ETF - Early Color Television

Early Television Museum

Early Color Television

The first color system was developed by John Logie Baird in 1928. It used mechanical techniques. In the early 1940s, CBS pioneered a system which transmitted an image in each of the three primary colors sequentially. A wheel with segments of red, green, and blue rotated in front of the camera, while a similar wheel rotated in front of the television screen, synchronized to the one at the camera. The system was simple and produced excellent pictures, though it had many drawbacks, including low resolution, flicker, and most signifcant, it wasn't compatible with existing black and white broadcasting.

In 1950 the FCC tested the CBS system, along with a compatible system by RCA. At that time, the RCA system produced poor picture quality, and CBS was successful in getting the FCC to adopt their system. Here is a paper delivered by the Chairman of the FCC describing the thinking that led to the adoption of the CBS system.

For a few months in 1951, test broadcasts were done using the CBS system. Some manufacturers, such as Admiral, made adaptors for the CBS standard. See. Here is a 1950 film taken off the screen of a CBS receiver.

Manufacturers were relutant to make sets for the CBS system, and very few sets were made. RCA, meanwhile, continued to improve their system. In late 1953, the FCC adopted the RCA compatible system, commonly referred to as the NTSC system. The first color television sets for this system were sold in 1954. They used a 15 inch screen. Later that year, 19 inch sets were made, and by 1955 all sets were made with a 21 inch picture tube. Several manufacturers made 15 and 19 inch sets, most in very small quantities.

Here are magazine and newspaper articles and advertisements about the two competing color systems. The most comprehensive website on early color history is by Ed Reitan.

The first set was made by Westinghouse, and sold for $1295. RCA introduced the CT-100 a few weeks later, at a price of $1000. GE sold its 15 inch set for $1,000, Sylvania's cost $1,150. Emerson rented color sets for $200 for the first month and $75/month thereafter. By the summer of 1954 there was already a shakeout. A headline in the New York Times said "Set Buying Lags - Public Seen Awaiting Larger Screens, Lower Prices". Motorola and CBS promised a 19 inch screen at $995.

In 1955, Raytheon introduced a 21 inch set for $795 and CBS offered a trade-in of up to $400 for their black and white sets towards the purchase of a $895 21 inch color model.

By the end of 1957 only 150,000 color sets had been sold. Color sales were slow until the mid 1960s, when the reliability of sets improved, prices came down, and more color programming became available. Read these Time Magazine articles from 1956 and 1958.

Early Color Set Gallery

Early Color Set Database

Early Color TV Systems
John Logie Baird mechanical system (1928)	DeForest mechanical color (1948)
Bell Labs system (1929)	Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Color System (1950)
Leishman color system (1936)	DuMont industrial color system (1950)
CBS field sequential system (1940-53)	Eidophor (1952)
RCA dot sequential system (1941-49)	British experimental system (1953)
General Electric 2 Color System (1941)	CBS Chromacoder system (1954)
John Logie Baird electronic system (1943-45)	Early Russian Color TV (1954-56)
Philco Color Projection System (1945)	DuMont Vitascan (1955)
RCA field sequential system (1945)	Mexican 2 color system (1964)
RCA 3 channel system (1947)	Butterfield color system (1965)
Color Television, Inc. (CTI/Sleeper system) (1947)

More on Early Color
A simple way to convert your black and white TV to color	Newspaper and magazine articles about early color
British experiments with NTSC color	Online films and videos
CBS system at CNAM Museum in Paris	Philco 1964 advertisement and patent
Color picture tubes	RCA color production quantities
Experimental British color set	RCA CTC-4 based sets made for other manufacturers.
1945 Federal Transmitter for CBS Color	Russian color demonstration at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair
Five working 15GP22 based sets	Restoration of early color sets
History of CBS Color, by Bob Cooper	Smith, Kline & French Medical color TV
History of the NBC Peacock	Stan Lebar, Apollo moon camera developer
Hoffman Color School	Technical data (Rider, Sams, etc.)
Homemade color converters	Two tube vidicon color camera - 1975
Hue control circuits in early color sets	Uniray, an advanced Apple CRT
Sava Jacobson's recollections about early color	Zenith neon advertising sign