The Father of Television

Jan 29, 1901: DuMont Will Make TV Work

 from Wired.com By Hugh Hart  January 28, 2010:

1901: In Brooklyn, a boy is born who will himself give birth to a revolution in home entertainment. Allen B. DuMont will be called by many the Father of Television.

DuMont contracted polio as a child. Bedridden for a year, he became obsessed with disassembling and reassembling a crystal-radio set. By 13, he’d built his own two-way radio from scratch and soon began spending his summer vacations working as a licensed wireless operator on trans-Atlantic ships.

DuMont then went to work at a radio company, where he failed in his early attempt to capture sound and picture through the use of spinning disks, so-called mechanical television. Realizing that cathode-ray tubes and a fully electronic system offered a more promising solution, he quit his day job in 1931.

Working in his garage, the incessant tinkerer figured out how to extend the life of the cathode ray tube from just a day to 1,000 hours. Armed with the innovation, DuMont showed off the first CRT television receiver to the public at the New York World’s Fair in 1939.

The engineering breakthrough propelled the television medium from an interesting experiment to a practical reality. DuMont introduced his own line of then-revolutionary TV sets that used CRTs as picture tubes.

Like Steve Jobs and Thomas Edison, DuMont was a shrewd businessman. He became one of the TV industry’s first millionaires.

Figuring that entertainment content would accelerate demand for the TV sets manufactured by his company, he launched the DuMont Television Network after World War II. The net was home to early sci-fi series Captain Video and His Video Rangers and Tom Corbett, Space Cadet. It also broadcast Jackie Gleason’s first “Honeymooners” sketches on its Cavalcade of Stars variety show.

But DuMont finished a perennial fourth to ABC, CBS and NBC. In 1955, DuMont shut down the network that bore his name.

Even if he fell short as a network exec, DuMont’s tech-head virtuosity ensures him a permanent niche in broadcasting history as a father of television, along with Philo T. Farnsworth, John Logie Baird, Vladimir Zworykin and David Sarnoff.

Comments

[Bob Stockton]

The bus, by the way, is an old Flxible (not misspelled).

[Allen Forrest]

Thanks for pointing that out, DrBob!

Until you posted that comment, I had never heard of Flxible buses. So, to satisfy my curiosity, I did a web search and discovered that there is an association of Flxible owners at http://www.flxibleowners.org/

[Bob Stockton]

Pop was a bus driver and could name every make and model number extant. I guess some of it rubbed off on me.

[Allen Forrest]

I thought it was because you had one of their sidecars for your motorcycle.

According to the history of Flxible at http://www.flxibleowners.org/history.htm:

"It Started With Sidecars...

"The Flxible Company, not unlike many other companies, had a modest, but unique beginning.

"In 1912, Hugo H. Young, the operator of a motorcycle sales agency in Mansfield Ohio. had an idea for a new type of motorcycle sidecar; one which would permit the third wheel to tilt and stay on the ground when the motorcycle leaned while going around curves in either direction.

"Young built a prototype sidecar for his own use. The sidecar was attached to the motorcycle with a "flexible" connection. This was a new and basic idea. It also allowed the sidecar wheel to rise over obstructions, or to drop below the road level without affecting the motorcycle's balance. The axle pivot of the sidecar wheel was slightly tilted which caused the sidecar wheel always to follow the direction of the motorcycle, whether rounding turns or on a straight course.

"A traveling salesman friend saw the newly designed sidecar, and urged him to patent and manufacture the sidecar. Mr. Young founded and became the first president of the Flxible Company. Young's patent was also the fore-runner of the principle which is now known as knee-action in automobiles.

"In 1913, Young founded the Flxible Side Car Company in Loudonville, Ohio to manufacture his patented vehicle. This original company was a partnership owned by Hugo Young and Carl F. Dudte. In 1914 they incorporated the Flexible Sidecar Co. for $25,000.

"Young's sidecar went over in a big way. It was such an improvement over the other sidecars that it soon became a favorite. This was especially true for the riders in the dangerous sport of motorcycle sidecar racing. Soon all important sidecar racing records were held by race drivers whose cycles were equipped with Flexible Sidecars."