural colors, Dr. Alexanderson thought.
In their experimental work Dr. Alexanderson and the engineers collaborating with him received their greatest encouragement from the actors, he said, the players displaying the greatest interest in the work.
It is not the present plan of the company to produce television receiving sets for commercial purposes, as the entire project must be made under the observance of laboratory workers, he explained.
The voices and action of actors, perfectly synchronized, last night [11] spanned the nation. A one-act play, broadcast by radio and television from the General Electric Company's station, WGY, at Schenectady, N. Y., was heard and seen in Los Angeles—a distance of 3200 miles—in the studio at Gilbert Lee's home at 2274 Hidalgo avenue.
Mr. Lee, who is a manufacturer by day and an electrical engineer by night, several weeks ago received a television picture over a receiving set, which had been designed by himself and Kenneth G. Ormiston. Last night he was called upon by the General Electric Company to co-operate in the nationwide radio and television broadcast.
RECORD ESTABLISHED
As far as is known, Mr. Lee is the only one on the Pacific Coast who took part in the national test. The reception of both the television pictures and the voices established a record that never before has been equalled. "Until we received the television pictures a few weeks ago," said Mr. Lee at the conclusion of the experiment, "it was believed that the limit of television broadcasting was approximately 200 miles." The reception of the television pictures last night was described by Mr. Lee as being about 60 per cent perfect, while the voice reception was 100 per cent perfect.
APPEARED AS SHADOW
In describing the television pictures Mr. Lee said: "While we could distinguish the actors as they appeared before the television sending device to speak their parts, they appeared to be in a shadow, due to the fact that the signals faded. The television was over one station, 2XAD, at twenty-one meters and the voice over station, 2XAF at thirty-one meters. It is my belief that had the meters been reversed on this test the television, as well as the voices, would have been received p[e]rfectly. The voices and the pictures were perfectly synchronized and presented a miniature vita-phone production."
The test was started at 7:30 p.m. Pacific Coast time, and continued until 8 o'clock.
Mr. Lee received word from the General Electric engineers early yesterday afternoon to prepare to take, part in the test, which was kept a secret until it had been completed. (Los Angeles Times, Sept. 12)
TELEVISION HAS BUFFALO DEBUT THROUGH WMAK
Television made its debut in Buffalo last night [11] when station WMAK in conjunction with WGY of Schenectady, broadcast a one-act play, produced in the Schenectady studio. The play went on at 11.30 o’clock.Notice to owners of ordinary receiving sets that local history was being made in a broadcasting of vision as well as sound was a high-pitched, squealing noise when station WMAK was tuned in. However, sets equipped for television reproduced the scene being exacted the studio and the voices of the speakers.
Some Amateur Television Sets
While there are not many radios in Buffalo and vicinity with television equipment, it was said at station WMAK that some amateurs have sets arranged for such reception. No reports had been received last night on the results attained on these sets.
Station WMAK announced that last night’s experiment was first in a series of its kind. Arrangements for last night's experiment were made so hurriedly that there was not time to give the public advance notice. Announcement will be made in advance of future television transmissions.
The arrangements at the Buffalo end were made by I. R. Lounsberry, manager of WMAK. The operators were Robert C. Trago and Henry Kenny. (Buffalo Courier Express, Sept. 12)
REPORTS RECEPTION OF TELEVISION
SCHENECTADY, N. Y., Sept. 12 (A.P.)—Reception of a television drama broadcast last night [11] by station WGY of the General Electric Company was reported to the company by a Pittsfield, Mass. experimenter. In a telegram signed “Camilli,” the Pittsfield operator said that reception of the television broadcast was “distinctly better after midnight in spite of static.”
MORE TELEVISION AT STATION WRNYSince WRNY started to broadcast on a regular schedule on Aug. 21st, thousands of telephone calls and hundreds of letters have been received by the station asking for lengthened schedules. Up to the present time, the station has been broadcasting television impulses for five minutes of every hour that it is on the air.
