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The Man Who Chose A Jail Sentence To Escape His Wife’s TV Obsession In 1954
The dawning of the television age led to some quickly becoming obsessed with the new technology, which wasn’t always taken kindly.
The introduction of television sets completely changed the way that we entertain ourselves and receive information. For some, especially in the early days of the innovation, adapting to the existence of sets could be difficult. This was particularly true for a 1950s California man who became so fed up with his wife’s addiction to their television that he voluntarily went to jail for a brief respite.
Televisions first appeared in the late 1920s. Even after they began to be mass produced a decade later they were still slow to infiltrate American homes. People were fascinated by them to be sure, but their cost was prohibitive to many. Even by the 1950s, they ranged in price from $130 to nearly $1,300 each, the modern equivalent of $1,600 to $16,000.
The April 8, 1954 issue of the Spokane Chronicle reported on the curious case of Roscoe Tard from Long Beach, California. He and his wife Beatrice had bitten the bullet and purchased a new television, which was much to her delight, but became the bane of his existence.
