I remember the day in the late 40's, a delivery truck pulled up at our house on Lookout Drive in Dayton, and they brought in our ....... television. I don't remember our antenna, had to have one, but not sure where ours was installed. I remember the anxiety, waiting, for something to come on. Limited viewing hours in those days.
I do remember the "awe" of looking at the 10" screen, RCA, I think it was, similar to the one pictured above. WLW out of Cincinnati was about the only station we got in those days.
Commercials were performed by the people on the shows, or they had an announcer, who did them, it was primarily radio being televised. Crosley Broadcasting soon had a station in Columbus, Ohio and Indianapolis, Indiana as well as the anchor in Cincinnati. They covered the Midwest pretty well. It eventually enabled them to attract talent to the area. Bob Hope, movie stars, politicians, if they had a message to get across, they presented it on WLW, and they covered much of the Midwest that way.
Ruth Lyons, a daytime icon from Cincinnati, could sell like no one else. She would mention a new product and it would be sold out by the end of the day. Tickets to her 100 seat studio were gobbled up, and I recall she had a one or two year wait for tickets. They were given as "prized" Christmas gits and Birthday gifts, they were like gold.
Sid Caesar, Red Skelton, so many good shows in the evening, mostly live shows, and then at 11 or 12, the National Anthem .... and then ...... staring at the blank screen for a while ..... the TV was off. On some we got a "Test Pattern" .... and I must admit, I have stared at it, blankly, because, nothing else was one. I think that every station played the National Anthem when they signed off. Each station had their own version of it, all very good. Some performed by marching bands and some had singers. but, often, after that, the screen went BLANK ...... and you sat, quietly, in the stillness of the night, staring at the dark screen, now, having to wait, till tomorrow, for that "magic picture" to appear again.
