On the topic of television this week, I decided to not opt for the eldest person I could find, but rather my Dad.
My Father, the great Paul Sherley, had an interesting upbringing moving about the country, and consequently had some interesting memories on the topic of television whilst growing up. I thought I would extend this research a little further, and got in contact with his four sisters too. (I know what you’re thinking for the guys out there… They all get on incredibly well now, I swear.)
Whilst discussing all of these memories via email between the five of them, I would have easily had enough info and recollections to write a whole series purely based of their memories and recollections of television. It was interesting as they clearly had such fond memories linked to watching television, that weren’t positive purely because of what was on the television itself. As I watched on, reminiscing about childhood and their parents, it was great to witness what part this played in their lives or what it at least reminded them of.
An artistic take on the cellophane covered TV screens of the ’60’s.
Of the countless memories, one of the points I found most interesting started with the fact that when my Dad was born in Lismore, it had TV reception. This isn’t exactly the interesting part yet, but as he is the youngest, all of his oldest sisters have different recollections associated with this time period. This included people sticky-taping coloured cellophane over the screen, apparently to reduce damage to your eyes (the whacky 60’s right), and then all of the usual recollections such as neighbours coming around to watch together as not everyone had televisions, and people gathering in front of TV’s in the electrical store. The part that I found most interesting though was that a few years later when the family moved to Darwin, this city didn’t have any television coverage yet.
So even if you could afford a television, I assume all you would have seen would have been the classic static lines accompanied by white noise. To put this into perspective, can you imagine having internet for the last four years, and then tomorrow moving to Melbourne and not even having the option of internet access? The local church apparently used to organise movies in its hall on Friday nights in replacement, something that would have been a social initiative as they were just trying to populate and establish Darwin as a city. This was again using the notion of television and movies as a social gathering and tool.
When the family moved to Sydney in 1969, due to regaining access to television, some of them became mesmerised by it. The older siblings recalled feeling quite out of the loop when they first moved, as the majority of lunch time conversations centred around TV shows. This had quite an effect, with one of my aunties even spending all of her pocket money on both the TV Week and TV Guide for around a year when they finally gained access again. The great upside to this meant that they could engage with pop culture finally, religiously watching Uptight, Happening ‘70 and Countdown. These shows and their viewership’s all were very “groovy” as they described, showing that there was still trends and activity that you abided by and followed to fit into social norms. (More importantly though, what ever happened to the use of ‘groovy’?!)
Naturally, I asked about the most memorable events that they witnessed on TV and unsurprisingly events such as The Moon Landing, watching coverage of the Granville Train Crash intently to find out if their uncle had survived, something they later find out that he hadn’t, and also the unfolding of the PLO attack on the Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics. On a side note, when I further researched these attacks after the mention of them, I found out as the police were planning an ambushing operation,the live images were broadcasted across television. Something that would have been enthralling to watch of course and a relatively new concept I imagine, but also meant that the hostage takers could also watch and had to time to prepare, subsequently leading to the rescue being botched.
The political coverage was an extremely important element of the television for the family, watching the election counting coverage as a family late into the night. My grandfather would have a printout of the candidates, and notes would be taken by everyone as they tried to figure out the likely outcome . It wasn’t all happy though, as I was told that my Grandfather would “stand up and put his bottom up against the screen whenever Malcom Fraser appeared” as a form of protest, something I was humorously ensured was probably quite a regular form of protesting in a many a household.
The progression to colour TV didn’t come until years later, only when their last one was stolen, which was just in time for the Royal Wedding in 1981. Another event which I feel like if it happened now, would not be anywhere near as big of a deal and blockbuster event as it was back then.
As you can tell by the length of this post even, is that the topic of television brought up countless recollections for the generation ahead of myself. The most interesting point I took from this exercise though was how much joy reminiscing about the memories associated with television brought to my Dad and his siblings, as I guess it reminded them of happy times growing up and thoughts about their late parents. As TV wasn’t a novelty growing up for myself, I don’t think my siblings and I will have any similar recollections associated to television and family time recalling back on our time of when growing up together. It has made me realise that television can mean more than just that “time-wasting box” in the corner, but something that has brought family and friends together and represents fond times for a whole generation of people.
ankledeepin 
