On 2 November 1936 the world's first high definition television station
was inaugurated at Alexandra Palace. Two competing companies,
Marconi-EMI Television Company Ltd and Baird Television Ltd, provided
studio and transmitting equipment for the new service which operated, on
an alternate basis, with the systems of the two companies. After a trial
period the 405-line system of the Marconi-EMI company was adopted and
the last transmission by the 240-line system of Baird Television Ltd was
sent out on 30 January 1937.
This book is concerned with the history of British television for home
reception from 1922/23 to 1939, when the London Station closed down for
the war years. Great care has been taken to ensure that an unbiased,
accurate history has been written and the work is based predominantly on
written primary source material. More than 900 references are given in
the text, which is illustrated with many photographs and illustrations.
An endeavour has been made to present a balanced history rather than a
purely technical history. Thus the book considers the factors -
technical, financial and general - which led to the establishment of the
world's first, all-electronic, public, regular, high definition
television broadcasting service.