When did TV remote controls come in to use?

My dad died in 1975 and I guarantee if they had been available and affordable then, he would have had one. He did not have one. We joked a lot after remotes came out how much he would have loved them.

Remotes with a simple one channel up or down (only 13 channels) were available in the late 1950’s.

Cool info. I was surprised in the film but I guess it was accurate.

I remember a friend’s family having one in the 60s and I was so jealous. In our house, I was the remote.

^So good to serve a useful purpose.

I had a crappy TV that was old in 1980 which had a remote that was just a noise-making clicker. The TV would sense loud clicks (or hand-claps) and would start automatically turning the physical dial about once per second until it heard another click. It seemed hilariously savage even at the time.

My Dad had 4 remote controls, his kids. He would call us at a friend’s house, down the street, and tell us to come home quick. I’d walk in, and he’d be sitting, in bed or on the sofa, wiggle his finger at the television, and say “see what else is on!”
He got his first real one in 1975. I remember the vrkng around before that.

My grandma had one in the late 60’s. I really didn’t encounter them again until the mid to late 70’s. We had a black and white TV up until about 1978, with no remote.

The earliest remotes were wired remotes – my grandparents had an Zenith TV, probably around 1962, with a long (30-foot) cable connected to the TV. It had mechanical (push button) components, not solid state and not radio waves.

You clicked one time per channel changed, so to go from channel 3 to channel 8, you clicked 5 times. Of course in those days there were only three channels.

Being the youngest of 6 children I was the remote in our home until the late 70s.

In the late 1960’s my Dad had a TV with a remote that changed the channel up or down. It worked ultrasonically. When you pushed the button it made a hammer whack against an ultrasonic tuning fork. It clicked loudly so we called it a clicker.
I had a certain belt that would make a noise that changed the channel when I shook it. Magic!

Our neighbors had a TV with remote (and color!) in the late 1960s. It was the loud clicking kind.

I don’t recall when they became common. We didn’t have color TV until the 80s, so I would have been the last on the block to have a remote.

As I remember, the transition advanced quickly with the elimination of the round plastic dial with the channels stamped on it that you turned to “click”
bumpily through the stations.

@stanleybmanly The clicker buttons on my Dad’s remote was not too different from the push button starter on a gas grill. You pushed down against a spring and at some point it would let loose and whack something inside. I think there were buttons for volume up and down and one for the channel. Channels only went in one direction – no big deal when there were only 12 channels.

I just have to laugh with this question, because I was the original TV remote. My Dad always said “Janet, change to channel 2”. I loved to help him whenever I could.