Television experimenters have been asking for longer schedules because it is difficult to adjust a television receiver to synchronize and it sometimes takes three or four minutes to get the images into step. For this reason, the station has decided to give three extra twenty-minute periods over WRNY and 2XAL, on 326 and 30.91 meters, respectively. The additional schedule will be as follows: Monday: 6:40 p. m. to 7 p. m.
Tuesday: Midnight to 12:20 a. m.
Saturday: 3:40 p. m. to 4 p. m.
Between the broadcasting of different objects, an operator will break in and will state what is being televised. (Home Talk-The Item, Brooklyn)
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1928
LOS ANGELES, Sept. 15.—(Special.)—This city's annual national radio show has drawn to a close after giving one week of demonstrations calculated to reveal the steps taken during the past year, in advancing audible and visible radio.
Attendance touched the 175,000 mark, 25,000 than the goal of the Radio Trades association of southern California, sponsor of the exposition, according to Waldo T. Tupper, managing director. Three outstanding features marked the show—television, the new devices for improving radio reception in the home, and a daily series of continuous programs, changed each day and furnished by the southern California coterie of broadcast artists.
Kenneth G. Ormiston, prominent southern California radio engineer, held sway in the television booth, where Gilbert C. Lee, Los Angeles business man and dabbler in the art of television, also was found.
A broadcast booth was maintained at the exposition, where television pictures were put on the air, to be picked up in view of the crowd a few feet away by a receiving set, which Ormiston and Lee had installed.
Efforts also were made to bring in television images, broadcast by Los Angeles' news [new] station, KGFJ, or by the eastern sending studios. No great success was experienced in this, due to interference of high-power lines near the Ambassador auditordum, where the show was held.
Crowds were permitted by, gazing first at the sending equipment and then at the recorded image. Jams, almost to the suffocation point, were the rule in the vicinity of the television layout, notwithstanding disappointment was expressed by many of the onlookers at the miniature proportions of the television picture and at the fact that no outside images were brought in.
Although the television display revealed that this new science is far from having attained the perfection which the lay mind believes it has, television proved the sensation of the show, even overshadowing receiving sets which ran into the thousands of dollars and the fact that virtually every radio artist of consequence was on the programs. (The Oregonian, Portland)
Daytonian to Get Chance to Explain Television Project.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 15.—John C. Slade, Hamilton, owner of radio station WRK, today got action from the federal radio commission on his application, filed recently, for a permit authorizing build a television station. So did C. A. Petry, Dayton, who also wants a television station. The action by the commission came in the form of an announcement that hearings are to be held within the next month on the two. Slade and Petry have not yet been notified when the hearing will be granted. The hearing date is set for approximately 20 days after official notices are mailed out from the commission.
It is expected the notices will go out Monday, making the hearing date about Oct. 9. All television licenses will be temporary, said O. H. Caldwell, first zone radio commissioner, and the stations will be authorized to conduct only experimental work. At least a day will be devoted to the hearings.
C. A. Petry, whose home is at 111 W. Hillcrest is an operator for WSMK, Dayton. If his request for a permit is granted, he will build an amateur television station on an experimental basis, he said. (Dayton Daily News)
Dancer’s Dimples to be Sent Over Radio
NEW YORK, Sept. 15 (U.P.)—Ann Pennington’s dimpled knees, long one of the attractions of Broadway, will be broadcast by television over the country today.
The clever dancer will be televisioned with eight girls of contrasting types.
The broadcast today will be the first part of the opening of the radio world’s fair.
Broadcast Television Image Shows Lights and Shadows
By C. E. BUTTERFIELD
Associated Press Radio Editor
New York, Sept. 15.—(A.P.)—Imperfect when compared to a moving picture, the image that a broadcast band television receiver will reproduce contains at least sufficient detail to give a fair indication of what is being transmitted.
Only the lights and shadows will register, considerable detail being lost as transmission over a broadcast station must be held within 5,000 cycles.
