Re: Mechanical television

[Donna Halper <dlh@donnahalper.com>]

Once upon upon, in a kingdom far away (Lexington, Mass), there lived a man
named Jesse Smith Dodge (better known as Jack) who was an engineer for
Shepard at WNAC but who also had a little 5-watt station in Somerville
called (gasp) WAGS.  Jack Dodge saved his money and upgraded, along with a
partner, Carl Wheeler, to a station in Lexington, which became WLEX.  Their
engineer was an enterprising kid just out of MIT, named Al Pote.  Al, who
would end up working for Raytheon, and Jack were fascinated by the invention
of C. Francis Jenkins-- a huge, noisy scanning disk (first demonstrated by a
Scottish eccentric named John Logie Baird) which actually broadcast 'radio
pictures'.  After a number of experiments, Smith, Wheeler and Pote got some
funding (from Raytheon, the Boston Post, Hal Power-- yes he was still around
and liked to have a hand in anything new-- and various other folks) and in
late September of 1928, greater Boston's first TV station was on the air for
an hour a day-- W1XAY.  Unlike electronic TV, mechanical TV was crude and
only used about 48 scanning lines, but people were excited about it.
Jenkins (who was also on the license with Dodge and Wheeler) had several
other mechanical stations up and running too.  Basically, W1XAY allowed the
WLEX audience to see (sort of) a broadcast taking place.  Usually, each
afternoon during the week, one hour was televised.  You needed a special
receiver, the quality was icky, but hey-- it was cutting edge for 1928.
When Zworykin and Farnsworth perfected electronic TV, mechanical was far too
crude to compete and it ultimately went the way of the dinosaur.  W1XAY
stayed on the air till about March of 1930 when Dodge, Pote and friends ran
out of money.  And so ended Boston's first TV station.  The end.  (PS-- Al
Pote's work so impressed Raytheon that he was hired to create new and better
TV tubes, which he did... he also consulted for a number of Boston-area
stations and helped his brother Bill to run what became WMEX...)   

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