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Oldest Extant Off-Air VHS/Beta Tape You Have

^

Well, since nobody was brave enough to make a guess from eight posts above, I'll just post my results from that lot.

Tape 1: Starts off with 20/20 off WLS/ABC on 1/5/1990 w/commercials, followed by part of the WMAQ 10 PM News from the same night with a couple ads, then cuts to a portion of Children of a Lesser God, the CBS Tuesday Movie from 1/2/1990 w/commercials, then it jumps back to three partial and one full episode of Santa Barbara from August 1986 off WMAQ/NBC with commercials, with the partials about a third complete, and the full episode being from 8/11.

Tape 2: Kicks off with a WFLD broadcast of the MTV edit of Phil Collins in concert from 7/27/1985 w/commercials, followed by The Best of Saturday Night Live: Season 10 off WMAQ/NBC on 8/3/1985 w/ads, then continues on with another MTV-edited concert off WFLD from the same night, this time starring the Eurythmics, then continues with most of Santa Barbara from 8/8/1985 off WMAQ/NBC w/ads, then wraps up with a portion of the WMAQ 10 PM News from 8/9/1985, featuring a story on the Bruce Springsteen concert there. The WFLD concerts featured a DJ from WPWR-FM describing some programming features coming into and out of the breaks.

Tape 3: My third find of NBC's network premiere broadcast on The Karate Kid, off WMAQ on 3/2/1987 w/commercials (I already have found KING and KGW copies), followed by Cheers off WMAQ/NBC on 3/5/1987 w/commercials.

Tape 4: Starts with America's Funniest Home Videos and America's Funniest People off WLS/ABC on 11/24/1991 w/commercials, then continues with the last third or so of the WMAQ 10 PM News from 10/18/1991 with a few ads, then features about half an hour from the 31st Grammys off WBBM/CBS on 2/22/1989 with a couple commercial breaks, then jumps back again to about the last ten minutes of the WMAQ 10 O'Clock news from July 1988, then rolls back to a portion of the movie Doctor Zhivago off WFLD from around spring 1988 with some commercials, then finishes off with a portion of the TV movie Elvis And Me off WLS/ABC on 2/7/1988 with some ads. Quite an interesting jumble of content here.

Tape 5: Just like tape #2, more great '80s music rarities! This tape begins with about the last 10 minutes of Video Shock off WLS from circa August 1985 with some commercials, followed by most of Record Guide from the same station on the same night. Later on the tape is part of 20/20 off WLS/ABC on 10/3/1985 with commercials, followed by part of a Beatle Documentary circa fall 1985 with some commercials off WFLD, followed by footage from Elton John's Central Park concert with some commercials, then various footage from the 1986 Liberty Weekend off WMAQ/NBC, including a clip of the late news from one night, and finally a portion of WPWR Music Video 60 off WFLD circa July 1986 with some commercials. Video Shock was actually produced by the defunct department store Carson Pirie Scott, and even features a commercial for Coca-Cola fashions.

Tape 6: I actually meant to place "About Last Night" and "Field of Dreams" as my label clue instead of a duplicate of Tape #1 here, sorry for that. Yes, both of those films were present, the former zapped without ads, the second found complete with ads off CBS/WBBM on 9/18/1990, as well as the first few minutes of the late news afterwards.

Tape 7: "The Trinity" and "They Call Me Trinity", recorded off WBBM on 1/30 and 1/31/1983 with some commercials on the original, and all commercials on the sequel.

Tape 8: The Blues Brothers and 48 Hrs. taped off WGN without commercials, followed by part of Evergreen, the NBC Sunday Night Movie taped off WMAQ on 2/25/85 with commercials. The tape ends with about a half hour remaining in this TV movie.

Tape 9: Marty (1955) recorded off WGBO on 1/10/1989 w/commercials, followed by two partial episodes of Santa Barbara off WMAQ/NBC from August 1986 with some commercials.

Tape 10: Begins with the last several minutes of Night Court (poor B&W video), followed by L.A. Law (in color but with weak audio) off WMAQ/NBC on 1/8/1987 w/commercials. Over 3/4ths of the tape is blank, and based on the label, the bulk eraser kryptonited recordings of Superman II and Footloose.

