Whatever happened to Channel 1?
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Whatever happened to Channel 1?
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Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#2Answer starts in the last section.
1946-1948 Manufacturers quickly began producing television receivers, transmitters, antennas, etc. New television stations were built all over the United States. The FCC had identified the top 140 metropolitan cities and assigned each at least one channel; a total of 400 were to be allotted. The FCC received many more applications than it had available channels. In an effort to provide with as many channels as possible, the FCC routinely threw away the "safety factor" of mileage between licensed transmitters.
But problems began to appear. So, even with just 50 stations on the air, interference problems were beginning to appear. Meanwhile, the FCC had reduced the minimum distance between stations using the same channel to just 80 miles. An engineering study released by the FCC warned of interference problems if immediate action wasn't taken. That lead to an FCC report issued on may 5, 1949, that rules that television could no longer share its frequencies with fixed and mobile services, and that the 72 to 76 MHz band could be used for fixed radio services only.
But where could the mobile services be located if they could no longer share the television allocations, and could no longer be used for use the 72 to 76 MHz band? There was only one place to go -- the television industry would have to give up another television channel. But which channel would that be? The American Radio Relay League (an association of amateur radio operators) urged that Channel 2 be deleted so that the second harmonics of the 28-29.7 MHz amateur radio band would not interfere with television reception. The television industry, although not pleased about losing yet another television channel, agreed that 12 clear channels were preferable to 12 shared channels. If they had to lose a channel, they preferred that it be Channel 1, because its absence would have the least impact on commercial television.
The FCC went along with the television industry's position, and on June 14, 1948, Channel 1 was deleted from the allocation plan. Channel 1"s frequencies were assigned to the land and mobile services. At the same time, the FCC decided not to renumber the channels -- that is what happened to Channel 1.
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#3tl;dr as more spectrum was used in the late 1940s a channel had to be freed up to deal with interference issues so they picked channel 1 and simply choose not to renumber.
You'd think the article would explore why they didn't renumber, but nope.
Legacy hardware and possible consumer confusion seem like the most likely speculation.
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#4tl;dr as more spectrum was used in the late 1940s a channel had to be freed up to deal with interference issues so they picked channel 1 and simply choose not to renumber. You'd think the article would explore why they didn't renumber, but nope. Legacy hardware and possible consumer confusion seem like the most likely speculation.
Probably because if you had an old set and were watching on Ch2 but your neighbor was watching the same thing on Ch1 on a new set, that could have been a bit confusing at the dawn of television.
Or, watch ABC news on Ch2 on old sets, but Ch1 on new sets...., wait, do I have an old set or a new set?
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#5A long, long time ago when there were only 4 channels to watch on our B&W TV, I asked my dad this question. He said something about it interfering with radio traffic but his apocryphal speculation was that it was so that no one network would get to be "#1".
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#6Really, the title is just a teaser. I thought this was a rewarding read and I just learned a hell of a lot about the history of radio.
I don't suppose anyone has any book recommendations on the subject besides the ones mentioned in the article?
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#7Project idea: Make a television system from vacuum tubes that broadcasts in the unlicensed home bands (2.4GHz & 5GHz). It could be either digital or analog, but it needs to use vacuum tubes. I'd like to see if such technologies would have been possible back in the 40's. Bonus points if they could transmit hi-def signals (1+ megapixels)
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#8Project idea: Make a television system from vacuum tubes that broadcasts in the unlicensed home bands (2.4GHz & 5GHz). It could be either digital or analog, but it needs to use vacuum tubes. I'd like to see if such technologies would have been possible back in the 40's. Bonus points if they could transmit hi-def signals (1+ megapixels)
You "might" be able to do transmissions that high with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krytron
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#9Not all the channels were usable in one area. Tuners were not very good at rejecting harmonics back then.
Today, we have phones with four or five radio receivers and three transmitters operating without interference. It's amazing that works. Receivers are far, far better than they were in the tube era.
Re: Whatever happened to Channel 1?
#10Not all the channels were usable in one area. Tuners were not very good at rejecting harmonics back then. Today, we have phones with four or five radio receivers and three transmitters operating without interference. It's amazing that works. Receivers are far, far better than they were in the tube era.
> Receivers are far, far better than they were in the tube era.
Only two "far"s? That's a significant understatement :P