Televisionaries

Within a relatively recent historical period, modern society has achieved the luxury and benefits of viewing the world through the scope of a variety of media outlets including print, radio and social media. All of these technologies can connect us promptly yet vicariously to the stories and events we otherwise couldn’t share or experience.

Front & center:
Arthur Godfrey

Undeniably, among the most revolutionary of these mediums was that of television.

A technological marvel that was developed by a succession of brilliant inventors throughout the 19th and 20th Centuries, TV’s aim was essentially to transmit images and sounds from a source to a receiver. Traditionally sent by radio waves(broadcasted), today it can also be received through cable, satellite and internet technologies.

The Cisco Kid starring Duncan Renaldo
was the first TV
program filmed in color.

In short, the electronic television contained a cathode ray tube where electrons were beamed into an empty “vacuum” of the tube. The negatively charged electrons would then find their way to positively charged anodes on the screen. “Steering coils” would magnetically move the beam in various directions. Phosphorus dust on the inside of the screen would then emit light as the beams scanned across the screen in rows, forming the transmitted image.

Imogene Coca & Sid Caesar
in Your Show of Shows

In the Twenties and Thirties, the first television stations in America were built with the first TV sets commercially available in 1938. The first TV program believed to have been broadcast was The Queen’s Messenger, ten years earlier.

None of these breakthroughs occurred overnight and television’s subsequent advancements, color and increased sound and image resolution have continued in a similarly unmitigated manner.

<< This RCA Victor / radio / phonograph combination console was a wedding present to my parents from my uncle. As a toddler, my brother had watched the moon landing on this set.

In 1961, Newton Minnow, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission infamously declared television to be “a vast wasteland.” Unfortunately, I’d have to wholeheartedly agree although I think the denunciation might have been fifty years too soon.

Newton Minnow receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016. >>

TV from the golden age undeniably provided great value in entertainment and information. For many, television’s appeal was only as alluring as the programming of the moment. Perhaps the source of Minnow’s criticisms simply resulted from the cancellation of some of his favorite shows.

Are there any great inventions you feel are ‘wasted?'

How and what would you have changed concerning them?

Contact Chris: Name: Email: Comment:

Farewell, Green Manalishi

This week the music world lost a seminal figure in rock and blues with the passing of singer, songwriter and guitarist Peter Green. Known peripherally to the average rock and roll fan, Green’s name might be more familiar than his body of work thanks to the subsequent stardom of the band he initially created.

Fleetwood Mac began in 1967 as a follow-up to Green’s tenure as lead guitarist in John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers, the premiere British blues act of the era.

With the Bluesbreakers’ John McVie and Mick Fleetwood on bass and drums, respectively, the Mac rivaled the popularity of their former group and showcased Green’s signature guitar approach in addition to his soulful interpretations of blues standards. Green also wrote original blues numbers, rapidly evolving into a progressive style that produced the fan favorites, “Albatross”, “Oh Well”, and “Black Magic Woman” which Santana famously covered in 1970.

In Chicago, on a single day(January 4th, 1969), the band prolifically recorded two albums of blues recordings at Chess Studios with a group of their musical heroes that included Willie Dixon, Otis Spann and Buddy Guy. But in the Sixties, music and style were in a constant state of change and Green’s mind was in equal flux.

He soon began a downward spiral of disillusionment and drug addiction, resulting in his decision to quit the band in 1970. Giving away his belongings and walking away from music at the height of his fame, he cited religion as one of the factors in ditching the band he founded four years earlier.

Many point to a single incidental detour as the breaking point in Green’s life. During a tour of Europe, Green attended an LSD party at a commune in Munich. It was soon after this event and his sudden associations with the commune’s members that Green exhibited noticeable changes in his mental state and extreme ideologies (Fleetwood Mac’s guitarist Danny Kirwan was said to have been with him at the commune, experiencing a concurrent decline in his own mental health).

Diagnosed with schizophrenia, Green dropped out of the music scene altogether, at one point finding work digging graves. By this time, his former band was enjoying a level of commercial success that couldn’t have been imagined ten years earlier.

In time, Green triumphantly bounced back with the assistance of family and friends and he began playing guitar and recording again, much to the delight of his loyal fans.

Recently, I had been thinking how time might be running out for the original Mac to reunite and perform again. It surely would have been an overdue occasion and an historical event to witness. Now, with Peter Green’s death it will never come to be. Are there any heroes you have missed due to the passage of time? Hopefully, you’ll still have some chances, but you might need to act soon.

“‘Cause there’s very few of us left, my friend,
from the days that used to be.” -Neil Young

Contact Chris: Name: Email: Comment: