Milton Stern System

Mechanical Television

Milton Stern System

Early Television

Courtesy of Harry Moore

Comment from Paul Lindemeyer: From the patent letter, seems like it was a mirror drum/ball that sent just a pixel at a time to a screen, instead of a line at a time. ie very much hybrid technology, out of date before it could go anywhere.

The 1935 movie "Murder by Television" features the Stern Scanner that was used by WRNY. Here are comments by Art Redman of the )Northwest Vintage Radio Society (NWVRS

Murder By Television: Film The Stern Scanner in Operation
By Art Redman

The movie Murder by Television stars Bela Lugosi in a dual role-playing twin brothers Arthur and an unnamed twin. Also, June Collyer, and Huntley Gordon as Dr. Scofield, M.S.B.S. The 53-minute movie opens with several magazine clippings of television like “Television Comes to the Home” and Successful Television Programs Televised by WRNY”. [Hugo Gernsback]. The one featuring Lee de Forest in “Miracles in Television” is the most noteworthy. The mechanical television transmitter broadcasts on 0.75 meters [225mHz]. The scanning system was invented in 1934 by Milton M. Stern: U.S. Patent 2,099,872 granted in 1937 consisting of rotating curved reflectors. The subjects of the broadcast are illuminated by eight or more high intensity electric lights used in mechanical broadcast systems which are picked up by a photocell. By watching the film, modern viewers can see the Stern’s device in action.

Is this movie Science Fiction, futuristic mystery or both? The electronic receivers and world- wide television network and death ray did not exist in 1935. Some DVD outlets call the movie the “Houghland Murder Case”. James Houghland, invents a new method by which television signals can be instantaneously sent anywhere in the world, and refuses to sell the process to the C.M.P. Television Company who send agents to acquire the patent rights any way they can even if it includes murder.

On the night of his initial worldwide broadcast from his studio at White Plains, New York, Houghland is mysteriously murdered in the middle of his live television demonstration nineteen minutes into the film. It is then up to Police Chief Nelson to determine who the murderer from the many suspects present. It turns out, Arthur Perry’s brother is a police inspector who solves two crimes: How Houghland was murdered and the stabbing death of his twin brother. Doctor Scofield leaves during the television demonstration to place a telephone call. A blinding flash of light is seen by the television viewers which is a death ray activated by the noise from a telephone bell from within the studio.