Better pictures can be obtained where the channel is as wide as 20,000 cycles, but because station separation is only 10,000 cycles, a limit must be placed on the emitted signal. In short wave picture sending wider channels are available.
Results obtained will depend largely upon the efficiency of the reception apparatus as well as the ability of the experimenter. To see by radio it is necessary to have a neon tube, a scanning disc turned by a motor and some means of regulating the speed ot the motor. Of the various schemes used, engineers recommend from one to three rheostats in the motor lines as the simplest for the amateur. The receiver that feeds the neon tube may be any broadcast set, preferably one with resistance coupled audio amplification, as this system will pass a wider band of frequencies than transformers.
A picture can be seen only when the speed of the receiving motor and its disc is in step, or nearly so, with that at the transmitter. Even then parts of the picture may be lost due to interference or other causes.The received image will be crossed by a series of lines, the number depending upon how many holes the disc contains. In newspaper reproduction, a printed picture is made up of a number of dots, their closeness determining the shade.
For television, a somewhat similar system is used, except that the dots are transmitted and received one after another much like a line is written on a typewriter, but at a high speed. Each dot at the receiver represents a hole in the disc which has passed a ray of light from the neon tube for a fleeting instant. The intensity of this light, which is governed by the variation of the received signal, will determine whether the dot is dark or light. The dots follow each other so closely that the eye receives the impression of a complete picture.
Too much detail must not be expected. Parts of the face, such as the eyes, the lips and the neck, will record as shadows, vaguely following the general outline of the features. Other sections will register as open spots. The picture will be pink, as the glow from the neon tube is that color.
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1928
Plan Exhibit of Television During Show
Western New York radio fans will have an opportunity to see the latest in television apparatus at the fourth annual Radio Show in Convention Hall all week. E. Willis Stratton, who will have charge of the amateur transmitting station exhibit at the show, has completed arrangements with C. Francis Jenkins, famous inventor and pioneer in the field of radio-vision, for the exhibition of the newest in television equipment. The picture receiver, which will be on display, was built by Mr. Jenkins at his laboratories in Washington, D. C.
Television Exhibit
"The telescope enables us to see to great distances, but only along straight lines," says this television expert. "As our only long straight lines lead away off into space, telescopes are necessarily pointed skyward. But with radiovision we can see along curved lines; we can see around obstructions and over mountain ranges."
Mr. Jenkins predicts that In the near future we shall be able to see around the earth. He believes television will prove to be excellent stimulus to peace nations.
"Radiovision as a pantomime story teller is ready to come to our firesides," he states. "It will be fascinating teacher and entertainer, without language, literacy or age limitation. It will soon be a visitor to the old homestead, bringing photoplays, the opera and a direct vision of world activities."
Despite the fact that such an attainment was said to be impossible a few months ago, this expert radio engineer promises radiovision entertainment in the home before the first of next year.
Progress Rapid
Great strides have been made in television since its first public demonstration in 1925, at which time Mr. Jenkins received recognizable moving objects in his laboratory, which were transmitted from the navy radio station, NOF, at Anacostia.
Mr. Jenkins says:
"Radiovision is not visionary or even a very difficult thing to do; speech and music are carried by radio, and sight can be so carried just as easily. For radio is not a noise it is a carrier, comparable to copper wires extending in every conceivable direction from the broadcasting station. Doubtless the story of motion picture entertainment in the theater will be repeated in radiomovies in the home."
There is no television transmitting station in the vicinity of Rochester. The nearest broadcasters of radio pictures are Schenectady, and CKNC, Toronto. These two stations send pictures daily on their regular program transmitting frequencies. Listeners will recognize television broadcasts by the steady hum in their loudspeakers when they tune to the waves of WGY or CKNC.
Foresees Demand
The Jenkins laboratory station, 3XK, at Washington, is heard by Rochester short wave listeners on Monday, Wednesday and Friday nights, transmitting images on a wavelength of 46 meters.
C. Francis Jenkins believes that there now exists a latent interest in radio vision which undoubtedly will soon burst into a great demand for receivers. He foresees a great interest in the home reception of moving silhouettes by radio.
