SV Staff

Sixty-six years ago this week AT&T Bell Laboratories researchers John Bardeen, Walter Brattain, and William Shockley were granted a U.S. Patent for a device that would become a fundamental building block of modern electronics for decades to come—the transistor.

Sixty-three years ago this month the first color TVs were offered for sale to the U.S. public.

Sixty-four years ago this week, Westinghouse unveiled the world’s first color TV in 60 stores throughout New York. The Westinghouse H840CK15 had a tiny 15-inch screen and sold for $1,295 — the equivalent of almost 12 grand in 2018 dollars!

Almost a decade after Elvis Presley was dubbed “Elvis the Pelvis” for the “vulgar” act of gyrating his hips on national television, the FBI in reacting to an outcry from parents launched a formal investigation into the supposedly pornographic lyrics of the R&B standard “Louie, Louie,” written and recorded by Richard Berry in 1957 but popularized by The Kingsmen in 1963.