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IDKMYDE: The Man Who Invented Color TV... Didn't Even Own One · The Breakfast Club

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  Speaker 1: The man who invented color TV didn't even own one.
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  Speaker 1: Welcome back Know It alls to another episode of the most
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  Speaker 1: anticipated podcast on the Black Effect podcast Network, especially in February,
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  Speaker 1: entitled I didn't know Maybe you didn't either. I'm your
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  Speaker 1: host b dot and my cash app is b dot TV.
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  Speaker 1: If anybody's feeling generous to kick off today's episode, we
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  Speaker 1: will start, as we always do, with three of the
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  Speaker 1: most useless facts you'll never need, never, not a day
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  Speaker 1: in life. Your first useless fact, color televisions. They didn't
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  Speaker 1: become widespread until the nineteen sixties, a full decade after
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  Speaker 1: the technology existed. Your second useless fact, the core technology
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  Speaker 1: that made color TV stable and affordable, was invented decades earlier.
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  Speaker 1: And your third useless fact, the black man who helped
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  Speaker 1: make it possible couldn't even afford a color television himself.
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  Speaker 1: Speaking of color televisions, we just moved our son to
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  Speaker 1: his honors dorm because he finished his first semester with
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  Speaker 1: a three point seven eight gpa. And you would think
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  Speaker 1: with a GPA that high that he would be smart.
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  Speaker 1: At least I did, until after unloading his car, we
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  Speaker 1: realized that he had laid his flat screen television in
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  Speaker 1: the bottom of his trunk, and then packed his drawers
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  Speaker 1: and shoes and clothes and snacks on top of the
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  Speaker 1: television in the trunk. And of course we had to
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  Speaker 1: go over three huge speed bumps to get to the
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  Speaker 1: Honors Dorm. Marl of the story is, Isaiah needs a
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  Speaker 1: new television. But my question to you is do you
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  Speaker 1: know who made color TVs possible? Because I didn't. I
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  Speaker 1: didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know.
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  Speaker 1: I didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know. All right,
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  Speaker 1: let's talk about color television. So when we think about it,
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  Speaker 1: we think about family rooms, super bowls, sitcoms, cartoons, culture.
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  Speaker 1: What we don't think about is the man who made
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  Speaker 1: it possible. Otis Frank Boykin. Otis Boykin. He was an
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  Speaker 1: electrical engineer and an inventor who's work on electrical resistors
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  Speaker 1: and signal control devices made television signals, especially color signals, stable, affordable,
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  Speaker 1: and reliable. Now let me break it down to you
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  Speaker 1: like a five year old. Before Boykin's improvements, televisions was
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  Speaker 1: od expensive. Only the rich people had them. They were unstable,
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  Speaker 1: The signals was jumping all over the place, and of
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  Speaker 1: course they were overheat I mean legit fire hazards in
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  Speaker 1: your living room. It was inconsistent in signal quality. Watching
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  Speaker 1: one of your favorite shows was like watching through a migraine.
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  Speaker 1: Color TV wasn't just about adding color. It needed precise
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  Speaker 1: control of electrical currents. You couldn't just paint the signal
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  Speaker 1: rainbow and call it a day. Boykin invented a wire
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  Speaker 1: precision resistant that improved signal clarity. I reduced interference, It
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  Speaker 1: lowered production costs, and the best part, it didn't catch
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  Speaker 1: your damn house on fire. And the last one was
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  Speaker 1: very important. But the components he designed wasn't just for televisions.
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  Speaker 1: It was for radios, computers, pacemakers, yeah, the thing to
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  Speaker 1: keep your heart beating, and military missile god and systems.
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  Speaker 1: This man's work is keeping mem alive and protecting the country.
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  Speaker 1: How we never knew his name. Now here's the part
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  Speaker 1: that makes the episode hurt a little. Despite holding twenty
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  Speaker 1: six patents and revolutionizing consumer electronics, Oh, this boy can
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  Speaker 1: never own the color TV. Not because he didn't believe
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  Speaker 1: in it, not because he didn't want one, but because
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  Speaker 1: the wealth that was generated from his inventions. He didn't
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  Speaker 1: see none of that money. His designs was licensed, his
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  Speaker 1: components were mass produced. Companies got rich rich. He got
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  Speaker 1: recognition late, and not nearly enough compensation. See this is
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  Speaker 1: the other side of innovation in America. Black inventors build
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  Speaker 1: a future, but don't always get to live comfortable. And
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  Speaker 1: Cardigie Woodson warned us about this one hundred years ago.
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  Speaker 1: If you don't document who built what, somebody else will
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  Speaker 1: claim it. If you don't control the narrative, someone else
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  Speaker 1: will rewrite it. And if you don't own the means
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  Speaker 1: of production, you just produce something for someone else's means.
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  Speaker 1: So every time you watch a color screen, whether it's
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  Speaker 1: your TV, your phone, your tablet, that laptop you're pretending
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  Speaker 1: to work on right now, remember a black man helped
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  Speaker 1: make that possible, even if he never got to sit
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  Speaker 1: back and enjoy it himself. And I didn't know, maybe
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  Speaker 1: you didn't either. I