“Television won’t last because people will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night.” – Darryl F. Zanuck, American film producer and co-founder of 20th Century Fox

On October 14, 1964, Philips TV reportedly conducted their first official experimental broadcast of Philips’ color TV system in the Philips television studio in Waalre, Netherlands. The demonstration is said to have featured a Polygoon color film news program described by a journalist as “well blue-tinted.”

This event was part of Philips’ broader 1964 test campaign, during which some 100 Philips employees received color TVs at home to evaluate the new technology, along with some select members of the media.

While Philips had been developing and testing color TV earlier in 1964, October 14, 1964, is historically recognized as the date of the first official experimental color TV broadcast by the company and hailed as a milestone in Philips’ rollout of color TV in Europe. 

Just for fun, yours truly took a quick peek at the astrology that day:

The transiting Moon was passing through innovative, tinkering Aquarius, the sign actually associated with broadcasting as well as tech in general.

Trailblazing Mars, the planet of action and motivation, was also deposited in bold, colorful “Leo the Lion,” which is thought to be a much more dramatic, performance-laden placement for Mars, with Leo also linked with entertainment.

Mars was also forming an exact square to fantasy or make-believe Neptune in Scorpio, an influence that sometimes is linked with our perceptions seeming a bit off or at least altered, for whatever reason. Perhaps this element also just capturing here the difference in the actual visual reality going from the accustomed black and white screen to color. Neptune also governs cameras, lenses, photographic equipment, and images.

Too, “Mars-Neptune” aspects are often regarded in astrology as among the most potentially creative pairings of all. Perhaps because Neptune is seen as overseeing our dreams, vision, and imagination, and pioneering Mars often acts as a catalyst to fire up or animate whatever it is aligned with.

Too, when we are under the spell of idealistic Neptune’s ray it is often conjectured that we may be looking through “rose-colored glasses.” 🙂

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Anyone remember when color TVs first came out? They were quite a gamechanger! I think my family got our first one in the mid-sixties. Initially, color televisions were reportedly nearly triple the price of the black and white TVs, with some purportedly costing as much as a $1000! Too, I’ve read that it was only in the early 1970s that color TVs finally overtook the black and white television market. Maybe the hesitancy to make the switch was due to the higher price.

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Hope it’s a good one! Please be safe and well.

Patrice Thompson

Copyright 2026

Source Notes:

Unsplash Photo: PJ Gal-Szabo

https://isgeschiedenis.nl/nieuws/eerste-demonstratie-kleurentelevisie-in-nederland

https://quotlr.com/quotes-about-color-television/

Phillips color tv: http://www.brainyhistory.com/days/october_14.html

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