As long as great shows like "Wheel of Fish" are shown, I will watch this new frontier in televised-vision.

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop: Win!

Today, We teach poodles how to fly!

When I was really little we had a TV that would only get UHF channels if someone stood there and held down the button. When my dad would get back from jogging, he'd make whichever of his progeny he managed to capture stand there holding the button while he did sit-ups so he could watch a soccer game on the Spanish-language channel or something equally inane. All the while we complained bitterly that he smelled sweaty and he told us to keep our head tipped just so to help supplement the antenna's reception.

If we complained too much, he'd threaten us with "sweat hugs."

Good times, UHF. Good times!

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop:

Supplies!

@Pibbs: Spatula City!

Ah, ultra-high frequency. How did you go from being the superior bandwidth, to being cluttered with foreign language programming and shop at home services?

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop: You get to drink from the FIRE HOSE!

Who knew Mallory was responsible for the vibrator power supply in their car radio?? Heck who knew their car radio HAD a vibrator power supply!?!?!?!

Or, another fun fact about UHF-TV. Originally encompassing channels 14-83, then 14-69, and now 14-52, the upper limits of the band were given to cellular companies. All TV stations had to move to channel 69 or under. If you had an old TV with a tuner that still went up to channel 83, you could listen to cell phone calls. Around channels 81, 82, and 83 you could pick up cell phones, around the mid-1990s before GSM and fancy 3G stuff. More importantly, you had to have that small knob for fine tuning to get more calls. Good times eavesdropping!

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop: We've got it all on UHF!!

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop: "What do you think R.J. Fletcher Senior would be saying if he were alive today?"
"Help me out of this box, I can't breathe in here. Help, let me out."

@FreeShaggy: Badgers?!? BADGERS!?! WE DON"T NEED NO STINKIN" BADGERS!!!

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!): Tape wouldn't have hold it down?

Not that you could exactly go back and suggest that to yourself.. but ya know.. lol.

Our old tv didn't have a remote at one time, so my brother and I would lay on the floor and watch tv, and he'd change it with his toe.

Ahh, lazyness.

PS. Sweat hugs, that is hillarious and frightening at the same time.

@Kimaroo - No Stars Upon Thars: The buttons were a metal ring with a metal dot on the inside, and basically a finger completed the circuit and switched the channel. For whatever reason, the TV wouldn't stay switched to the UHF channels, so someone had to hold the button, and it had to be something conductive, not tape.

But not a paperclip taped in place, that almost set the house on fire.

It was a really old TV.

@Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!): Your dad sounds awesome! I can see me doing that to my son when he gets older, and I already threaten my wife with "sweaty hugs" after gym sessions so I guess I'm ahead of the curve.

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop:

I, for one, welcome our new UHF overlords...

@kc2gvx: Man that sounds like something from the KGB field manual

@Grabraham:

And they also invented the Duracell battery! (Actually true)

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop:

That's me getting Weird Al to sign my copy of UHF at a party he was at for an audiobook he did the voice on ("Dog Train"). He was shocked and awe'd.

Oh noes! Old Popular Mechanics issues on Google Books... as if the internet didn't have enough ways to help me waste time...

@mazzic1083: He is awesome, and I can tell you the best side-effect of the sweaty hugs is that he turned 59 this year, still does triathlons, 10Ks, 20-mile bike rides for after-work recreation, and is in excellent shape to provide sweaty hugs to his grandchildren for years to come now that he has achieved grandfatherhood. :)

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop:
This is one threadjack I wholeheartedly support.

Dun, dundundun, dundundun, dundundun, da Da DAAAAA!
Dun, dundundun, dundundun, dundundun, dun dun-dun da DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!
What, you guys don't like Bonanza?

MY MOP! THEY'VE GOT MY MOP!
^_^

Be sure to rescan often or you may miss an episode of "Ted Mack's The Original Amateur Hour" on the DuMont.

BTW: is this compatible with a punchcard -based DVR?

Weird Al would be proud.

@GTI2.0: aw crap, embed didn't work

And to think I'd rather see the Indian Head then most of the channels I get now.

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop: Don't you know the Dewey Decimal system???

