Chapter 300: Visiting the Factory (1/2)

"Mr. Ferro..."

In Brooklyn, in the Messenger TV factory.

Wiping the stains on his hands, the worker in overalls asked Ferro Farnsworth with a nervous look.

"Will Mr. Colin Luper really bring President Roosevelt here?"

Although the news that President Roosevelt would visit the Messenger TV factory had already spread throughout the factory, he still didn't quite believe it. After all, this was Mr. President. Hoover had never visited their workplace when he was in office.

"Of course."

Faced with the worker's inquiry, Ferro Farnsworth nodded.

In fact, not to mention the factory workers, even Ferro himself was a little bit unbelievable when he first got the news, until he confirmed it with Colin again and again before he reluctantly believed it.

The factory tour was in the afternoon, but the workers at the Messenger TV factory had been looking forward to it since early morning.

Because of the upcoming presidential visit, the TV factory was immersed in a tense atmosphere for the whole morning. Both the workers and Philo Farnsworth were a little distracted from work. Of course, under the influence of such emotions, the production line of the entire factory was not ideal that day, but everyone from top to bottom cared about this.

In this way, they spent the whole morning in a distracted working state.

"Here he comes!"

As Louise Walton came to the factory, everyone knew that the president was coming.

The presidential security during this period was not as strong as it was later.

In fact, the change of the entire secret service system was after Kennedy was assassinated. The Secret Service, which was responsible for protecting the head of state, launched a revolutionary change in security practices.

Kennedy's assassination in Dallas, Texas, also became the biggest failure in the history of the US Secret Service.

After all, the president's skull was opened by a shot in front of them.

Before that, although the president's security standards were strict, there was still a certain degree of freedom.

Following Louise Walton, several small teams of Secret Service security personnel came to the factory. Ten minutes later, Roosevelt, accompanied by Colin, also arrived at the Courier TV Factory in Brooklyn by car.

After getting off the car, the reporter of the Courier World waiting around the factory immediately took a photo. Relying on his status as a veteran of the Courier Newspaper, John followed behind Colin and witnessed the boss helping the president push the wheelchair.

Although, when he was in the Pulitzer Building, he was skeptical about Roosevelt's political views.

But this did not prevent him from being excited about seeing the president in person, especially at a close distance now.

Pushing Roosevelt's wheelchair, Colin took him to the Courier TV Factory.

"Mr. President..."

Looking at Roosevelt appearing in the factory, even though he had already received Colin's affirmation, the expression on Ferro Farnsworth's face still looked a little excited.

He nervously adjusted his clothes, and then stepped forward and said, "It's an honor for you to come to the Courier TV Factory."

"Good afternoon, Mr. Ferro Farnsworth."

In the wheelchair, Roosevelt smiled and stretched out his palm: "It's a pleasure to meet you."

Looking at Roosevelt's outstretched palm, Ferro was slightly stunned, and then quickly stretched out his hand and shook it.

At the same time, on the other side, the reporter of the Courier World immediately pressed the shutter to record this scene.

The visit to the TV factory was an itinerary that Colin had determined after Roosevelt's "fireside chat". The purpose was naturally to distinguish it from the image of former President Hoover who was far away from the people, to establish a people-friendly attitude for him, in order to maintain the people's trust in him.

Although the "fireside chat" helped Roosevelt stabilize the worsening financial crisis, it did not completely solve the problem.

Therefore, while actively promoting the "New Deal", Roosevelt also needed to constantly call on the people through a people-friendly image to avoid the loss of credibility.

Retracting his palm, Roosevelt's eyes fell on the assembly line of the factory.

Roosevelt obviously had some interest in the production of televisions. As a new product, Roosevelt didn't know much about televisions.

In fact, not only him, but the entire United States and even the world didn't know about this product.

"So, is this a TV?"

Sliding his wheelchair with both hands, approaching the assembly line of the factory, Roosevelt looked at the semi-finished machine on the line and couldn't help asking the worker beside him.

"Yes... yes... Mr. President..."

Faced with the president's sudden inquiry, the worker was obviously a little overwhelmed. He was excited for a long time before he stammered.

"Don't be too nervous. In fact, we are all working hard for this country, but it's just because of different divisions of labor."

It must be said that Roosevelt is obviously very experienced in winning the hearts of the people.

This may also be related to his own experience. After all, when a person loses the ability to act, he will naturally choose other ways to show his charm.

Under Roosevelt's friendly attitude, not only the workers of the Messenger TV Factory, but also the reporters who were responsible for taking pictures were infected by his friendly attitude.

The whole process of visiting the TV was extremely smooth.

Following Roosevelt's wheelchair, the Courier World took a large number of photos.

Soon, under Colin's guidance, a group of people passed from the factory assembly line to the TV R&D department.

When he came to the field where he was good at, Philo Farnsworth's original nervousness was somewhat relieved. He briefly introduced his invention in front of Roosevelt.

"A wonderful invention, Mr. Ferro."

Although Roosevelt could not fully understand many of Ferro Farnsworth's descriptions during the process, this did not prevent him from praising Ferro's invention.

“Sometimes, a good idea can change the world.”

Considering the current patent litigation between Colin and RCA, Roosevelt cannot express his attitude too obviously to avoid being criticized by the opposition party for the president's interference in the judiciary. However, Roosevelt's visit to the Messenger TV factory is actually a position in itself. Express.

