Television is Born - John Baird

January 27 marks a major milestone is the history of television. On January 27, 1926 - a Scottish inventor named John Baird demonstates a new invention that is able to transmit pictures - and guess what, the machine is called TELEVISION. Sadly - today, virtually no one even knows his name or that he was the guy who helped make the concept of transmitting images real. (the principles behind this had been around since 1875… but they remained mostly ethereal principles). Oh yeah… Al Gore wasn’t born yet… so he was in no position to take credit for it, like the he internet.

Baird used a series of rapidly rotating discs with holes in them to create a series of horizontal lines. Later…. a fellow named Philo Farnsworth would come up with a better idea as he watched his dad plow the fields in the farm - in a single line, back and forth, making a new row at each turn. This idea was the birth of scan lines, which looks like a series of horizontal lines… but is actually a continuous line.

And the story about Philo Farnsworth and RCA’s David Sarnoff is really interesting too… but we’ll save that for another day…. because today - January 27 - LikeTelevision proudly commemorates Scotsman John Logie Baird, and the birth of television.

And today is also marks the birthday of Sabu (01/27/1924), also known as the elephant boy - and India’s first star of the silver screen., He starred as Mowgli in Hollywood’s original screen adaptation of Kipling’s Jungle Book. His full name was Sabu Dastagir - I tried to do a google image search for Sabu… and darn it… there was virtually nothing of interest. I did learn however that there’s a pro wrestler named Sabu.

And - yes… one of favorites - the elegant Donna Reed - best known for her role as Mary Hatch in It’s a Wonderful Life was born on January 27, 1921. LikeTelevision offers a few movies starring Donna Reed - Picture of Dorian Gray (with Angela Lansbury) - free preview - and Last Time I Saw Paris - starring Elizabeth Taylor, Van Johnson, Walter Pidgeon, Eva Gabor, Roger Moore - yep… a very Bond… James Bond.

Johnny Carson - We’ll Miss You

On January 23, 2005 - the world lost one of the greatest comedians EVER, as Johnny Carson died after a incredible career. In wouldn’t surprise me if Johnny made more people laugh than any man ever born. No kidding. For those too young to remember, Johnny Carson was as big in the world of laughs as Elvis was to music. What made Johnny so darn special - was not only his timing and his razor sharp wit - but mostly i think…. it was his huge heart. Yes - he would poke fun and goof on people, but i never saw him do it in a mean way. He didn’t get his laughs at the expense of others… which seems to be standard operating procedure in comedy today. It is quite a special gift, making others laugh… and to do it in a way that celebrated life, instead of dumping on people - is a sweet spot in comedy that Johnny owned.

May God bless you Johnny Carson - and I hope all of heaven is giving back to you… all the sweet and gentle laughter you gave to so many. You deserve it.

So please - check out some terrific video moments from The Tonght Show starring Johnny Carson. Yes… you can watch Johnny Carson at the top of his game…. with guests like Drew Barrymore, Raquel Welch, Rosanne Barr, Tiny Tim… Jack Benny…. and so many more. All of us at LikeTelevision welcome all the guests dropping by our site to honor this terrific man. We’ll miss you Johnny.

Hercules Burns Bones?

Another LikeTelevision Birthday Bash - Steve Reeves, Burns & Bones. PLUS - Woo woo - another movie has been made available for download - yes - it’s Steve Reeves in Hercules Unchained. Never seen it? Well check out Frank Random’s FREE Preview. (Wonder if Oliver Stone used this movie as a model for Troy? tee hee hee).

So here’s the birthday roundup - DeForest Jackson Kelley, best known for his role as Dr. Bones McCoy on Star Trek was born January 20, 1920 in Atlanta, Georgia. You can watch him in an episode of The Lone Ranger - no kidding! And yes… if you are a member, you can even download the mpeg files. And also born on January 20th - George Burns (Nathan Birnbaum) b. 01/20/1896 in New York City. You can watch a bunch of Burns & Allen - and in case you didn’t know, his wife Gracie is about the funniest lady in entertainment history. And finally - Steve Reeves born Jan 21, 1926 in Glasgow, Montana. In addition to Hercules Unchained, makes sure you check out muscle man Reeves in Ed Wood’s Crime film noire - Jailbait. And yes… you can watch the original trailer for this movie too - free preview.

