Published: Wednesday, 5th November, 2008 09:00
TV inventor's Grandson to visit the Borders
By Ally McGilvray
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THE grandson of the man who invented the television will visit the Borders to celebrate the switchover this week.
Iain Logie Baird will visit pupils at Knowepark Primary School in Selkirk on Wednesday.
His grandfather, John Logie Baird (August 13, 1888 – June 14, 1946), who was born in Helensburgh, Argyll, was a Scottish engineer and inventor of the world’s first working television system.
Known as a televisor, he built it using an old hatbox, a pair of scissors, some darning needles, a few bicycle light lenses, a used tea chest, and a great deal of sealing wax and glue.
There is a working model of the Baird televisor in the London Science Museum.
TV now spans the globe and is the world's most popular form of entertainment, offering multiple channels covering all sorts of subjects, though it has been suggested that Baird might not have altogether approved.
In the Channel 5 programme Don't Get Me Started, aired on August 29, 2006, presenter Selina Scott complained about the falling standards of British TV with such shows as Big Brother and other “reality” programmes.
Malcolm Baird said in an interview that had his father known how TV would turn out in sixty years time, he would have dropped it and turned to other inventions.
However, not all of Baird’s inventions were a success. In his twenties he tried to create diamonds by heating graphite and shorted out Glasgow's electricity supply.
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