When did cable become available where you live?

I'm thinking it was right around 1980 (lived in the suburbs of Fort Wayne, IN) and we got it not long after that. I remember HBO wasn't even 24/7 at the time and I also remember having it for the launch of MTV.

 

Around 1979, my Dad attempted to get cable tv for our home. The cable company said that if he paid to run the cable line to our area, about 10 miles, then we could receive cable. He then sought to purchase a satellite dish and determined that the cost for a dish was about $10k. So he built a dish from scratch. Satellite signals were fairly weak then, and we lived in central Florida, at the edge of the satellite signal footprint, so the dish was 16 feet in diameter. Friends would kid that my house would be bombed by the Soviets.

 

1983

 

Around 1950 Jarmain Cable. Ed Jarmain is said to be the Father of Cable in Canada.
I met him once. A true gentleman. R.I.P.

 

1970s high tech.

 

1977(maybe?). I remember the first thing I ever saw on cable was an Muhammed Ali fight on a premium movie channel called Showcase.

 

1973-74. My family in Bayshore NY had HBO then running off channel 3 or 4 with a red push button to engage. Man, when my father and I put on Magnum Force with the "F$$k the courts" line in the first five minutes we went nuts. Cursing on TV, Wow. Great times. John M.

 

The HBO Guide - August 1975

I remember these guides, from when HBO first entered my family's home!

 

I lived in East Islip, back in the 70's (and '80's)...
My mom & dad thought getting HBO would be more 'economical' that taking my and my brother to the movies all the time!
I, too, remember 'the button'!

 

Link won't work, for me anyway. I do remember a paper sheet or small guide. John..

 

1980. Caught the first episode of MTV.

Haven't paid for cable in 20 years now. Rabbit ears are fine for me and the wife. Plenty of records to be heard!

 

1983. Shortly after we got it, HBO showed Star Wars for what I believe was the first time it was shown on any kind of TV. Star Trek II (which was already in heavy rotation) was shown right before or after it.

 

Here's the entire archive:
The HBO Guide Archive

 

Do you remember HBOs "Video Jukebox" music videos they'd show? It was quite some time before TBS did "Night Tracks" and even longer before MTV. The first video that I saw was Michael Nesmith's "Cruisin'"

I loved cable TV back then because it provided entertainment that I otherwise would never have seen. It's not really relevant in the age of the Internet and streaming video (I love, love, love my Roku...) We still have cable, but it's mostly watched by my wife. Neither of my kids have any use for it.

 

HBO would often show the "Blow Away" video by George Harrison between the movies....
no rhyme or reason....just to get the time between movies to the top of the hour..
I remember seeing Talking Heads "Once In A Lifetime" video this way, too!

 

The early '70s in Burlington, Vermont; 13 channels!

 

Wow -- those brought back some memories. We waited for those guide to show up in the mail with great anticipation!

We started getting cable TV in June 1976. We lived in an area in which the company didn't have to retrofit too much, so the sales-folks actually showed up at your house after making an appointment... sorta like selling vacuum cleaners door to door at the time! We fell into a test region. At that time, we got the very low intro rate of $8.95 per month. After we signed up, I remember the sales dude saying, "Remember to tell everyone how great it is and invite all your friends over to watch movies!" We were basically a "promo" house to show everyone just how great this new "drug" was and get them "addicted" as well!

Little did my dad know just what his pre-teen kids would start watching!

 

I've seen them when I've gone to the HBO offices to visit friends. Looking at all of the great sports events that they showed in the 70s which are all gone just makes me ill.

 

Down here in the lower Rio Grande Valley in Texas, the poorest spot per capita in the US announced by Walter Cronkite on the CBS Evening News (thanks Captain Obvious) circa late '70's, I saw my first cable program around '79 or '80. I remember that's when I first saw the David Lynch movie "Eraserhead", mesmerizing. My future wife to be didn't get it. It was either on HBO or The Movie Channel or Stars, can't remember exactly.

It's also when I first became aware of premium channels like HBO offering a free tryout period to get you to subscribe to a bigger package. I remember my cable bill was around $38/month at the time.

 

You guys might like this HBO Guides archive site.

The HBO Guide Archive

 

Our town in Western KY got cable in the early 80s but my street didn’t get service for a couple of years because the cable company didn’t want to run the line down to us. Our neighbors at the top of the hill had it but those of us (25 or so houses) at the bottom had to wait.
MTV and The Kids Are Alright were some of the first things I watched.

 

Non-terrestrial TV appeared in the UK in 1991 as I recall. I'd just turned 14 and after discovering all the German soft porn on the likes of RTL and SAT1, it was like Christmas Day every day for at least a year.

 

Early 70's. I recall it very clearly; me and a bunch of friends were hanging out poolside (we were playing hooky) at my (parents) house. Suddenly this guy just walks up! I remember he was dressed like crap and sweating bullets. Heard what he was selling and signed up, been watching it ever since. Only now am I starting to think about cutting that cord!

 

Back then, I lived in the Lehigh Valley -- home to the first cable tv system in America! Service Electric! Must have been 70s. Even if you didn't pay for premium service, the technology was so primative, you used to be able to use your fine tune knob on your analog set, and dial in HBO between channel frequencies - it wasn't even scrambled!

 

The Binghamton area here in upstate New York was very bad for analog transmissions due to all the hills and valleys we have. A co-worker of mine remembers first getting cable in the late 1960s, and I believe that the area did first have it around 1968 or so. My grandparents in Endicott got it in the early 1970s, so I was familiar with it from that time. My family first got it when we moved to West Corners (which borders Endicott) in 1976. The New Channels lineup at that time consisted of twelve regular channels, one of which was just for time and temperature. HBO was available as a paid add-on but I couldn't talk my parents into getting it. Nor could I talk them into adding service for the black and white set I had in my room.