Frank Dresser wrote:


"Simon Mason" wrote in message
...



I remember that story, - it was KLEE -TV see he

http://www.bvws.org.uk/405alive/hist..._of_texas.html



"It so happens that the January 1950 issue of Radio Electronics magazine
has a rundown on all the television stations operational in the USA and
conveniently, there on page 53, is a sharp photo of the KLEE station
ident caption."

I have the Feburary 1950 Radio Electronics, but not the January edition.
Just missed it! Anyway, TV dx was a regular feature of the electronics
magazines of the late 40s and early 50s. They printed pictures of the
test patterns in the stories. The webpage says American electronics
magazines were distributed in England and it would be easy to convert
the picture for use in a flying spot scanner.

Oh, well. The cosmic repeater theory is yet to be confirmed.

Frank Dresser



Taking the story at the above webpage at face value, it would seem that
the only people to recieve the KLEE "signal" were the engineers and the
one man named in the article. Also the only thing recieved was the ID
slide and not any programming. These facts lead me to believe that it
was a joke among the engineers that got out of hand. It would not strain
credulity to imagine five or six bored electrical engineers who suddenly
come up with the idea of aliens (remember this was a time when the
public imagination was gripped with the idea that humans were being
"visited") rebroadcasting TV shows to Earth in an attempt to communicate
with us. So they dig up an old issue of Radio Electronics, select the
KLEE photo at random, scan it in, and broadcast it from one room to
another at work so they can photograph it on the screen. They get the
other guy in on the joke and get him to come forward a few days before
the engineers do to say that he too had recieved the mysterious signal.
When TV Guide publishes the "mystery" and has the American engineers
vouch for the "integrity" of the British engineers, the Brits realize
that they're in real hot water if they admit the prank. So they swear
each other to secrecy, and years go by and the concept gets woven into
novels and urban legends, and the original hoaxers don't want to admit
that it was a joke, so they take it to their graves. After fifty years
the smell of rat is still there, but nobody seems to notice it-like the
emperor's clothing.

tommyknocker wrote:
Frank Dresser wrote:


"Simon Mason" wrote in message
...



I remember that story, - it was KLEE -TV see he

http://www.bvws.org.uk/405alive/hist..._of_texas.html



"It so happens that the January 1950 issue of Radio Electronics magazine
has a rundown on all the television stations operational in the USA and
conveniently, there on page 53, is a sharp photo of the KLEE station
ident caption."

I have the Feburary 1950 Radio Electronics, but not the January edition.
Just missed it! Anyway, TV dx was a regular feature of the electronics
magazines of the late 40s and early 50s. They printed pictures of the
test patterns in the stories. The webpage says American electronics
magazines were distributed in England and it would be easy to convert
the picture for use in a flying spot scanner.

Oh, well. The cosmic repeater theory is yet to be confirmed.

Frank Dresser




Taking the story at the above webpage at face value, it would seem that
the only people to recieve the KLEE "signal" were the engineers and the
one man named in the article. Also the only thing recieved was the ID
slide and not any programming. These facts lead me to believe that it
was a joke among the engineers that got out of hand. It would not strain
credulity to imagine five or six bored electrical engineers who suddenly
come up with the idea of aliens (remember this was a time when the
public imagination was gripped with the idea that humans were being
"visited") rebroadcasting TV shows to Earth in an attempt to communicate
with us. So they dig up an old issue of Radio Electronics, select the
KLEE photo at random, scan it in, and broadcast it from one room to
another at work so they can photograph it on the screen. They get the
other guy in on the joke and get him to come forward a few days before
the engineers do to say that he too had recieved the mysterious signal.
When TV Guide publishes the "mystery" and has the American engineers
vouch for the "integrity" of the British engineers, the Brits realize
that they're in real hot water if they admit the prank. So they swear
each other to secrecy, and years go by and the concept gets woven into
novels and urban legends, and the original hoaxers don't want to admit
that it was a joke, so they take it to their graves. After fifty years
the smell of rat is still there, but nobody seems to notice it-like the
emperor's clothing.




See:

http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/klee.htm

to see how this hoax was done.

Mark S. Holden wrote:

tommyknocker wrote:
Frank Dresser wrote:


"Simon Mason" wrote in message
...



I remember that story, - it was KLEE -TV see he

http://www.bvws.org.uk/405alive/hist..._of_texas.html



"It so happens that the January 1950 issue of Radio Electronics magazine
has a rundown on all the television stations operational in the USA and
conveniently, there on page 53, is a sharp photo of the KLEE station
ident caption."

I have the Feburary 1950 Radio Electronics, but not the January edition.
Just missed it! Anyway, TV dx was a regular feature of the electronics
magazines of the late 40s and early 50s. They printed pictures of the
test patterns in the stories. The webpage says American electronics
magazines were distributed in England and it would be easy to convert
the picture for use in a flying spot scanner.

Oh, well. The cosmic repeater theory is yet to be confirmed.