I'm just trying to figure out why their car stereos--- I mean, radios, had 'vibrator power supplies'...

The dude on pg 6 is ENTIRELY too Creepy.
[img146.imageshack.us]
Almost makes me want to put it on my neighbor's door for Halloween.

@GTI2.0: Here is a photo of Al singing "Wanna b ur luvr" to my wife when we attended an Al concert on one of our wedding anniversaries.

@GitEmSteveDave_GoneInAMmmBop: ooh a red snapper, very tasty.

@GTI2.0: COOL! I love Weird Al!

@2 replies by: Eeeeyeeewww....that made me squirm. And not in a good way.

@TVGenius: The vibrator referred to a relay that cycled on-off rapidly that broke up the DC into a pseudo-AC, then sent that through a transformer to increase voltage for the tubes.

Kids whose families had UHF were like kids whose families had color televisions: Instant Neighborhood Popularity. I remember marveling at MarineBoy (from the Kimba/Astroboy Japanese cartoon family) in color and feeling in genuine awe of the SECOND channel dial!

Of course, Bubbe Rae had a remote in the late 50s and I thought that was like owning a private flying saucer, too.

@TVGenius: Some info on electronic vibrators:
[en.wikipedia.org]

Any one have old C-band sat at home ads?

@kc2gvx: You know what's ironic, I live in Charlotte which has a really high Spanish speaking population. There are absolutely no Spanish language / Hispanic television stations (unless you have cable, which I do not by choice).

I guess a lot of people would find them annoying, but I actually would like to watch the channels to help in my quest to learn Spanish. I guess the upside is that there are not really any shopping channels, so I guess have something to be grateful for.

Well, June 12th is only days away, even if it is October 26.

I remember UHF channels when I was a kid in Kansas City. They were crappy channels with no clear picture. The good channels were VHF.

@otherginger: gah, we didn't get a color tv till the watergate hearings.

scarred for life, I tell ya.

Ah yes, childhood.

I thought having my tonsils removed was going to be sooooo cool because I was going to sit in bed and watch TV. Alas, what I did not know was that the dinky B&W placed into my room would only pickup the single UHF station in my area... and it was public television doing a fund raiser. Worse, every time Mom or a neighbor cranked up a vacuum cleaner or can opener the TV would go nuts with static.

Life suxed.

I lived in Portland OR when KPTV, the first commercial UHF station in the country, went on the air on channel 27 in 1952. We had a Philco 21" TV with optional UHF tuner. Back then, vacuum tube technology wasn't quite up to the task and the tuner designers had to run the tuner tubes at or above their design limits. As a result, we'd usually get 6-8 months of viewing before the picture would start getting snowier and snowier. A new tube would fix things for another few months. We were happy when KPTV switched to VHF channel 12 a couple of years later.

Hell, UHF was years in coming. We had all we could do when they introduced VHF.

not to nitpick, but 'transition' is when the old service is being turned off. This was a UHF expansion, not transition.

I remember turning the inside dial from channel 15 to channel 39 (zzzzzzzzzz!), and then push/turning the outside wheel to tune in the picture. Also, going outside to turn the antenna depending on if we were watching a Los Angeles station or one from San Diego. That was before we bought the rotor that used a motor to turn it from inside the house (hmmmmmm, clunk, hmmmmmm, clunk!)

Kids these days! They don't remember having 2 dials... or an antenna... or even what a dial is (it's like an iPod wheel that - aw forget it!).

Lousy stinkin' kids with their hula hoops and their hip hop records and sock hops...

Oh, this brings back great memories! When I was little, our old black & white set had tubes & when the set acted up, Dad pulled it away from the wall, turned out the light, and tried to see which tube wasn't lit or something. Then it was off to the hall closet, and getting the box of spare tubes. The best part was when the spare tubes didn't do the job, and I got to go with Dad to town to a store that had a tube tester. He always put the suspected tubes in his hat. Dad tested the tubes, while I got a free stick pretzel and a cold drink from the fountain.

It's amazing what we remember from childhood. This makes me smile to this day!

@ducttape38: You won't learn much Spanish. Trust me, you'll spend more time looking at the weather girl and trying to figure out if there's a cohesive plot line somewhere...