What Old Technology Has Been Replaced by Modern Innovations?

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When dad fitted a converter to the TV so we could receive ITV as well as BBC,
2 channels wow.
 
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I remember my first movie to watch on tv (i don't remember the name) around 1955-57, A rich man would close his home and dismiss his staff, and winter in Florida, as soon as he left, this bum, who has been living in the park, would slip in through a basement window and take on the life of the rich man while he was gone, and when the rich man returned , the bum had closed down the house and release the staff, and removed all traces that he had been there.

It was a simple, but cute movie, most likely quite boring by todays standards.
 
Ivan Seeking said:
I still have my dad's old degaussing coil.


I found one at a garage sale for a buck--I thought that there's got to be another use for it (for that price!)
 
Yeah, not much use these days. I've tried degaussing my wife but it hasn't helped.
 
Until I was in around grade 6 or 7 or so we only had one TV channel, I remember being quite excited to have a satellite dish.
 
Ivan Seeking said:
Yeah, not much use these days. I've tried degaussing my wife but it hasn't helped.

I thought being magnetic was a good thing
 
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rewebster said:
I thought being magnetic was a good thing

Not if you have a CRT telly.
 
I remember when central Maine had two TV stations, both out of Bangor. They broadcast shows from about 6-7am until 10-11 pm and and test patterns the rest of the time. Most of the daytime shows were local content - locals playing instruments and singing, with call-in conversations with fans, kids shows with local talent showing kids how to cut out silhouettes, draw, etc, with obligatory cartoon breaks. There was very little network content until the national news came on after supper, and then a few evening shows.
 
when one could crank a car if the battery was flat, now cranks drive cars.
 
wolram said:
when one could crank a car if the battery was flat, now cranks drive cars.

I remember when a car's battery was dead you could get a push either by hand or by another car a to start it.

I also remember my first few TV sets frequently had to have the vertical roll control knob adjusted. It took about ten years before the manufacturers started to put the blasted knob on the front of the set instead of on the back.
 
edward said:
I remember when a car's battery was dead you could get a push either by hand or by another car a to start it.
Ah yes, I used to live on the top of a hill, and our neighbors had a VW Bug that still worked that way, and I remember many times they'd start pushing the thing down the hill to get it started.

I also remember my first few TV sets frequently had to have the vertical roll control knob adjusted. It took about ten years before the manufacturers started to put the blasted knob on the front of the set instead of on the back.

Yep, remember that too! Though, I don't recall ever having that knob on the front. I must've hung onto the old TV set long enough that by the time I got a new one, we didn't need those vertical control knobs anymore. (Then it was the "tracking" button on the VCR.)

I remember the TV being a big beast in a wooden box, with the box on the floor behind it to adjust the antenna on the roof (until it got so out of whack that Dad had to go on the roof to adjust it), and having to replace tubes in the TV every so often.
 
We already talked about party lines, you obviously didnt read all the "11 pages"
 
D H said:
11 pages, and nobody remembers party lines?? I cannot remember our ring tone, though.

Someone mentioned party lines a page or so ago. We didn't have one, but my grandmother still had one when I was a kid...party line with the house behind her. Every so often you'd pick up the phone to make a call and someone would already be on it.
 
Moonbear said:
Someone mentioned party lines a page or so ago. We didn't have one, but my grandmother still had one when I was a kid...party line with the house behind her. Every so often you'd pick up the phone to make a call and someone would already be on it.

Apparently my grandpa used to get so mad when he needed to make a call to the elevator or something and the gossipy neighbour was inevitably on the phone for hours at a time so that he couldn't make his call. They also used to have a cat that would sit on the telephone line cutting off the phone for everyone on the party line, eventually someone would drive to the house to tell them to get the damn cat off the phone line.
 
scorpa said:
They also used to have a cat that would sit on the telephone line cutting off the phone for everyone on the party line, eventually someone would drive to the house to tell them to get the damn cat off the phone line.

That leaves me in the dark??
 
Our magneto/crank phone was replaced by a dial phone in 1970. I came home on a break from school, and found a brand-new dial phone in the front room.

Change comes slow in rural Maine, and the last magneto-crank phone system was finally converted in 1983 in Bryant Pond.
http://www.privateline.com/mt_telephonehistory/iv_the_telephone_evolves/07_part_g/
 
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turbo-1 said:
Change comes slow in rural Maine, and the last magneto-crank phone system was finally converted in 1983 in Bryant Pond.
http://www.privateline.com/mt_telephonehistory/iv_the_telephone_evolves/07_part_g/

Maine got Rural Electrification when every one started to get it, as I recall. The "maine" driving force according the the NRECA archives was so folks could use refrigeration to save food from spoiling. A powerful motive down under or anywhere else. :smile:

What coop serves you guys?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I remember when you could have the students calculate the speed of a satellite (in meters/second) in a circular orbit of 12,988.259 km and then turn their calculators upside down to see the name of their favorite instructor.

That problem worked great on the old TI-25X and other 7-segment displays.

With a 31x96 dot LCD capable of displaying 2 lines of either symbolic notation and/or answers out to 10 digits or more, the problem just isn't nearly as entertaining on a Casio fx-300ES or graphing calculator.

No more designing problems to spell out cuss words when you turn the calculator upside down.
 
jim mcnamara said:
Maine got Rural Electrification when every one started to get it, as I recall. The "maine" driving force according the the NRECA archives was so folks could use refrigeration to save food from spoiling. A powerful motive down under or anywhere else. :smile:

What coop serves you guys?
Actually, we got electrified pretty early. The little town I grew up in (Moscow) had a large hydro dam commissioned in 1931. Its power was subscribed by a pulp and paper mill in Bucksport. Since the mill was completed before the dam, barges with package boilers and turbine generators were floated up the Penobscot river and moored alongside the mill to provide electricity.

Maine is a net exporter of electrical power due to all the hydro stations. Our area is served by Central Maine Power (transmission only) and Florida Power and Light (they bought all of CMP's generating capacity).
 
This was the definition of cool.

http://www.moviecritic.com.au/userimages/user624_1168917590.jpg
 
_Mayday_ said:
This was the definition of cool.

http://www.moviecritic.com.au/userimages/user624_1168917590.jpg


Having a suspicious lump in your spangly pants? :rolleyes:
 
Kurdt said:
Having a suspicious lump in your spangly pants? :rolleyes:

:smile: ye what is that? I meant the whole over the top image. (minus the lump)
 
I remember you would give the cashier your credit card and she would place it under the small paper and slide the little thing back and forth to imprint the numbers onto the paper and carbon copy. I loved the sound those things made.
 
I remember car phones. Those were around for a good 2 weeks.
Oh yeah and beepers. Wow those are literally useless now.
 
leroyjenkens said:
I remember car phones. Those were around for a good 2 weeks.
Oh yeah and beepers. Wow those are literally useless now.
What about the bag phones?
 
I remember when my grandfather had a little counter-top Coke machine in his repair shop. It dispensed icy 6-oz bottles of Coke, and he used to make people drink the Coke in the waiting area and put the bottles into the wooden crate to be returned. Coke had phased out the small bottles, and he was one of the few people with one of those tiny dispensers, so he had to make sure that the bottles all got sent back to the bottler for refilling. I remember when the bottler increased the price so that he had to charge 3 cents a bottle for the soda instead of 2. He was ticked off about that one!
 
jimmysnyder said:
I remember this thread.
I forgot it.
 

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