Frank Dresser




Taking the story at the above webpage at face value, it would seem that
the only people to recieve the KLEE "signal" were the engineers and the
one man named in the article. Also the only thing recieved was the ID
slide and not any programming. These facts lead me to believe that it
was a joke among the engineers that got out of hand. It would not strain
credulity to imagine five or six bored electrical engineers who suddenly
come up with the idea of aliens (remember this was a time when the
public imagination was gripped with the idea that humans were being
"visited") rebroadcasting TV shows to Earth in an attempt to communicate
with us. So they dig up an old issue of Radio Electronics, select the
KLEE photo at random, scan it in, and broadcast it from one room to
another at work so they can photograph it on the screen. They get the
other guy in on the joke and get him to come forward a few days before
the engineers do to say that he too had recieved the mysterious signal.
When TV Guide publishes the "mystery" and has the American engineers
vouch for the "integrity" of the British engineers, the Brits realize
that they're in real hot water if they admit the prank. So they swear
each other to secrecy, and years go by and the concept gets woven into
novels and urban legends, and the original hoaxers don't want to admit
that it was a joke, so they take it to their graves. After fifty years
the smell of rat is still there, but nobody seems to notice it-like the
emperor's clothing.




See:

http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/klee.htm

to see how this hoax was done.


Ah. So it was, technically, a scam (a hoax designed to elicit money). As
has been pointed out earlier, doing this sort of thing was easy with
technology in existence in 1953. I've never seen a "flying spot
scanner", but I'm sure that it could reproduce a test pattern and feed
it into a homebrew TV transmitter. Distance wouldn't be required; the tx
would just have to be concealed in the next room. And at least for the
US stations, the scammers had a ready source of test patterns-old
American technology magazines. (The "Soviet" ID slide in English reveals
that when they couldn't find them, they made them up.) One of Snopes's
sources is a book by Carl Sagan; he surely had the scam in mind when he
wrote "Contact". I still can't figure out why the gaping holes in the
story-chief among them the fact that Britain's TV standards were unique
in the world-didn't tip people off. But maybe people WANTED to believe.

tommyknocker wrote:

I still can't figure out why the gaping holes in the
story-chief among them the fact that Britain's TV standards were unique
in the world-didn't tip people off. But maybe people WANTED to believe.



How many people out of 100 do you suppose knew about different TV
standards back then?

"tommyknocker" wrote in message
...

Ah. So it was, technically, a scam (a hoax designed to elicit money).
As
has been pointed out earlier, doing this sort of thing was easy with
technology in existence in 1953. I've never seen a "flying spot
scanner", but I'm sure that it could reproduce a test pattern and feed
it into a homebrew TV transmitter. Distance wouldn't be required; the
tx
would just have to be concealed in the next room.


Exactly. We had a flying spot scanner in my High School electronics
class. It used a small picture tube as a sweeping light source. There
was some sort of light sensitive matrix as a receiver. A slide, about
3"x4", could be placed between the tube and the matrix. The only slide
we had was the familiar Indian Head Test Pattern. There was just enough
room to slip a few fingers and wave them around. The easily amused
among us could wave our fingers around and watch them on TV.

That thing was so cool.


And at least for the
US stations, the scammers had a ready source of test patterns-old
American technology magazines. (The "Soviet" ID slide in English
reveals
that when they couldn't find them, they made them up.) One of Snopes's
sources is a book by Carl Sagan; he surely had the scam in mind when
he
wrote "Contact". I still can't figure out why the gaping holes in the
story-chief among them the fact that Britain's TV standards were
unique
in the world-didn't tip people off. But maybe people WANTED to
believe.



I'm sure the engineers knew about the different standards. But they
also knew that sets could be modified for different sweeps and
modulation polarity. Non engineers probably didn't know about the
differing standards.

Frank Dresser

Frank Dresser wrote:

"tommyknocker" wrote in message
...

Ah. So it was, technically, a scam (a hoax designed to elicit money).
As
has been pointed out earlier, doing this sort of thing was easy with
technology in existence in 1953. I've never seen a "flying spot
scanner", but I'm sure that it could reproduce a test pattern and feed
it into a homebrew TV transmitter. Distance wouldn't be required; the
tx
would just have to be concealed in the next room.

Exactly. We had a flying spot scanner in my High School electronics
class. It used a small picture tube as a sweeping light source. There
was some sort of light sensitive matrix as a receiver. A slide, about
3"x4", could be placed between the tube and the matrix. The only slide
we had was the familiar Indian Head Test Pattern. There was just enough
room to slip a few fingers and wave them around. The easily amused
among us could wave our fingers around and watch them on TV.

That thing was so cool.

And at least for the
US stations, the scammers had a ready source of test patterns-old
American technology magazines. (The "Soviet" ID slide in English
reveals
that when they couldn't find them, they made them up.) One of Snopes's
sources is a book by Carl Sagan; he surely had the scam in mind when
he
wrote "Contact". I still can't figure out why the gaping holes in the
story-chief among them the fact that Britain's TV standards were
unique
in the world-didn't tip people off. But maybe people WANTED to
believe.



I'm sure the engineers knew about the different standards. But they
also knew that sets could be modified for different sweeps and
modulation polarity. Non engineers probably didn't know about the
differing standards.

Frank Dresser



Exactly. I was always intrigued by the story, as I wrote a few days
ago. But I always took it with a bag of salt. I believe there's a lot
of stuff we must still take as "unexplained". But I don't believe for a
minute that stuff won't someday *be* explained and understood.

Tony


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"Tony Meloche" wrote in message
...




Exactly. I was always intrigued by the story, as I wrote a few
days
ago. But I always took it with a bag of salt. I believe there's a
lot
of stuff we must still take as "unexplained". But I don't believe for
a
minute that stuff won't someday *be* explained and understood.

Tony


Just like the stuff they talk about on shortwave radio. A good story is
sometimes better than a good explaination.

Frank Dresser