Tape 11: Rocky and Risky Business without commercials, followed by part of Battle From The Planet Of Apes recorded off WLS circa summer 1985 with commercials.

It seems like nostalgia for the 1980s/early '90s is maturing to more of a "it sure was a simpler time" feeling as opposed to a "they changed it to crap, why can't we have that back?" mood as the coming of age generation from the time moves well into middle age. Still nice to search a lot in 2021 and not see a single Internet URL, a toll-free phone number that doesn't begin with 800, a DVD/Blu-Ray/streaming promo, the word HD, or "ask your doctor". Another lot is coming soon as I make my first trade in two months that features many classic episodes of AT10 with Casey Kasem, Solid Gold, and MTV from the early-mid 80s that I don't have.
 
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I am with you Mike. For over 20 years before YouTube I have been on the search for those kind of tapes from the late 80s/early 90s. Pre-Clinton tapes I should say. Because they were much simpler times back then.
 
When I was a teenager before the days of YouTube. We are talking late 1990s/early 2000s here. I tried to find tapes from that era. Late 80s/early 2000s.
 
While I am still multitasking college homework and rapidly restoring my YouTube collection to Archive (now at 430 videos/commercial compilations restored), I have still been hitting the estate sales. Today I went to an estate sale in Tieton, WA (14 mi NW of Yakima). Picked up plenty of cool things - vintage sarsaparilla and Philips Milk of Magnesia bottles; a Harrah's Reno ashtray from the '60s, and two Disneyland postcards from the same time (one mailed w/ stamp). There were several boxes of VHS tapes there as well. Nearly all of them were ex-rental movies. Except for one RCA VK250 that stood out to me. And this tape netted me my oldest Yakima recordings found since the weekend of July 22nd, 2017, where I found 1979 KAPP recordings at an estate sale among many other things.

Contents on this tape: Roy Acuff: 50 Years in Country Music taped off KNDO/NBC on 3/1/1982 with commercials. After about 10 minutes of static, the tape flips over to part of an episode of Nero Wolfe taped off KNDO/NBC on 5/5/1981 with commercials; part of an episode of Hill Street Blues and first five minutes of Face the Music (with Ron Ely) taped off KNDO/NBC on 1/17/1981 with commercials; ends with a few minutes of KNDO 11:00 Newservice taped in mid-October 1980 with commercials. (SWEET!!!)
The Roy Acuff special was in LP. Everything else was in SP and recorded over by the Acuff special.

Meanwhile, flash back a couple of weeks. Just before YouTube decided 'you're done posting here', I picked up an eBay lot from the small Nebraska panhandle town of Chappell. Chappell is in between Sidney and Ogallala on I-80. They seemed to have Primestar and then both DirecTV/Dish at various points. Twelve tapes, ten keepers. They liked taping movies.

