Colombia. On June 13, 64 years ago, the first television broadcast was made in Colombia and since that moment the magic box has witnessed great events that have marked the history of Colombians in all social areas.
Since June 13, 1954, television has been embedded in every home as a benchmark to build citizenship, educate and entertain thousands of generations who have seen in this technological device a key element to keep in touch with society.
This is an account made by the National Television Authority, ANTV, of important facts that are the radiography of Colombians and the world, shown through the screen:
- On June 13, 1954, General Gustavo Rojas Pinilla, then president of Colombia, made the first television broadcast in the country. At that time the president made an address in commemoration of the first year of the coup d'état that brought him to power.
- In 1884 the German Paul Nipkow realized that he could pass an image through a flat steel disc and turn it into a mosaic of lines and dots in front of his wall.
- In 1927 electronic television was created and in 1928 the first content was transmitted through the magic box: the movie The Queen's Messenger.
- President Gustavo Rojas Pinilla brought the invention to the country and on the first of May 1954 the first television broadcast was made from Bogotá to Manizales.
- Colombian television was inaugurated on June 13, 1954 at 7 p.m. with the creation of Canal Uno.
- 1955 the government noticed the low profitability of television. It was then that the first commercial spaces were born, which private companies rented to promote their products.
- The two radio networks of the time, Caracol Radio and RCN Radio, bought television spaces to produce content, and with this the way was opened to television contests and music magazines, such as 'El Lápiz Mágico' and 'Meet the authors'.
- In 1956 Producciones PUNCH was created, producer responsible for creations such as the first Colombian telenovela 'El 0597 está ocupado' of 1959. Also 'The Jimmy Show' in '71, 'Manuelita Sáenz' in '78, the famous 'Dumis' that many still remember and series like 'Secret Flight' in 1992.
- International series also arrived in the country thanks to this production company, such as 'El auto fantástico', 'Guardianes de la bahía' in 1991 or 'Chavo del ocho' in 1993.
- In 1956 began the transmission of the comedy 'Yo y tú', which lasted 20 years on the air.
- In 1963 the National Institute of Radio and Television (Inravisión) was founded, an entity that was part of the Ministry of Communications. These television crises led to the session of increasingly large spaces to private companies.
- Thus was born the first private channel in Colombia called Teletigre, which in its first broadcast had the singers Lyda Zamora and Berenice Chávez and the composer and organist Jaime Llano González. But the channel failed just five years after it was born, in 1971, in part because of its opposition to the National Front.
- His disappearance gave way to Tele 9 Corazón, later to Cadena Dos, in 1992 renamed Canal A. This channel in 2004 was replaced by the public space of Canal Institucional.
- Television in Colombia began to take on great relevance in all national affairs at the end of the 60s, with the transmission of the first visit of Pope Paul VI to our country, in 1968, and the arrival of man on the moon in 1969.
- On February 9, 1970, Señal Colombia, then Canal 11, was founded, where science, geography and mathematics classes were broadcast.
- In 1972 the program 'Champions of Laughter' was created, whose name changed in 1976 to 'Happy Saturdays' and which was the winner in 2016 of the Guinness Award for the oldest on-air humor program on world television.
- In 1974 on a giant screen in front of the Coliseum el Campín de Bogotá the inauguration and the first match (Brazil-Yugoslavia) of the World Cup in Germany was broadcast, for the first time in color.
- In 1985, regional television was created through Law 42 and the first regional channel in the country: Teleantioquia. It would be followed by Televalle in 1988, which would later be called Telepacífico, and Telecafé in 1992.
- In 1994 Fernando Gaitán created a novel that split the history of Colombian television in two: 'Café con aroma de mujer'. When the TV was turned on at 8 p.m. This novel became one of the most viewed in all of Latin America until 1999, the year in which Gaitán surprised the country with 'Yo soy Betty, la fea'.
- Hand in hand with the Political Constitution of Colombia of 1991, the freedom to create media was born and also the need for a state entity to regulate these creations: thus was born the National Television Commission (CNTV) in 1995.
- One of its first measures of the CNTV was to award the tender of the two most important private channels, RCN and Caracol, which began to operate as such in 1998, the year in which private television officially began in the country, generating the disappearance of producers such as Tevecine, Punch, JES and Cenpro.
- At the end of the 90s other local and regional channels appeared, such as Canal Capital in 1997, and Canal Trece in 1998.
- The new millennium came with hundreds of important changes for national television, between the liquidation of Inravisión, its transformation into the National Radio Television of Colombia, and the National Television Commission, which today is the National Television Authority, as well as the arrival of Digital Terrestrial Television.
Colombian television is a reflection of great changes that have marked the history of Colombia, and has gone from being more than just an entertainment channel to becoming a witness of what happens in the country and in the world. Despite many other alternatives that exist such as the internet, the press and the radio; television is maintained through time as a tool to narrate our entire audiovisual history.
