My Dozen-Year-Old 1951 Emerson TV In 1964

Although born in London, Ontario, I lived in Long Branch and went to high school at New Toronto Secondary. There was a new Bad Boys Appliance Store at the end of our street. I was in Grade  9 or 10 on my way home from school and went in to peruse the used TV section as I often did. THERE IT WAS!  A big, dozen year or so old, 1951 Emerson 16" TV. No price on it but the tag said "Not Working".  I asked the salesman... How much? He said "How much do you have?"  I said I only had fifty cents on me but I could get more. He said "Fifty cents would do it. How will you get it home?"  I said "I'll bring my Toronto Star paper route wagon". Done deal! I don't know how I got it upstairs to my bedroom but that's where it sat for several years.  Some of the time not working at all, or some of the time doling out only audio. Good sound though, it had a nice, big speaker.

I guess it came with a cardboard back on it but it would have been the first thing removed and I don't remember there being one on there ever again. The smell of the interior of the TV seemed to me like a mix of burnt dust and old cigarette butts. I re-experienced this burnt dust/tobacco smell over half a decade or so later when I was working in "Production" at the television station CFPL in London. The control room, the transmitter room, and master control all had that same "high voltage" burnt dust smell and of course everyone smoked so, the mix was complete.

...the interior of the TV seemed to smell like a mix of burnt dust and old cigarette butts.

Of course there was no Internet so any knowledge about repair was by word of mouth (unreliable at best) or the public library. (again, limited at best)  or from a teacher at school (somewhat better) The drug store had a tube tester and I was soon well known at the pharmacy. I don't know how much money I wasted on replacing good tubes that were falsely condemned by that thieving tube tester. One day, by some miracle the TV came to life. The fault was a soldered-in glass fuse I think. (that I likely bridged with a piece of copper wire) It's amazing that I never electrocuted myself, but I was taking "Electricity" in high school so I was somewhat aware of the danger and managed to get most of my serious electric shocks at school in "a supervised and safe environment".  Watch out for that big wire from the "HV fly-back transformer" that attaches to the side of the picture tube. Ha ha!

Twilight Zone, Margie and The Untouchables were my favorites. (All in lovely black and white of course!) No other kids I knew had TV's in their room. Lucky me, but homework did take a back seat I'm afraid. Living in Toronto, with USA across Lake Ontario, we could get, without an outside antenna, (some a little snowy with only "rabbit ears"), 3 Buffalo NY channels (2, 4, and 7). Also channel 6 CBC and later the new channel 9 Agincourt and also channel 11 in Hamilton. Rarely, channel 13 in Kitchener and 12 in Erie PA. There was no cable or PBS.

CLICK HERE to see a sales brochure for Emerson TV's
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