I would have been 13 and I doubt I was studying (although I probably SHOULD have been). I don't remember the evening it happened and I'm sure my father was watching the game.
Not even alive. Watching the video I do find it really odd that they mentioned his death right in the middle of the game, I can't imagine the announcers for a Packers game taking time from the event to let me know someone like (for example) Ozzie Osbourne had been shot. Kinda odd, but then I wasn't around for the Beatles mania so I guess I don't know.
I was a different time though, only three network stations and a public broadcasting station (US). So any breaking news you got was from TV or radio.
EDIT: And no channel surfing those 3 stations (the public doesn't count), who had remote control in 1980?
Anyone with young children. "Change it to 7!"
The Jedi Master
The anteater is wearing the bagel because he's a reindeer princess. -- my 4 yr old daughter
Joined: Apr 2001 Posts: 121,484PanzerMeyer
Pro-Consul of Florida
PanzerMeyer
Pro-Consul of Florida
King Crimson - SimHQ's Top Poster
Joined: Apr 2001
Posts: 121,484
Miami, FL USA
If I recall correctly, I think the first tv remote controls came out in the late 70's but you are probably right in saying that most consumers didn't have them in 1980.
“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”
If I recall correctly, I think the first tv remote controls came out in the late 70's but you are probably right in saying that most consumers didn't have them in 1980.
I remember my grandpa's Zenith had remote with it in the mid seventies. It almost always never worked and used batteries up like crazy.
Turning the knob around with a click, click, click to change the channel was a fairly common thing until the mid to late 80's depending on the age of your TV.
Dorothy Stratton was one of your childhood celebs??
I remember my mom telling me it happened, I knew the Beatles' music but none of John's solo work at the time. I don't remember thinking much other than "I guess there will be no reunion now".
The Jedi Master
Oh yeah, I had a lot of older cousins that had Playboy collections under their beds. For the articles of course.
#4048251 - 12/09/1407:54 PMRe: Where Were You 34 Years ago tonight?
[Re: U-96]
Not even alive. Watching the video I do find it really odd that they mentioned his death right in the middle of the game, I can't imagine the announcers for a Packers game taking time from the event to let me know someone like (for example) Ozzie Osbourne had been shot. Kinda odd, but then I wasn't around for the Beatles mania so I guess I don't know.
an interesting perspective on how the announcement was made by Monday Night Football. I'm surprised ABC News didn't just break in to the game, but considering the implications of playoff berth they didn't want to. And as Mark said; "only three major networks. UHF stations didn't carry news. PBS had McNeil Lehrer at 6pm. Local news was at 11 with no NIGHTLINE to follow up at 11:30. The local affiliates wouldn't have got this out at all except for maybe NYC stations.
Start at 3:00
I can't stand Yoko. I know Julian wasn't her responsibility but shouldn't she have had the same concern for him as she did Sean. Getting the news about your fathers death on TV is heart breaking to anyone.
Ee, lads, it were a shock to us all down at'th' pre-Christmas kiddies afternoon party at Jabez Grimsdyke's Sebastopol Bleach Works Club. Bingo callin' got interrupted so we noo it were goin't be summat serious.
I snapped me G string, drummer cocked up 5/4 time and'th' singer, Lance Majestico gives out a fab Norman Collier impression...
Tears was shed for a good few seconds before't pies and peas arrived, bingo resumed and life went on pretty much as before...tha'naws.
'Find your enemy and shoot him down - everything else is unimportant.'
Manfred von Richtofen ---------------------------
#4048337 - 12/09/1411:06 PMRe: Where Were You 34 Years ago tonight?
[Re: MarkG]
EDIT: And no channel surfing those 3 stations (the public doesn't count), who had remote control in 1980?
We did. Our cable box easily reached from the TV to the couch. and had a row of 15 pushbuttons and a 2-way rocker switch that gave you positions 16-30. We only got maybe 12 or 13 channels with basic cable, though.
Phil
“The biggest problem people have is they don’t think they’re supposed to have problems.” - Hayes Barnard
If I recall correctly, I think the first tv remote controls came out in the late 70's but you are probably right in saying that most consumers didn't have them in 1980.
note the text "most General Electric consoles include remote control - at no extra cost."
