Channelling the TV Dad built in a shed

DURING late 1952 and spring 1953, my father often took me to his friend’s garden shed where they were building their own TVs. As an eight-year-old, I watched in wonder at what seemed to be the soldering of thousands of miniature Liquorice allsorts and torpedoes.

They also built their own floor-standing TV cabinets.

At the same time, Dad was building a fish pond in the garden that had varying fountain changes with red, white and blue flashing lights, just in time for the Coronation. By the last week of May 1953, Dad was ready for a test run for the TV.

Jack, a fireman friend, was on the roof with the BBC’s ‘h’ aerial that denoted a house of wealth, which we were not. Dad twiddled the horizontal and vertical hold, shouting ‘Turn!’ to Uncle Stan in the back garden to relay to Jack on the roof.

My elder brother and I were watching the tiny screen, hoping for a picture to emerge. Suddenly we saw a steam train on the screen. Dad was mesmerised by the speed of the picture going by. It soon came to an end and announcer Mary Malcolm came on screen to say: ‘That was an interlude of going from London to Brighton in four minutes.’

A week later, we had a houseful for the Coronation. ‘Bring your own dining chair!’ was the order, with the adults sitting in cinema style and children on the floor. After this success, we’d watch TV as a family. When there was just a straight horizontal line or a white spot on the screen, I’d be sent to Kettering to buy a new valve at a cost of ten shillings. We kept Dad’s homemade TV until ITV arrived and we bought a proper one.