1951 in Television - Events

Events

• March 22 - RCA introduces an eight-pound (3.6 kg) monochrome television camera with a 53-pound (24 kg) backpack transmitter, both operated by batteries. It is the first portable television camera.
• May 28 - The US Supreme Court upholds the FCC's approval of the CBS color television system.
• June 25 – CBS presents its first commercial color telecast with Arthur Godfrey, Ed Sullivan, and Faye Emerson.
• June - RCA demonstrates its new electronic color system.
• August 11 - The first baseball game is televised in color, a double-header between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Boston Braves.
• September 4 - The first live transcontinental television broadcast takes place in San Francisco, California from the Japanese Peace Treaty Conference.
• September 29 - The first live sporting event seen coast-to-coast, a college football game between Duke University and the University of Pittsburgh, is televised on NBC.
• September 29 - CBS broadcasts the first American football game in color, between the University of California and the University of Pennsylvania, at Philadelphia.
• October 3 - The first live coast-to-coast network telecast of a World Series game.
• October 12 - The Holme Moss transmitter is opened in Northern England, making BBC Television available to the region for the first time.
• October 17 - Television broadcasts begin in Argentina from Primera Televisora Argentina on channel 7, Buenos Aires.
• October 20 - The iconic CBS eye logo makes its television debut.
• November 11 - Bing Crosby Enterprises demonstrates black-and-white video recording using a modified Ampex tape recorder.
• November 18 - Edward R. Murrow on See It Now presents the first live coast-to-coast commercial television broadcast in the US, showing a split screen view of the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City and the Bay Bridge in San Francisco.
• December 24 - The first televised opera written for television, Amahl and the Night Visitors by Gian Carlo Menotti, airs on NBC.
• Television broadcasts begin in Peru.
• Ernie Kovacs' Time for Ernie and Ernie in Kovacsland television shows premiere. Kovacs pushes the limits of television technology with his use of camera tricks and special effects.