The remote was a fat seven conductor ribbon cable about 18 ft long, which was laid under the carpet from the TV to the side table next to the couch. It terminated in a cafe-au-lait coloured plastic object which looked like a 500ml jar, with a matching coloured lid over it, with a cream coloured GE curly logo in the middle of the lid, in raised plastic inlay. You placed your palm over the lid, and it depressed, a huge pushbutton switch, and it would start a motor on the TV which mechanically rotated the tuner assembly - whirr-clunk-whirr-clunk.... If you rotated the lid, it operated an on/off volume control. The on switch had to be turned on for the channel turner to operate, as you might expect. And it worked great for about five or six years, until the two kids in the house (who were those guys, anyway?) pretty much destroyed it by fighting over the show to watch and driving the wheel around until all the contacts on the tuner were getting sloppy, and the motor began losing the ability to stop when you lifted your hand of the control.
This thread takes me back to when I was a child, if you stayed up late enough (~2AM) the station you were watching would sign off, you'd get the National Anthem and then an Emergency Broadcast like sound with the color bands, and then static. One station in Atlanta did this even in the early '90s, they'd sign off with Ray Charles' Georgia On My Mind and a cool video, ending with an alligator swimming in the swamp.
++++++++++
A quick remote control story (being the juvenile delinquent that I was)...
When our small neighborhood first got cable (required a box), one night a friend of mine and I walked around with his remote, standing against people's living room windows switching their station. A little back and forth while you could sometimes hear fussing and confusion. Then off to try the next house.
Walking back on our street we could tell this guy (big ex-Marine, although mostly belly) was watching TV in his bedroom. They had a really small house, his bedroom windows were small squares almost ceiling height, you couldn't see in but you could see the TV light flashes from the street. If you stood on the brick flowerbed border under the window, you could just make out the TV mounted high near the ceiling in the opposite corner, like they do in hospitals.
We flipped the station. Station flips back. We flip again. Station flips back. We wait a while, flip again, flips back. Flip again...this time we hear him yell as a beer can goes flying at the TV! We take off scared and hide in my backyard, then see a focused light moving in his backyard. The dude is walking his yard in his underwear with a flashlight checking out the wires. We decide to call it a night.
We went to his wake recently with my parents, seems like everyone on that street in my parent's generation is dying now.
Last edited by MarkG; 12/10/1405:55 PM. Reason: removed pic of house
Joined: Sep 2001 Posts: 24,712Dart
Measured in Llamathrusts
Dart
Measured in Llamathrusts
Lifer
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 24,712
Alabaster, AL USA
Hmmm, earliest remote control...
Well, we had one that was really a tuning fork inside! It would make a particular click and the TV knew to change the channel in one of two directions. No volume control on it, though.
And then I had a TV with a wired remote. Nothing sexy like a ribbon cable - this thing had two twelve foot long cables (think the thin black one on a TrackIR or headset) that plugged into the front of it. But hey, it was color!
I think I paid five bucks for it in a pawn shop - dude was just trying to get it off his shelf.
The opinions of this poster are largely based on facts and portray a possible version of the actual events.
Joined: Apr 2001 Posts: 121,484PanzerMeyer
Pro-Consul of Florida
PanzerMeyer
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King Crimson - SimHQ's Top Poster
Joined: Apr 2001
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Miami, FL USA
From discussing John Lennnon's death to tv remote controls. Gotta love SimHQ!
“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.”
From discussing John Lennnon's death to tv remote controls. Gotta love SimHQ!
I guess they were both big deals 34 years ago.
The rusty wire that holds the cork that keeps the anger in Gives way and suddenly it’s day again The sun is in the east Even though the day is done Two suns in the sunset, hmph Could be the human race is run
#4048798 - 12/10/1409:56 PMRe: Where Were You 34 Years ago tonight?
[Re: MarkG]
Joined: Feb 2000 Posts: 49,716Jedi Master
Entil'zha
This thread takes me back to when I was a child, if you stayed up late enough (~2AM) the station you were watching would sign off, you'd get the National Anthem and then an Emergency Broadcast like sound with the color bands, and then static.
As immortalized in the beginning of this 1980 Billy Joel song (although this copy is very quite and hard to hear unless you crank it up):
The Jedi Master
The anteater is wearing the bagel because he's a reindeer princess. -- my 4 yr old daughter