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Person to Appear on TV - Elma
G. "Pem" Farnsworth was the first person ever to appear on television. Often
called, the "Mother of Television," Elma was the wife of researcher Philo T.
Farnsworth, who earned the title of the "Father of Television. Elma was on
his technical team in San Francisco when Philo demonstrated his invention in
San Francisco on September 7, 1927. Elma died Thursday, April 27 in
Bountiful, UT at age 98.
Comedian Johnny Carson once said of him: "If it weren't for Philo T.
Farnsworth, inventor of television, we'd still be eating frozen radio
dinners." A statue of Philo T. Farnsworth stands outside the old Beaver
County Courthouse in Beaver, Utah.
TRIVIA NOTE: An earlier television pioneer also touted as "The Father of
Television" was US physicist and inventor Vladimir Kosma Zworykin of
Wilkinsburg, PA (actually born in Russia). In 1923, he designed the
"iconoscope," the photocell "eye" of the early TV camera. His device was the
first element necessary in the development of an all electronic television
system. His patent application (No. 2,141,059) was filed December 29, 1923.
The first animal character to appear on television was a papier-mâché statue
of the popular cartoon feline "Felix
the Cat".
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