Friday / Weekend Open Line


The important holiday business of viewing such classics as “It’s A Wonderful Life” and “A Christmas Story” from the comfort of home owes much to a technological advance this month 75 years ago. In December 1938, Russian-American engineer Vladimir Zworykin was awarded two patents for cathode ray tubes. One was for the iconoscope to capture video images. The other was for the kinescope, which displayed television and computer monitor images for decades until the advent of flat panel screens. Zworykin was not one to rest on these laurels, as in 1940 he invented the electron microscope. Whatever the ills of TV programming, obviously the American people consider it an appliance for a wonderful life. More than 98 percent of U.S. households own at least one set, a percentage that has held steady for years. Profile America is in its17th year as a public service of the U.S. Census Bureau.