Seeing by radio is but slightly more complex than hearing over the air. There no longer is any mystery connected with television.
Mr. Jenkins, in considering the technical side of the radiovision questions, says:
"The essence of radiovision is the translation of light and darkness into variations of electrical intensity which can be broadcast through the ether and received in the home. Where the microphone of the ordinary sound radio transmitting station picks up sound and translates it into variations of electricity, the eye of radiovision transmitting station analyzes the scene or motion picture before it [turns] into strips of fluctuating light and feeds this electrical representation of the scene Into a regular broadcasting radio transmitter.
Describes Process
"The trickery of the movies is used in radiovision and radio-movies. The eye is satisfied and fooled into seeing motion if fifteen still pictures are flashed on a screen each second. Every motion picture consists of a series of still pictures, each focused on the screen for a mere fraction of a second.
"In television the picture that is to be sent is divided up into many horizontal lines, and the variation of light and darkness along these lines is scanned by an 'electrical eye' that changes the variations of light into variations of electrical impulses. This electrical eye is called a photo-electric cell.
"Some scanning device is used to focus the photo-electric cell upon each point of the picture or scene in succession. For radiovision it is necessary to scan the picture once every fifteenth of a second.
"In the radiovision receiver a neon lamp which fluctuates with the changes of the incoming radio impulses allows the scanning disc to recreate the scene or move that was seen by the eye of the transmitter. (Rochester Democrat and Chronicle)
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 1928 Radio Television Occupies Center of Stage at Display
By SAM LOVE
United Press Staff Correspondent
NEW YORK, Sept. 18, (UP)—Radio television, little more than a dream a year ago, took the center of the stage and held it at the Fifth Annual Radio World's Fair, which opened last night [17] in Madison Square Garden.
The utmost efforts of makers of ordinary radio equipment to lure the fans into their sections of the elephantine spectacle proved futile until the public had satisfied itself about the present condition and future prospects of television. Although some of the more opulent manufacturers had erected Spanish villas and sprinkled them with eye-filling young women and other attention-halting devices, the exposition visitors left them flat for the hastily banged-together beaverboard huts housing the rival television apparatus. Extra police were stationed at the latter to keep the crowds moving.
What they saw was some odd-looking and queer-acting pieces of mechanism. The most amazing one was that of the General Electric company, developed by Dr. E. F. W. Alexanderson, because it demonstrated the hitherto unheard-of feat of projecting television on a silver screen with voice accompaniment.
The screen showed images twelve inches square of the subject to successive crowds of fifty persons who passed in and out of a darkened room as fast as the police could handle them. The achievement moved television out of the "peep-show" and into the movie class, but at about the point where motion picture projection was 25 years ago. Indeed, the images greatly resembled the sort of movies that knocked 'em cold at the St. Louis world's fair.On the 12-inch screen the face of Dr. D. McFarland Moore, inventor of the "Crater Lamp” used in the device—a vacuum tube with what is apparently a white metal spool inside—appeared and lectured briefly. Then Miss Faye Cusick, an actress, and LeLe Crowe, an actor, appeared facially and one after the other for a few moments in a bit from "The Queen's Messenger," a one-act play by Hartley Manners.
Their faces were recognizable but not sharply defined. The playlet was also a trifle vague, owing to its having been bobtailed in order to shorten the program and allow additional audiences to see it.
Dr. Moore explained that the projection was by means of transmitted narrow bands of light, each band racing across the screen with part of the subject's face and all of them picking up the contours and laying them down so, fast that an illusion was created.
It was noticeable in watching television that each time a spectator blinked his eyes, an orange streak seemed to that particular spectator, to slash across the screen. This caused a dazzling effect which could only be avoided, it was explained, by refraining from blinking.
Other television sets at the fair ranged from peep-shows with screens about three inches square to an amateur set in the New York Telegram booth which registered rather clearly, but on a screen about the size of a lady's calling card.
