The U.S. Census Bureau offers a tribute to the 50th anniversary of color TV:
- It was described as "the wonderful world of color" in the title of an early television program. On March 25, 1954, the Radio Corporation of America began to manufacture color television sets at its Bloomington, Ind., plant. It initially built about 5,000 of these sets, known as the model CT-100 color receiver. They retailed for $1,000 apiece. These sets with 12-inch-wide screens didn't receive much use that year, as colorcasting was severely limited at that time. It would be difficult to imagine life without color television today. To mark the anniversary, the Census Bureau has assembled a sampling of statistics from its publications about television and the television industry.
Tuned In
248 million
The number of television sets in U.S. households in 2001.
87.3%
The percentage of households with at least one TV in 1960. (From the 1960 census)
98.2%
The percentage of households with at least one TV in 2001.
2.4
The average number of TVs per home in 2001.
1,669
The projected number of hours that adults (age 18 and older) will watch television in 2004. This is the equivalent of about 70 days.
94.3%
The percentage of people age 18 and over who said they watched television in the spring of 2002. Older Americans (age 65 and over) were more likely to be glued to the tube (97 percent) than any other age group.
92%
The percentage of children ages 6 to 11 whose parents in 2000 imposed at least one rule for watching TV, such as types of programs watched, how early or late the children could watch and the number of hours watched. The percentage dropped to 73 percent for children ages 12 to 17.
$255.18
The projected spending per person for cable and satellite TV in 2004.
Article comments