I don't know what the general perception of the invention of television is, although I suspect the question would provoke a reference to John Logie Baird, the BBC and a MacLeans toothpaste advert when commercial television started up in the 1950s. Things are complicated by the fact that things began with mechanical TV, and there was a war along the lines of VHS/Betamax to decide whether it would prevail, or if fully electronic TV would be the way forward. (It may be no bad thing that Baird's mechanical system sometimes had a tendency to fly apart at demonstrations.)

There isn't enough space to go into any detail here, but suffice to note that Baird used a Nipcow Disc in his system, and this was invented by Paul Nipcow, a German, who patented a television system in 1884 - JL Baird wasn't born until 1888. You may also want to look up Hungarian, Kálmán (Coloman) Tihanyi, and there's Vladimir Zworykin, and Boris Rosing also worth a look. Don't mis-interpret this as knocking Baird in any way at all, I'm merely suggesting a time scale and illustrating the complexity of the beginnings. Also how we, and Baird, failed to capitalise the invention, and spent more time fighting and arguing about it - while the Germans just got on with it.

Nazi television went on air in 1935 and ran for nine years, until 1945.

The problem with it was that it was really only available to the elite of the Reich, who didn't need to be converted, but could enjoy the content. With so few television receivers available, the potential we now see for spreading propaganda was just not available to he Reich, the medium couldn't really reach the volk (people), and they never capitalised on it, and probably didn't realise the power of this new tool.

As you'll see in the video, those involved in the development and production side of things were largely ignored, and effectively resorted to self-promotion to get funding from their masters, and stay in a job. Can you imagine the same problem if the Nazis were around to use television today?

Less then 300 reels of material have survived from the time, and there was little to survive anyway, as there were no video recorders then, and most of the material was broadcast live, so filming of televising was almost the only way that this material would be captured, however you'll see how film was involved in the transmission process too, so this led to more material being produced.

Unfortunately, it seems we can't embed Google video here, only YouTube (or I've just forgotten how to) so I'm afraid it's link time, but I think the quality is better, having seen both. Settle down for "Television Under The Swastika", credited as the first regular television broadcast in the world. 55 minutes, so break out the tea and biscuits.

The programme is not new, having been made in 1999, so we're lucky to be getting this English version.

http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=1992130789606468647&hl=en&fs=true

The Nazis also had a tv service in Paris for their occupying troops after 1940. It was covered in After the Battle magazine a few years ago.

Yes, the Eiffel Tower was already in use as a television transmitter for Nazi television, and gets a mention in the documentary.

There's probably a lot more buried away along the same lines, and it's probably true to say that ordinary folk - viz those unlikely to be reading in here - are probably blissfully unaware that the Nazi had all the technical toys that the British/Allies had, and could easily have wiped the floor with "us" had they not been intent on aggression (remember the old story paraphrased as no-one having time to look at the first incarnation of the machine-gun because they were too busy loading their single-shot guns), and had cleansed the nation of most of its brainpower thanks to genocide and the removal of anyone that could think.

Hitler's interference in projects such as the Me 262 jet were genuine reprieves for "us", and I just noted a documentary that described the 262's effect on bomber fleets as "devastating", up to 100 knots faster than anything else, and speed in the air in war is king. Fortunately, the jet didn't take to the air until the last days of the war, when the Luftwaffe was all but grounded as the Allies had turned off the fuel taps, and they only flew when they absolutely had to.

Don't know if anyone else enjoys the 1970's TV series "Secret Army" which features television in one episode, brought to Brussels for evaluation by the SS, while it is being set up for demonstration and is pointed towards the sky, we see the arrival of a British Mosquito flown by a pilot who had been captured and tortured by the SS in their Brussels HQ. Having appropriated the aircraft while returning from another mission, he convinced his companion not to stop him, and diverts to Brussels and lays waste the SS HQ, unwittingly destroying the television equipment and killing the technicians in the process - but missing the ranking officers.

It wasn't just Hitler that interfered in German projects, for example Erhard Milch, Inspector General of the Luftwaffe and Herman Goering fought little personal wars with others.  One apparently caused General Ernst Udet to commit suicide, and Milch was also determined pre-war that Messerschmitt wouldn't get their Me-109 fighter off the ground (literally).  A lot of the higher up members of the party disliked each other intenselely and had their own little fiefdoms.  For some reason Admiral Erich Raeder disliked Karl Donitz.

Slightly different scenarios - the problem with Der Führer was that he had ultimate power, and could decree that developments were used for what he wanted, and not what the designers designed them for. Good for us, as it meant they spent more time on the drawing board than they really needed to, and were less effective than they might have been.