“Will the television receiver of 1935 look like this?" was sign over a cubistic box in the New York Sun booth. The projection, however, was of a miniature movie film, which proved popular because it repeated for all to see the dreadful experience of Gene Tunney during the seventh round with Jack Dempsey in Chicago.
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1928
REFUSE PERMIT THREE RECRUITS ON TELEVISION
WASHINGTON, Sept. 18.—Hearing on the application of C. A. Petry, 3621 W. Hillcrest av., Dayton, for a television license has been indefinitely postponed. The hearing on applications of Petry and John C. Slade, Hamilton, were set for the early part of October, after near half a year of waiting on their part, but now comes Louis G. Caldwell, general counsel for the Federal Radio commission, with the news that litigation arising from the recent reallocation decisions of the commission will block action on the television licenses. (Dayton Daily News)
Television Signals Broadcast Weekly on Station WHAM’s Wave
Listeners who tuned in on WHAM between 10:30 and 11:30 o'clock last night [18] may have wondered what was wrong with the transmission, as nothing apparently was coming over the air except a humming noise. The explanation of this unusual occurrence is that WHAM was broadcasting the second of a series of television programs.
The feature was a play which originated in the studios of at Schenectady and was broadcast over the New York State Network. Radio fans who possess television receiving sets were able to see what was in actuality a moving picture of the actors going through their parts in the Schenectady studio.
These television programs will be a regular weekly feature from WHAM, being broadcast over the New York State Network from WGY every Tuesday evening at 10:30 o'clock. (Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Sept. 19)
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 1928
Romance and science walked hand in hand at the radio world's fair in Madison Square Garden last night [21st, 10 to 10:30 p.m. on WGBS, 349 metres]. A radio television wedding was the outstanding feature of the evening, the bride and groom being Bessie Simpson of 69 West 119th st. and Robert W. Philipson of Winnipeg, Canada. Thousands packed the basement of the great structure eager to behold the couple taking their vows before a microphone in the crystal studio. Arrangements were made for the minister, the Rev. Dr. Clarence C. Harris of the Universalist church, to read the marriage ritual from a room in the Hotel Astor. The music came from the organ of the Hell's Kitchen mission, 550 West 40th st. Receiving sets, loud speakers, microphones and televisors were placed at each of the three points to reproduce the voices and facial expressions of all those participating.
One of the biggest cakes ever baked in the city for a bride was prepared for the wedding. In the hollow center, an Atwater Kent radio set was inserted and the confection was topped by a miniature loud speaker of mother of pearl. (Ben Gross, Daily News, Sept. 22)
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 1928
The Fourth Annual Southwest National Radio Show at the Colesium will close at 11 o’clock tonight with an anticipated attendance for the week of more than 100,000. Officers of the St. Louis Radio Trades Association say the show is the most successful ever held here.[ . . .]
Officials said today that the only unsatisfactory feature of the show was the failure of television apparatus to give a successful demonstration. They have concluded that television has not yet reached a stage of development that assures reception and predict that it will be several years before such devices can be used practically. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch)
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1928
Due to station WGY at Schenectady, New York, taking the speech of Governor Smith last week on Tuesday evening at 11 o’clock, WMAK was unable to have the scheduled television broadcast. However, at 11.05 o’clock this Tuesday evening [25] WMAK will broadcast a program of television originating in the studios of WGY at Schenectady. (Buffalo Courier-Express, Sept. 23)
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 1928 WMAK AGAIN BROADCASTS WGY TELEVISION PLAYLET
Station WMAK, Buffalo, again successfully broadcast a television play last night [25]. The drama, originating in the studios of the General Electric Company at Schenectady and sent out by WGY over the New York state chain, came in flawlessly, tests at the local studio showed.