Tape 1 - 'Never Been Kissed' (1999) taped off HBO Signature in July 2001; 'Chicken Run' (2000) taped off unknown pay-TV channel; ; part of 'Author! Author!' (1982) and part of 'Rogue Trader' (1999) taped off HBO Signature on 7/19/2001 with several minutes of promos, then switches over on the Dish Network box to KUSA-9 Denver for part of the 4:00 news with commercials; part of the Grand Jury testimony for President Clinton taped off CBS on 9/21/1998. Unknown station, I assume either KCNC 4 Denver or KSTF 10 Scottsbluff. Gemini T-120
Tape 2 - 'The Horse Soldiers' (1959) taped off TBS Superstation on 3/3/1999 with commercials, taped off Primestar satellite; Gaither: Joy to the World taped off TNN on 12/11/1999; episode of Jenny Jones (Coast to Coast Makeovers Revealed) taped off KTVD-20 on 6/26/2002 with commercials; ends with part of a Tai Chi workout show taped off the Wisdom Channel (healthy lifestyle/new-age channel) circa early 2000s. Memorex T-90
Tape 3 - 'Mission to Mars' (2000), 'Billy Frankenstein' (1998), 'The Boy Who Could Fly' (1986) and part of 'Everyone Says I Love You' (1996) taped off STARZ! on 3/14/2001 with promos. Gemini T-120
Tape 4 - 'Pocahontas' (1995) and 'The Lion King' (1994) copied from Walt Disney rental tapes; 'A Little Piece of Heaven' (1991) taped off KTVK-3 Phoenix on 12/8/1996 with commercials; partial episode of Touched by an Angel and most of Walker, Texas Ranger taped off KPHO/CBS on 5/4/1996 with commercials. Tozai T-120
Tape 5 - 'Prince Charming' (2001) taped off TBS on 1/14/2005 with some commercials; 'My Boss's Daughter' (2003) and 'Calendar Girl' (1993) taped off Starz on Independence Day 2005 with promos; part of an episode of Dawson's Creek taped off TBS around February 2004 with commercials. Sony T-120
Tape 6 - 'Flightplan' (2005) taped off Starz in September 2006; 'After Sex' (2001) taped off Lifetime Movie Network/LMN on 9/17/2006 with commercials; 'Venus and Mars' (2001) taped off LMN in September 2006 with commercials. TDK Revue T-120
Tape 7 - 'The Polar Express' (2004) taped off Dish Network PPV; part of 'Somewhere in April' (2005) taped off HBO2 circa December 2006 with several minutes of promos; part of 'Sky High' (2005) taped off Dish Network PPV on 1/7/2006. Maxell T-120
Tape 8 - 'Legally Blonde' (2001) taped off Showtime in 2003; part of 'The Nutty Professor' (1996) taped off unknown pay-TV channel; 'Dirty Dancing' (1987) taped off TNT on St. Patrick's Day 2001 with commercials; 'Bounce' (2000) taped off unknown pay-TV channel; Primestar channel surfing clip and clip of Trauma: Life in the ER taped off TLC sometime in late 1997 with commercials; ESPNEWS clip and part of game 3 of the NHL Western Conference Final between the Colorado Avalanche and Detroit Red Wings taped off ESPN on 5/19/1997 with commercials. Polaroid T-120
Tape 9 - 'Legally Blonde 2' (2003) taped off Showtime circa 2005; part of 'Private Benjamin' (1980) taped off KWGN-2 Denver in February 1995 with commercials. Gemini T-120
Tape 10 - Body Shaping episode taped off ESPN2 on 6/1/2001 with a few commercials; multiple episodes of Denise Austin's Daily Workout taped off Lifetime circa June 2001, some with commercials and some without; another episode of Body Shaping taped off ESPN2 on 12/12/2000 with commercials; partial broadcasts of Basic Training and Getting Fit with Denise Austin taped off ESPN in late 1992 with commercials. Polaroid T-120

And on 3/27, I hit another estate sale off Wenas Road north of Selah. Tapes seemed to be early to mid 2000s with plenty of daytime programming and local news. Some of what I've found...

