The advent of television : a study of the perceptions and expectations of the first television viewers in metropolitan Halifax in the early 1950s

Abstract

On Monday, December 20th, 1954 at 5:45 PM, Haligonians tuned their television sets to the inaugural broadcast of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. CBC-CBHT, channel 8, welcomed Halifax-Dartmouth viewers to the newest channel on their network, another step towards predominately Canadian programming in Maritime Canada.

Few people at that time understood the changes that would take place in this new visual, technical world. In anticipation of a television broadcasting station being established in the Halifax-Dartmouth area, the CBC Bureau of Audience Research commissioned a study of radio listening patterns in order to obtain some background information on the likes and dislikes of the existing radio audience. This information was to be used to create programs and program schedules which would attract people to television. The survey consisted of diaries written by the members of the selected households as well as personal interview questionnaires. One year after television had arrived, the interviewers returned to talk to the original respondents to discover just how popular television was and how radio listening patterns had changed, if at all. Further research was done on how leisure activities were altered once television arrived in the community.

The course of television's beginnings has been an exploration of contradictions; it inspires while it incites, stimulates while it sells, provokes while it persuades, preaches while it pretends, educates while it elects. A pacifier to the lonely, the aged, the young, television enhances general knowledge while providing escapism for the masses. This paper focuses on the Halifax experience of this new medium.