A very important six years in the history of television, however. We didn't get TV until I was about seven, and I still vividly remember the first time I saw a neighbor's huge cathedral set with a picture the size of a tea saucer.
We were all in bed before Peggy Lee or Nat came on (we did watch the Sullivan Show, everyone in America did.) I didn't see, or at least don't recall ever seeing Elvis on the Sullivan show.
I think it must have been 1954 when we got our first TV. It was a Crosley fifteen inch console. For some reason my parents kept the cabinet long after the TV was pulled out and thrown away. I took a good look at that cabinet one day and realized the woodwork was a quality never to be seen again. You would have to find a professional cabinetmaker and pay a fortune to get something like that now.
My father paid $450. for that television and his gross income as a carpenter back then was something like $200. per MONTH! Looking back I cannot believe he spent that much on it. I remember seeing Elvis on the Sullivan show, I was about twelve at the time. I remember Johnny Cash singing “Teenage Queen”. I remember the first ads for the new Ford Thunderbird and Eartha Kitt was on the screen quite a lot back then.
I remember watching wrestling back when the really big guys weighed 220 but they could move and many of them had been wrestlers back when they actually fought for prize money, they had to learn to fake it for TV.