Today, I overheard a conversation that had me traveling on the way-back time machine. Apparently in the olden days, a TV was expected to take a few minutes (at least) to warm up! Television sets used to need at least 5 minutes to warm up from what was called a "cold start". A cold start in progress was signaled by the screen lighting up in an odd pattern and and making strange clicking sounds. The old sets used to have what was called a sub-power switch in the rear, this switch was also called the vacation switch.
The idea was to leave this switch on all the time (except when going on vacation) so that you would have nearly instant warm up by using a second power switch on the front of the set. Supposedly, this led to an increased risk of fire as well. When the sub-power switch was turned on some power was provided to the filaments of the cathode ray tube and other vacuum tubes that needed time to heat up and work properly. Photo Credit: Ryan McVay/Getty Images
Well though this description is ‘fairly’ accurate, it’s not the really old old story. For us ‘oldies’ or as the young of today seem to call us, ‘wrinklies’ the vacation power switch was a relatively new idea. When I was a kid in the 1950s we didn’t have a television, but in the 1960s when my parents bought a television (boy were we excited!) we always had to wait for the set to power up. When I started my own home in 1972 I bought an enormous television – 26″ – can you imagine a television that big?
It wasn’t until the 1970s – 1980s that the ‘vacation power switch’ became available.
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As a child of the 60′s, I well remember that the TV set had to warm up. The sound would come on right away, but the tube stayed black at least long enough for you to get back to your chair.
I remember we had a set the ‘dial” had fallen off of and we had to change the channel with pliers. We also kept both a wire coat hanger and “tin foil” handy to help with the signal.
I remember the national anthem would play before the station signed off and showed the test screen.
I remember the morning devotional (given live by a local preacher) followed by the farm report was always the first programming in the morning.
.And I remember having only two stations.