Saturday, January 2, 2010
8:28 PM
Tubes and Things
My dad and his brothers owned a television/appliance store. It was an RCA dealership. In addition to sales, all of the boys were also certified repairmen so they all had one of these official repair cases. Back then, televisions were full of little tubes and usually, when a television went out, it was because of a blown tube. My dad and all of his brothers kept one of these big cases full of tubes and other t.v. parts at their houses so whenever our television broke down, all my dad had to do was pull out his trusty repair case, find the replacement tube (always in stock at our house! lol) and replace it. Back then, that was quite a luxury as television repair was something that could take several days and even weeks. If you didn't own your own store, then you had to take your television in (and they were huge televisions inside of heavy wooden structures back then) and leave it there indefinitely. As a rule, repairmen worked on a first-come-first-serve basis so if they were back up, you might not have a working television back in your living room for a long time. When televisions broke down, people couldn't just throw it out and go get another affordable one at Walmart in those days. You had to get it repaired so if your television broke down, it was a major bummer event in your household. Bernie and I really appreciated having a dad who always had all the necessary parts and know-how so that we didn't have to go without t.v. for long periods of time. When it comes to the issue of home entertainment options, kids today have no earthly idea how very good they have it.