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20th Century
Third Decade

1920: The first broadcasting stations are opened.
1920: First cross-country airmail flight in the U.S.
1920: Sound recording is done electrically.
1920: Post Office accepts the postage meter.
1920: KDKA in Pittsburgh broadcasts first scheduled programs.
1921: Quartz crystals keep radio signals from wandering.
1921: The word "robot" enters the language.
1921: Western Union begins wirephoto service.
1922: A commercial is broadcast, $100 for ten minutes.
1922: Technicolor introduces two-color process for movies.
1922: Germany's UFA produces a film with an optical sound track.
1922: First 3-D movie requires spectacles with one red and one green lens.
1922: Singers desert phonograph horn mouths for acoustic studios.
1923: Zworykin's electronic iconoscope camera tube and kinescope display tube.
1923: People on one ship can talk to people on another.
1923: Ribbon microphone becomes the studio standard.
1923: A picture, broken into dots, is sent by wire.
1923: 16 mm nonflammable film makes its debut.
1923: Kodak introduces home movie equipment.
1923: Neon advertising signs.
1924: Low-tech achievement: notebooks get spiral bindings.
1924: The Eveready Hour is the first sponsored radio program.
1924: At KDKA, Conrad sets up a short-wave radio transmitter.
1924: Daily coast-to-coast air mail service.
1924: Pictures are transmitted over telephone lines.
1924: Two and a half million radio sets in the U.S.
1925: The Leica 35 mm camera sets a new standard.
1925: Commercial picture facsimile radio service across the U.S.
1925: All-electric phonograph is built.
1925: A moving image, the blades of a model windmill, is telecast.
1925: From France, a wide-screen film.
1926: Commercial picture facsimile radio service across the Atlantic.
1926: Baird demonstrates an electro-mechanical TV system.
1926: Some radios get automatic volume control, a mixed blessing.
1926: The Book-of-the-Month Club.
1926: In U.S., first 16mm movie is shot.
1926: Goddard launches liquid-fuel rocket.
1926: Permanent radio network, NBC, is formed.
1926: Bell Telephone Labs transmit film by television.
1927: NBC begins two radio networks; CBS formed. 1927: Farnsworth assembles a complete electronic TV system.
1927: Jolson's "The Jazz Singer" is the first popular "talkie."
1927: Movietone offers newsreels in sound.
1927: U.S. Radio Act declares public ownership of the airwaves.
1927: Technicolor.
1927: Negative feedback makes hi-fi possible.
1928: Baird demonstrates color TV on electro-mechanical system.
1928: The Teletype machine makes its debut.
1928: Television sets are put in three homes, programming begins.
1928: Baird invents a video disc to record television.
1928: In an experiment, television crosses the Atlantic.
1928: In Schenectady, N.Y., the first scheduled television broadcasts.
1928: Steamboat Willie introduces Mickey Mouse.
1928: A motion picture is shown in color.
1928: Times Square gets moving headlines in electric lights.
1928: IBM adopts the 80-column punched card.
1929: Experiments begin on electronic color television.
1929: Telegraph ticker sends 500 characters per minute.
1929: Ship passengers can phone relatives ashore.
1929: Brokers watch stock prices on an automated electric board.
1929: Something else new: the car radio.
1929: In Germany, magnetic sound recording on plastic tape.
1929: Television studio is built in London.
1929: Air mail flown from Miami to South America.
1929: Bell Lab transmits stills in color by mechanical scanning.
1929: Zworykin demonstrates cathode-ray tube "kinescope" receiver, 60 scan lines.

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