During this time, the Courier World had been supporting Roosevelt's New Deal and promoting his policies in newspapers.

Therefore, Roosevelt naturally needed to respond.

What’s more, a factory tour itself is a mutually beneficial approach.

Colin needed Roosevelt to increase the popularity of television, and Roosevelt was using the media influence of "The Courier World" to promote his own image.

"What is this, Mr. Ferro?"

During the visit to the laboratory, Roosevelt's eyes were quickly caught by a strange-looking television in the laboratory.

"this……"

Facing Roosevelt's inquiry, Philo Farnsworth glanced at Colin who was standing aside with some hesitation.

"This is the latest research result of the Messenger TV Factory, a TV that can play color images."

Taking up Ferro's topic, Colin immediately opened his mouth to explain.

"Color, TV?"

At the same time, Roosevelt in the wheelchair also showed an unexpected expression at the right time.

"Nothing wrong."

After nodding, Colin nodded to Philo Farnsworth in the laboratory, who suddenly started the laboratory's color TV prototype.

"Friends, I want to tell you what we have done in the past few days, why we have done it, and what we plan to do next..."

As the TV was turned on, but after a brief signal jump, a colorful Superman logo flashed across the TV screen, and then a picture of Roosevelt sitting by the fireside appeared.

Because it is just a prototype, the color picture of the entire TV is not very clear.

However, looking at himself on the TV, Roosevelt couldn't help but push the wheelchair closer.

Not only Roosevelt, but all the visitors in the laboratory were shocked by the scene before them.

You know, at this time, even color pictures in movies had not yet been completely popularized. A TV that could play the world in color would have an impact on people. It is enough to imagine.

"A wonderful invention, Mr. Ferro."

Watching clips of his speeches and fireside chats on color television, Roosevelt looked to the side at Philo Farnsworth.

"In fact, this is not my fault alone."

Facing Roosevelt's praise, Ferro quickly shook his hand and said: "Mr. Colin Luper also put forward many design ideas during this process, especially the provision of color picture tubes. If it weren't for Colin Luper, With Mr. Po’s help, I might not have been able to produce a color TV set so smoothly.”

Historically, the development from black-and-white TVs to color TVs spanned about twenty years.

It was not until H. Low invented the three-gun shadow mask color picture tube and Lorenzo invented the single-gun color picture tube that color TV really took shape, and it took another ten years after that before color TV really became a reality. be popularized.

In other words, if we follow normal historical development, it would have taken 30 years of hard work by countless people before color TV was invented.

The existence of Colin has undoubtedly greatly reduced this process.

At present, the color prototype of the Messenger TV factory uses a three-gun and three-beam color picture tube, also called a shadow mask tube. It is an earlier developed picture tube. It consists of four parts: fluorescent screen, shadow mask, electron gun and glass casing.

The patent for the picture tube is in Colin's hands and is independently owned by him.

This is why Ferro said that without Colin's help, color television would not have been invented.

Because the picture tube technology was entirely provided by Colin, the picture tube alone might not mean much, but once combined with his television, it would be the prototype of color television.

In fact, Colin also has his own ideas about the patent of the picture tube.

If he fails in the patent litigation with RCA, he will take out this patent and directly launch a new generation of color TVs to crush the older generation TV patents held by RCA.

By the way, let’s call him the father of color television.

Of course, this was just a backup plan prepared by Colin. RCA's defeat was already doomed, so Colin was not in a hurry to launch his own color TV.

After all, in this era, it is still a bit too difficult to fully promote color TVs.

Not only is it limited by the complexity of the cathode ray tube process, the design of multi-tube circuits, especially the manufacturing of fluorescent screens, if you want to reproduce it in this era, you need to invest a lot of money and experiments.

The color TV in the messenger TV factory can be produced, but Colin cheated through the [thermal vision] ability.

In other words, under normal circumstances, it is extremely difficult to produce color cathode ray tubes.

Even if it is barely produced, it will cause the cost of the entire TV to rise. You must know that at this time, the price of a TV is not cheap.

It is precisely for this reason that Colin did not industrialize color TV and only put a prototype in the laboratory.

After all, in the development history of television, color TV is just an inevitable result, and 20 to 30 years before the appearance of color TV, black and white TV was the mainstream.

Although he intends to promote the development of the TV industry, he does not have the idea of ​​​​pulling it directly from black and white TV to color TV in one fell swoop.

】

Especially, in this period when even TV programs are not perfect and TVs are not popular.

Sometimes, the best is not necessarily the most suitable. From the perspective of the viewing experience of TV, color TV is naturally much better than black and white TV, but considering the cost of color images, even if Colin wants to promote it, the radio station may not be able to afford the cost of producing color programs or TV series.

Therefore, as a second choice, expanding the TV market is what Colin needs to do now.

Only when the entire TV market matures can the upgrade from black and white to color TV be successfully completed.

Because at that time, both the radio station and the audience can no longer do without this new entertainment industry.

……

“……I clearly saw that when President Roosevelt saw clips of his speeches and fireside chats on color TV, his expression seemed to be touched and he sighed: ‘The future will be the era of television.’ In fact, just as the great president said, the color TV invented by Mr. Colin Looper has become an indispensable existence in modern people’s lives. Perhaps at that time, President Roosevelt had already seen this and made such an exclamation.” - Excerpted from the Courier World column report

Reporter: John Walker

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