Next February marks the end of one era of broadcasting, and the start of another.  The obvious change is the shutdown of this country's analog full-power television stations, to be replaced by more efficient and higher quality digital transmissions.

It's also the end of a chapter in Syracuse's history, as the last television broadcast equipment designed and built at GE's Electronics Park comes out of service.  If you're old enough to remember Baron Daemon, chances are good you watched him on a TV that came out of building 5;  our audio amplifiers and very first color cameras were made in building 7.  To this day, we still have several BA25 audio preamps that work just as well as they did when we signed on the air in 1962.

Many stations around the country still operate transmitters built in Electronics Park:

This is the standby transmitter at our sister station in Elmira.  It takes up a fair portion of the room, not counting the transformers, blowers, tanks and miscellaneous plumbing fixtures -- the massive tubes are water cooled.  It's older than most of the people who operate it, but it still fires up when needed.  At WUTR, our former sister station in Utica, their GE transmitter has been kept on the air all day, every day for decades by their skilled engineers.  That's right -- decades.  How many things can you think of that are built that well?

One day early next year, these faithful rigs will be shut down, their tubes cooled, and the recirculating pumps stilled for the last time.  Antennas will be switched over to new transmitters, most made in other parts of this country, sending signals to converters and widescreen receivers made overseas.

Television was born and grew up in this country: giants like RCA, Ampex, and General Electric created much of the technology that we take for granted.  Videotape... compatible color... electronic graphics... all invented and made practical in America.  But today you will be hard pressed to buy a videotape recorder or a DVD player made in this country, even if the box has a name like GE or RCA or Zenith on the outside.  The coupon-eligible converter boxes we've been talking about?  All of the ones on my table were made in China, two for their Korean parent company.

Remember General Electric's slogan:  "Progress is our most important product"?  The technological advances coming into our living rooms are amazing... but when I drive down Electronics Parkway past acres of empty parking lots, what I see sure doesn't feel like progress.

-- Jeff