The sad thing is that the effect you describe appears to be universal, and the infighting and pursuit of personal agendas was as rife in Britain as it was in Germany (and no doubt America).

Frank Whittle developed his jet engine virtually alone, ignored by those he appealed to for resources and funding. I've just recently discovered that the establishment was being poisoned against him. It seems that the Air Ministry's man in this field was Whittle's mentor at one time, and had his own jet engine design, which he obviously wanted to promote. Unfortunately, his design was a failure, as he was unable to grasp the concept of jet propulsion itself, and postulated that the jet could not develop enough thrust to drive an aircraft, with the result that his design still used a propeller (and apparently naff anyway), so would never have delivered the speed potential of a proper jet, or been able to go supersonic.

Fortunately, as history shows is, Whittle managed to prevail.

While it may not be the same principle, Watson-Watt's radar developed not for a demand for an early warning systym, but a ministry demand for a death-ray. Fortunately, even back in the 1930s, Watson-Watt was smart enough to see that this was futile, and went on to sell the early warning system.

A similiar scenarion was in the USA where Goddard developed a lot of rocketry technology and did testing more or less on his own while Von Braun had the full backing of the party.

I've been having a rummage around the past, as I've forgotten more than I ever remembered about the Baird and the beginning of television.

The story's as murky and intrigue filled as the beginning of radio, and who invented it, with both containing claim and counter-claim, and its followers in each camp.

Before going any further, I believe the claim or question is flawed, and the truth is not so much found in who invented television (or radio), but in realising that there were many brilliant minds working on similar concepts at the time, and the final race to the line and the patents involved owed more to money, backers and commercial interests, than the individual inventors themselves - and this, of course, led to espionage, deceit, and theft.

(Similar principles can be applied to all the famous inventions, and the light bulb, radio, first flight, and telephone can found to suffer the same effect. I blame the media, which has only one braincell, and can only cope with quoting one inventor per item, and can't cope with any depth behind the story.)

I started the rummage because the Nazi television film placed the start of this service in 1935, meaning they had to have the started the infrastructure, small as it was, some time before this, suggesting they must have created or aqcuired the necessary technology earlier as well.

While the usual sources come up with the usual suspects - when I say usual, I mean to me, and suspect most folk will never have heard of any of the television pioneers other than Baird - there is little or no mention of German development (just a few names), and the battle for the title of inventor is largely confined to Britain and America.

I suspect, having now seen the Nazi television film, and the story it tells of much of the material being lost, that there is possibly a "Sin of Omission" taking place here, and that the true story of the invention of television should have a German strand, possibly a complete missing chapter. And I emphasis the German aspect, as the work was clearly in place before the Nazi's decided to run with it.

I suspect I won't find anything, and would have to disappear deep into library archives, learn how to read German, and have to spend the best part of a year travelling around Germany to prove, or disprove, this thought, as I think it's something nobody wants to know about, or simply ignores as it would upset the apple-cart of conventional wisdom

The Origins of Television

Television History - The First 75 Years

Although it doesn't relate directly to the Nazi television theme as such, it does relate to much of the content, which covered the architecture and construction.

This article dates back to 2005, and is an interesting review of the relationship between Adolf Hitler and Albert Speer - his architect - which was the subject of a four part TV series Speer und Er, said to have been watched by the largest TV audience in living memory, according to German media analysis.

Notably, the BBC showed the series, but reading the review, it seems the BBC were not offered Part IV: Sequel: The Deception, which, focused almost entirely on Speer after his release from Spandau prison.

I'd like to be able to watch it (the complete series) now.

Speer: architect of a lie?
A controversial documentary about Albert Speer portays him as being complicit in the genocide of the jews. Not true, says our correspondent, who interviewed him at length during his final years

Quoted from Apollo

A controversial documentary about Albert Speer portays him as being complicit in the genocide of the jews. Not true, says our correspondent, who interviewed him at length during his final years

I read the site you recommended Apollo, and found it interesting. i don't believe Speers had anything to do with the genocide of the Jews. Oh yes, he had a lot to do with forced labour, but i think he was innocent of charges about genocide. Th eauthor of this work about Speer is one Gitta Sereny. I copied the following from one of the the interlocking sites:

'Gitta Sereny was born a Hungarian in Vienna, Austria in 1921. Her father was Hungarian Protestant Christian, Ferdinand Serény, and her mother was a former actress from Hamburg, Margit born Herzfeld, of Jewish origin"