Television by DINSDALE, Alfred - 1926

First Edition of the First Book on Television DINSDALE, Alfred. Television. London: Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons, Ltd., 1926. First edition. Small octavo (7 1/4 x 4 3/4 inches; 183 x 122 mm). 62pp. Portrait frontispiece of John Logie Baird, 5 photographic plates and 6 full-page diagrams all included in the pagination. Contains the first photograph printed as it appeared on the screen of the first television. (p. 38). Original printed flexible boards. Pictorial dust jacket. Jacket rubbed along extremities with some light dust staining. Some small, almost invisible repairs to head and tail of jacket spine area. Some of the plates trimmed close at fore-edge by printer, with the caption to the plate on page 45 mostly trimmed off. Overall, a very good copy and very scarce in dust jacket. Housed in a blue cloth clamshell. Dinsdale focuses primarily on the work of Scottish engineer John Logie Baird, the first person to produce televised pictures of objects in motion. Baird produced the first television image in outline and transmitted the first pictures between two televisions. Of Baird's early experiments, Dinsdale writes: "Baird's weird apparatus - old bicycle sprockets, biscuit tins, cardboard discs and bullseye lenses, all tied together with sealing wax and string - failed to impress those who were accustomed to the shining brass and exquisite mechanism of the instrument maker. The importance of the demonstration was, however, realized by the scientific world..." (p 49). Although he did not succeed in producing a viable system of television, Baird paved the way for future technical development. HBS 67950. $4,500