This Was Television

1925: Inventor Charles Francis Jenkins provides the first public demonstration in the U.S. of a synchronized transmission of pictures and sound

According to the Museum of Broadcast Communications, “This early work in mechanical scanning television helped lay the foundation for later all-electronic television.”

Jenkins’s pioneering broadcast consisted of “crude silhouettes,” notable more for their spectacle than for narrative or coherence. Today, Ryan Murphy cites them as a huge influence on his work.  -A.D.

Today’s Birthdays: Tim Allen, tool man (59); Malcolm McDowell, even made Heroes entertaining (69); Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, Tanner tots (26); Richard Thomas, John-Boy (61).