I find the TV Western era which ran from the late 40's to the mid 60's interesting. It peaked in 1959 with an incredible number 30 western series running every week. By the end of the 60's they were almost all gone with the exception of some modern day series set in the west.The only thing I remember seeing on TV in the classroom were the early Mercury launches like Shepard. Later launches became so common they'd just barely rate a mention in the 6 oclock evening news broadcasts. The moon landing didn't happen until I was in the Air Force and married the first time.I remember they used to wheel TVs into the classroom so we could watch the 69 Mets during day gamesIt's UHF, ultra high frequency. UHF television began in 1952. Before that time there was only VHF, Channels 2-13. UHF was channels 14 thru 83. Of course all of this went away in the US with the digital conversion which completed about 10 years ago. It met a lot of resistance but is now seen as one of best things the FCC has ever done for television.Color was well established by the time I was born, but we did have 2 black and white portables when I was young. One even had a UFH channel that would pick up if you played with the knob and the weather was just right. Never crystal clear but good enough to see more image than snow. We always had cable so they were more a novelty for when camping and such.
My dad said little battery power TV's were all the rage when he was in school because they would let students bring them to school during March Madness to watch games during lunch, etc. Of course he also said a lot of the teachers would just check TV's out from the resource center and they would watch them in class while they were doing an "in-class reading assignment" those days.
That was before the games went on till midnight
Almost all these westerns were set during the Indian Wars from the 1860 to 1880. They had such an impact on our culture that millions of American grew up believing that they accurately portrayed the "old west." when in fact most of them were so fictitious they bordered on fantasy.
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