Atlantic Crossing

The historical accuracy of Atlantic Crossing is debatable but comments that there was no TV in the U. S. in 1939 and 1940 are dead wrong. During the 1939 World's Fair David Sarnoff, president of RCA, unveiled the first commercial publicly accessible television broadcast. I know because I was there. During the opening ceremonies of the Fair on April 30th, FDR became the first president to be televised. TV sets went on sale to the public the next day and were featured in NYC store windows.

From May through December 1939, NYC NBC station (W2XBS) of RCA broadcast twenty to fifty-eight hours of programming per month, Wednesday through Sunday of each week. The programming was 33% news, 29% drama, and 17% educational programming, with an estimated 2,000 receiving sets by the end of the year. The coverage area for reliable reception was a radius of 40 to 50 miles (80 km) from the Empire State Building. In June 1940, W2XBS covered the Republican National Convention for 33 hours during a five-day period. W2XBS also began transmitting NBC News with Lowell Thomas on February 21, 1940.