Tape 1 - Martha Stewart's Home for the Holidays taped off KIMA/CBS on 12/4/2001 with commercials (already have this); segments from Martha Stewart Living taped off KAPP-35 on 12/5/2001 minus commercials; Oprah Winfrey episode and first several minutes of Local News at 5 taped off KAPP-35 later that day with some commercials; Martha Stewart Living segments taped off KAPP-35 on 12/6/2001 minus commercials; Martha Stewart Living segments taped off KAPP-35 on 12/11/2001 with a few commercials; 48 Hours taped off KIMA/CBS on 12/12/2001 with commercials (Addicted); Martha Stewart Living and Oprah Winfrey segments taped off KAPP-35 on 12/13/2001 minus commercials. Fuji T-120
Tape 2 - Oprah Winfrey episode (A.J. McLean's drug addiction), Local News at 5 and ABC World News Tonight taped off KAPP-35 on 3/17/2004 with commercials; Stephen King's Kingdom Hospital taped off KAPP/ABC later that night with commercials; partial clip of 'The Green Mile' (1999) taped off KAPP/ABC on 3/15/2004; end of Nightline, Jimmy Kimmel Live, Becker rerun, Inside Edition and 2:05AM sign-off taped off KAPP/ABC on 3/13-14/2004 with commercials. They were still using the old '90s sign-off video. TDK T-120
Tape 3 - Barbara Walters Special: Heaven: Where Is It? How Do We Get There? taped off KAPP/ABC on 12/20/2005 with commercials. Maxell T-120
Tape 4 - Stephen King's Kingdom Hospital taped off KAPP/ABC on 3/31/2004 with commercials; Martha Stewart Living taped off KAPP-35 on 4/1/2004 with commercials; Primetime Live taped off KAPP/ABC later that night with commercials (Ecstasy Rising); partial broadcast of The View, and full broadcasts of Home Improvement, Cheers, All My Children, One Life to Live and part of General Hospital taped off KAPP/ABC earlier that day with commercials. Fuji T-120
Tape 5 - Oprah Winfrey, Local News at 5 and part of ABC World News Tonight taped off KAPP-35 on 11/6/2002 with commercials; part of The Thin Man: A Dateline Special (on Al Roker's weight loss) taped off KNDO/NBC in October 2002 minus commercials; clip from The Caroline Rhea Show taped off KNDO-23 on 11/13/2002 with a few commercials, then flips over to Dr. Phil in-progress on KIMA-29 with commercials, and over to KAPP-35 for Oprah Winfrey with commercials; episode of Law & Order taped off KNDO/NBC later that night with commercials; Law & Order: SVU taped off KNDO/NBC on 11/1/2002 with commercials. Sony T-120
Tape 6 - Part of an Oprah Winfrey episode and part of the KAPP Local News Hour taped off KAPP-35 in June 2002 with commercials (Oprah episode is a Father's Day salute). Fujifilm T-160
Tape 7 - Dr. Phil episode taped off KIMA-29 on 9/27/2002 with commercials; flips over to KAPP-35 at the top of the hour for Oprah Winfrey (wedding disasters) and KAPP Local News with commercials; then cuts to part of Friends, part of Scrubs and a full ER taped off KNDO/NBC on 9/26/2002 with commercials; ends with Law & Order: SVU taped off KNDO/NBC on 9/27/2002 with commercials. Sony T-160
There is also a tape marked with MTV and GI Joe. This should be '80s gold. But guess what tape brand it is? Oh yeah, AMPEX. Blah. Into the dehydrator it goes for 'baking'. Sometime. I also have a couple of L500 Ampex's from the Anacortes Beta lot that need to be 'baked'.
 
Just got back a refund from eBay due to a lot Betas that was nearly a total dud. Of the 15 Beta tapes with mostly mid-80s Scotch L-750 stock, only one contained anything interesting: about a 45 minute clip from Simmons Communications, Inc, the local cable provider in the Atlantic City, NJ-based area featuring Beautiful Music station WFPG-FM from 3/9/1985. I'll be posting it over on my YouTube channels this weekend. The other tapes were nothing but rental dud crap, so that's definitely a seller to avoid. He even replied "no refund will be given" after sending a refund request to eBay. It was still given since the return policy did state 14 day returns. I purchased a lot from him/her after a similar lot that contained two 1983 NFL games on its labels sold a couple weeks ago. At least I'm only out about $7.

Just now I decided to change gears with a new seller by winning two lots of 18 Betas for about $53, or a bit under $1.50 a tape (sub-$1 tape lots are getting hard to find if they aren't just nothing but movies on the labels). I did see that a couple of the tapes had labels that said things like "Soap April 1", "Centennial 1 & 2 parts cartoons", "Soap Jan 21 Cartoons", "Duck Adventure/Alice/Addams Family", and "Nutcracker/Christmas on Sesame Street". For the movie labels, I'll certainly take pay TV promos after that last lot, but especially I'm hoping for those ads and hopefully some CANCON (seller lives in a downriver Detroit suburb).

Speaking of Sesame Street, I recently found that my sister taped a bunch of goodies back around 1997 on VHS, including reruns of two first season episodes of A Wedding Story off The Learning Channel with commercials, along with a 4+ hour block of PBS Kids from 9/22/97 off WETA including episodes of The Puzzle Place, Barney, Shining Time Station, Sesame Street, Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, Wimzie's Place, and Reading Rainbow. I'll post the promos of that very soon as well on YT.

At least I learned how to use two Betamax machines at once from that last lot in order to fast forward through all those dud tapes quicker.
 
