Just Thinkin’: A fossil on social evolution - By Hal McBride

I have recently confessed that during this pandemic, I might have been prone to overthinking.

I wondered if this condition was limited to my generation.

A member of another generation asked me, “Did they have television when you were growing up?” My answer was, “No.” Then, “Well, kinda, yes.”  Then, “It depends.”

Television intruded into my life when I was in about the eighth grade. Understand, television wasn’t the only marauder that was charging into my life about then. Adolescence was staking its claim.

Rumors of television in far off places like New York City had been around for a few years. I knew it was silliness, like Dick Tracy’s wrist radio, impossible. The talk of dial telephones and fluorine in the water seemed high-tech to me.

My dad had a radio and appliance repair shop. Dad and Paul James, Oklahoma Tire and Supply, heard WKY television was broadcasting from Oklahoma City. So, they pooled their funds and purchased an Air King television set. The bulky set with a six inch screen was placed on our dining room table. Dad commenced to tinker.

A television antenna was attached to the west side of the house and telescoped skyward. It sat on a base that allowed the manual redirection of the antenna. I would be sent outside to turn the antenna as Dad directed me through an open window. “A little more! Back a little! More! That’s it. Nope – wait, almost there – back to your left. Little more – no, no back right.”  You get the idea?

Television changed people’s lifestyle, at least the entertainment portion of it. Card tables were out. Out unless you sat your TV on it. Canasta or Bridge games with friends in the evenings waned. Conversation diminished. Laughter changed.

What was in? Passive entertainment. People sat and watched. Conversation? At commercials only please.

I liked to spend my evenings sitting at my desk reading or doing my homework while listening to music or baseball on the radio. I’ll tell you what television brought to my world – static. Lots of static. Ear piercing, focus destroying, agonizing static. The Muskogee Reds would have the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth inning, down one run. On would come the television – what happened? I couldn’t hear. Well, crud. Of course, it was all about me. I was 13.

Groucho Marx said, “I find television very educating. Every time someone turns on the television set, I go to the other room and read a book.” I agreed. I remember because it was about the time I was moving from the Hardy Boys to Hemingway.

The idea that a picture originating in Oklahoma City was being immediately seen in Stigler was enthralling. I thought watching OU football film on Wednesday night at the Methodist Church was pretty dandy. Just imagine?

“I hate television. I hate it as much as peanuts. But I can’t stop eating peanuts.”  – Orson Wells.

McBride was raised in Haskell County and is the author of several books, which are available at the Haskell County Historical Society.