Bruce Wayne
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8. TV Station Sign-Off
Before infomercials were invented, television stations actually went off the air for a few hours each night. Some of us TV-holics experienced physical withdrawal symptoms when we heard the announcer intone, “We now conclude our broadcast day…” around 2AM or so. The format varied little from station to station across the country; first a few technical details were announced (broadcast frequency, physical address of the station, etc.), then a reading of “High Flight” followed by the National Anthem, and then the steady beeeeeeeeeeeeeep tone of the test pattern.
Geesh, I remember ALL those sounds! :eeek:
9. Cash Register
Those chunka-chunka push buttons were clumsy, but (unlike the fellow in this video) veteran cashiers could check you out just as fast with these old-style machines as their modern counterparts do with today’s scanners.
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I'd add to that the sounds of clip-clopping hooves and rumbling wagon wheels on cobblestones ... and the sound of a large ice block being slid into an icebox ... and the hum of a vacuum tube radio warming up.
I doubt there's anyone under 40 who knows what a mechanical dial tone sounds like -- it's nothing like the electronic tone you hear today.
Yep, I remember all that stuff. I want to get an old rotary desk phone, but it would go over like cement shoes in my house.