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Old Photographs, Recognition, Handwriting Deciphering => Free Photo Restoration & Date Old Photographs => Topic started by: Top-of-the-hill on Tuesday 25 June 24 17:07 BST (UK)
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I am trying to date a picture. I am guessing 1950s but maybe the TV aerials could confirm this?
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From what I've just found, I think aerials like that were the earliest sort, dating from 1952 onwards, but they were common right through the 1960s too. It was when colour TV and BBC2 started that a newer type was needed.
More information at the following - the second one, from a railway modelling forum, goes into quite a lot of detail:
https://www.southwalestvaerials.co.uk/the-history-of-the-tv-aerial/
https://www.rmweb.co.uk/forums/topic/144049-tv-aerials-through-the-years/
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Thanks Arthur. I don't think many of these people would have had TV as early as 1952, but I could probably say late 50s.
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Looks like possibly late 50’s?
https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co34534/antiference-band-i-channel-4-television-aerial-1957-1985-aerial
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Thanks, that is interesting, and I love the idea of the older aerials being damaged by large birds landing on them!
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The pictured antennae are all H type Yagi antennae, suitable only for BBC transmissions. So before or around the birth of ITV in 1955
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So before or around the birth of ITV in 1955
Agreed. ITV aerials had a horizontal bar with many short vertical bars. Most TV owners had both from the mid-1950s on. Some of the BBC aerials were X-shaped rather than H-shaped.
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Around 1960 I would guess:
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We had an X aerial from about 1956 to 1960, because we had a television which could only be tuned to a single channel (BBC). My grandparents bought a new television in the late 1950s when ITV arrived, this had a rotating dial so you could switch between the channels. They added an H aerial to their chimney. I think when they switched between channels they had to unplug one aerial and plug the other one in. Both these channels were 405 lines. When BBC2 came along it was on 625 lines, so all change again.
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Thanks everyone - mid to late 50s seems to be the general consensus. I remember these aerials, but I don't think many people in my village had one that early.
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We moved house in 1960 and Dad splashed out on a new television which got ITV. We got an H aerial then, having left the old "X" behind on the old house. The old TV didn't go to waste though. It was in a solid wood cabinet and was converted into a piece of furniture.
It was just like this one
https://www.1900s.org.uk/televisions-early.htm
See photo " Early television in a bulky wooden cabinet, photographed in Brooklands Museum"
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So before or around the birth of ITV in 1955
Agreed. ITV aerials had a horizontal bar with many short vertical bars. Most TV owners had both from the mid-1950s on. Some of the BBC aerials were X-shaped rather than H-shaped.
The H on the right appears to have a pair of the ITV aerials beneath it -- the pair giving more signal strength.