I regret we felt compelled to shut down any new posting on the message boards - it seems some purulent strain of pervert has decided to become a nuisance - so we just decided to close down any posting for the time being. There’s a lot of cleaning up to do, and to be honest, we’d rather be preparing some of the new movies next up in the queue. Some real winners are on the way… but that’s all I am gonna say for now.

Christie Love DVD Download

Woo woo - just in time for the weekend - a new DVD iso download of Get Christie Love starring Teresa Graves as the kung fu fighting policewoman who is just too good for the bad guys. (or would i say, she was too baad for the bad guys. hmm).

The DVD iso file is 1.3 gig. How do I burn a DVD from the DVD iso file I downloaded? Easy. Open the creation software for your DVD burner - and look for the command to record from an image file (or iso). Then select the iso file you just downloaded as the image file (iso). That’s it - then burn. In case you missed yesterday’s post - there is also a new W.C. Fields DVD iso file ready for download. Need more? Look here.

NEW - W.C. Fields DVD Download

William Claude Dukenfield, better known as W.C. Fields remains one of America’s greatest comedians. Best known for his cynical wit and nasal voice - he was one of Hollywood’s earliest stars and is remembered for many hilarious quotes. Here’s some of my favorites:

After two days in hospital, I took a turn for the nurse.

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again. Then give up. There’s no use being a damned fool about it.

I was in love with a beautiful blonde once, dear. She drove me to drink. That’s the one thing I’m indebted to her for.

We just added a new DVD iso download to the library - featuring 3 classic short films by the late, great W.C Fields. The disc includes Fatal Glass of Beer, The Golf Specialist, and The Dentist. The iso files can be found via the DOWNLOAD IT link on The Dentist page. Creatinbg a DVD from an ISO file is very easy to do. Here’s an old post with some tips on burning a DVD.

More fun stuff in the pipeline…

Download Movie Vault, DVD Help

Behind the scenes… some changes in the download library. Ready for download - part one of Inagaki’s Samurai trilogy. Also new - Suspiria has just been added to the download library. Several more… we’ll report soon. Suggestions welcome.

For those who own a DVD recorder - please check out the iso files files offered in the download library. What’s an iso file you ask.. well in this instance, it is an image file of a fully authored DVD disc… ready to play in your hardware hooked to you tv. To create a DVD - go to your DVD authoring creation software - and select, burn(record) a DVD from an image file - select the iso file you just downloaded, and record. Our favorite iso is either Owl Creek Bridge, or Hoichi the Earless, or maybe One Step Beyond, vol #1. More on the way. i s out.

Next Up - Argento’s Suspiria

Over the holiday break, Frank Random was hard at work on Dario Argento’s Suspiria - doing some major clean-up work on the film. the new streams are now up, sized in letterbox, 320 x 128, looks great at double sizeand the mpeg files for downloading will be ready in 2 hours. Check out this slick new Frank Random trailer - from LikeTelevision’s remastered version of Argento’s Thriller masterpiece - Suspiria.

Hockey Related Weird TV

For those suffering from no hockey games - let us offer an assorted video palette of hockey related comedy. Oh - you didn’t know that was a genre? Check out this free video snippet of Dr. Barre, hockey team dentist. And who could forget Thor, team mascot and star of the Vermont Vikings??? (not to be confused with this Thor)- Yes, the Vikings were hockey’s greatest team that never was. And the most whacked out of all - yes, Antoine DuFleur - the self designated poet laureate of the NFL (it seems he got checked one time too many).

Behind the scenes - tweaked all kinds of database backend pages to reflect the change to a New Year (2004 changed to 2005 in about 12000 places). It is always a bear - only because it is tedious and confusing. You haven’t done it in a year - so it feels rusty. AHHHH! What if i mess up? Which makes me reflect… on Y2K, Y2K… the fear fiasco of y2k is actually part of site maintence… done each year.. but in the case of Y2K, this work to be done was very well marketed. hahaha. More behind the scenes - it was time to take down the holiday related video lead-in spots and replace them with generics. Done. Also rotated most of the interstitial videos to keep things fresh. Blah blah blah.. back to work.