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Old 14th Feb 2018, 6:59 pm   #95
dazzlevision
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Join Date: Sep 2003
Location: Near Swindon, North Wiltshire, UK.
Posts: 3,595
Default Re: Vintage Radios, TVs etc in films and on TV (not anachronisms)

Quote:
Originally Posted by 'LIVEWIRE?' View Post
I've just watched tonight's edition of 'Back in time for Tea', and I'm certain that someone mentioned that Baird in the 1950s had a factory in Yorkshire, so the 14" TV was made locally.
That factory would have been the Ambassador factory, in Brighouse.

In 1954, Baird Television Ltd, of Lancelot Road, Wembley, Middlesex, amalgamated with the Hartley group of companies and was then known as Hartley-Baird Ltd. The Hartley group included Hartley Electromotives Ltd and Duratube & Wire Ltd.

In 1955, Hartley Baird acquired Ambassador Radio & Television Ltd. Originally set up by R N Fitton and he remained as Managing Director of Ambassador Radio & Television and became a director of the parent company.

Hartley Baird was then taken over by Camp Bird Ltd – a mini conglomerate, of Camp Bird House, 39 Dover Street, London, W1 (by at least 1958 - as seen on a Hartley Baird Ltd letterhead, dated 13th February 1958).

Baird Television looks to have relocated to the Brighouse Works, according to the address shown on some Baird mid-50s service manuals.

Camp Bird went into receivership and the Baird TV manufacturing operation ceased. Radio Rentals acquired the name in 1961 and Baird badged sets were then made in Radio Rentals subsidiary Mains Radio Gramophones Ltd, of Bradford. MRG had factories in Lidget Green (main factory), Windhill and Batley.

As for the claim in the programme that "the Baird TV factory was the largest in Europe", I remain highly sceptical.
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