The broadcast, which was on the air from 11.30 o’clock until 12.30 o’clock this morning, was in charge of Robert Trego and Henry Kenny (Buffalo Courier-Express, Sept. 26)
WMAK TELEVISION
Television was again on the air from Buffalo when station WMAK broadcast a program originating in the studios of WGY at Shenectady [sic]. A unique feature of these programs is that they are more or less impromptu and any one who happens to be in the studio is recruited for a television subject. Objects sent over the ether last Tuesday evening [25] included the General Electric monogram, a photograph of a woman, a man combing his hair, a girl powdering her face, a girl laughing, again a girl powdering her face.
Robert A. Trago, the chief engineer of WMAK has built a television receiving set at the studios and the different objects were received with remarkable clarity. The subject to be transmitted is placed within focus of a photo electric cell. The photo electric cell itself is a converter of light intensities into electric currents which may be employed as in ordinary electrical practice. Through this photo electric effect light is converted into extremely minute electrical impulses. This effect is due to the fact that an insulated metallic conductor loses negative electricity when illuminated. The cause of the loss of negative electricity is brought about by the emission of electrons from the conducting surface. The quantity of electrons omitted varies with the intensity of the light which influences the action. To put it in the form of a rule, the photo electric effect is proportional to the intensity of the illumination and to the time during which it acts.
This television broadcast is on the air from WMAK each Tuesday at 11:30 and will continue throughout the winter.(Buffalo Times, Sep. 30)
Radio Reception Conditions
Radio conditions, while allowing a number of programs of strength, provided no small amount of static in the bargain. Interference, however, of the smooth, frying type as contrasted with the sharp, staccato crashes, and could be tolerated in most cases. Mild rain or cloudiness causes static of the soft, steady sort, while a thunder storm results in the most rabid form of crackling noises.
For a part of the evening KDKA, WGR, and CKGW mutually interfered, with the result that none of the individual programs was intelligible. If one wishes to test the selectivity of his receiver, he should try to separate WPG from WHAM. In spite of a few bad features, reception in general last evening [25] was good.
The television drama, broadcast from WHAM at 10:30 o'clock last night no doubt was enjoyed by all. The plot was good and the actors displayed their abilities to the best advantage. (Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Sept. 26)
Listening In
The WGY television signals, which were broadcast for a half hour, were heard good and loud. Listening to them made me feel like building a televisor and hooking it on instead of the loud speaker, but the wife delivered this ultimatum:
“You’re not going to have any more junk sitting on that front room table. If you are going to build one of those things, you can take the whole business to the back room upstairs.” What to do, what to do. (“Dial Twister,” Knoxville News-Sentinel, Sept. 26)
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 1928
New Television Station Opens In New Jersey Plant Planned for Yonkers Locates Quarters in WRNY Broadcaster
The use of quarters in the Coytesville, N. J., broadcasting station of WRNY has led to the virtual abandonment of plans for a television studio on top of the Proctor Theatre Building, Superintendent William Cave said today.Mr. Cave, who handled early estimates and negotiations for Herbert Pokress of Yonkers, holder of a television rights, said today that the plans for a local station had dropped when a suitable arrangement had been made with the Radio News Magazine station.
It was originally planned to establish a television sending station and studio in the Proctor Building. Conferences were held with Building Superintendent James W. Armstrong on the legality of erecting two steel towers on the building to hold the antennas and estimates for the construction of the towers were asked of the Star Iron Works, Mr. Cave said, but all plans were dropped. (Yonkers Statesman, Sept. 27)
[Note: Pokress was the head of a company trying to establish the Baird television system of Britain in the U.S.]
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1928
As we were talking, a set was tuned in and staccato signals resounded all over the room.
“WCFL sending television,” Alter explained. [Harry Alter was a wholesaler in Chicago]. (Eric Palmer, Brooklyn Daily Times, from Chicago)
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1928
Hotel Will Install Television Throughout
NEW YORK, Sept. 29.—(NEA)—Builders of the new Hotel Carteret here are planning to have a television receiver installed in every room.
Franklin D. Morgan, managing director of the new hotel, says that negotiations are now under way with the Baird Television Co., of Great Britain, for this purpose.
Attempts are also being to get a prominent New York broadcaster to install a television transmitter so that hotel guests may have something to receive each night.