There's a yard sale in Yakima this weekend where they are selling not only VHS tapes and VCRs but also Betamax machines and tapes as well! Wow! That doesn't happen every day.
Meanwhile, I will reach 550 videos today on Archive, all re-uploads. Reposting today: KNDU breaks from 8/26-27/00 (+ 11 PM news), and a bunch of commercials taped from WGN's Superstation feed in 1994 including lots of cartoon breaks. Toys and games galore, even a VCR game (Party Mania).

I received an email a couple of nights ago from YouTube user Pepsi9072 (real name Eric). Our communication has been rocky in the past, but he wants to do something regarding my channels being terminated. Eric mostly looks for old closing logo compilations, but this time he wants to help reupload some of my videos back onto YouTube using his backup account for commercials and classic TV material.
I let him know what I'd like him to upload first (first batch will be Yakima newscasts and sign-offs, some local commercial breaks). This is amazing. So guess what? Some of my videos will go back up to YouTube. This isn't 'stealing.' He got my permission to do this, and if anyone relevant comments on my videos he'll let me know as well.
I hope this is OK with Google and they won't be going after both of us for something like, 'reposting videos from an account that was terminated for copyright strikes'..........

Meanwhile, one of my YouTube pals has joined the Internet Archive. It's misslizzie2007, who has uploaded all kinds of cool stuff from Tri-Cities and Yakima. I let her know about the suspensions and she would follow me over to Archive. Looks like it worked out :)
 
Got 3 tapes free from one of the local thrift stores that has a new policy where VHS is all "free" of course I bet 90% of the donated stuff goes straight to the trash, anyways, the one I was able to view so far:

Marked "NCSU vs VA. What's Allen Watching David Copperfield Valvono (sp?) Highlights VA-WF" Of note was this label was typed on a typewriter, something you see more with pre 1990s material. Boy was this wrong and taped over.

1989/11/25 Notre Dame at Miami (WRAL5) : 28 taped over by...
1990/7/7 Wimbledon Women's Final (WPTF28) (1:27-complete) then back to...
1989/11/25 Notre Dame at Miami (WRAL5) : 4 just the halftime break but local news clip was on Back to the Future 2 which was quite neat. The big question then was whether it was worth the price of a movie ticket to go see...
1990/7/26 Donahue with guest Arsenio Hall (nearly complete episode) (WTVD11) -date was a guestimate based on Arachnophobia release date trailer
1990 July? MC Hammer live performance on Arsenio Hall : 15 (WLFL22)
1990? Dionne and Friends (rare and short lived CBS variety show) :11 (WRAL5)
1990/1/1 Sugar Bowl Alabama vs Miami : 46 (WTVD11)
1990/1/1 Orange Bowl Notre Dame vs Miami : 16 odd the taper switched to this game just for the halftime show! (WPTF28)
now back to 1990/1/1 Sugar Bowl Alabama vs Miami (1:20) (WTVD11) tape ran out with a few minutes left
 
An estate sale on a Wednesday? Yep, it happened at a house in Parma this week. These tapes I picked up came in a bundle with a Kinyo VHS rewinder (which, unfortunately, turned out to not work), two retail tapes and four opened TDK T-120s that turned out to be blank. All but one of the recorded tapes in this lot were unlabeled. Here's what I ended up finding.

TAPE 1: NBC Sports coverage of the final round of the 37th Ryder Cup taped from WKYC on 9/21/2008 with commercials; partial episode of The Carol Duvall Show taped from HGTV in December 1998 with commercials. Maxell T-120.

TAPE 2: Two episodes of The Sopranos taped from A&E on 1/10/2007 with commercials. TDK T-120.

TAPE 3: The Thin Man (1934) and After the Thin Man (1936) taped from the Movie Channel on 12/31/1991 with promos; partial ABC Sports coverage of the final round of the 133rd Open Championship taped from WEWS on 7/18/2004 with commercials. Scotch T-120 (1980s stock).

TAPE 4: Unmentionables: A Brief History taped from A&E in January 1999 with commercials; The Story of Golf (PBS special) and start of Beyond Black and White: Affirmative Action in America taped from WNEO/WEAO in August 2000 with promos; last hour of Fox 8 News in the Morning and first few minutes of Jerry Springer ("Honey, I'm Through with You!") taped from WJW on 8/22/2000 with commercials; last hour of Fox 8 News in the Morning taped from WJW on 8/23/2000 with commercials. Maxell T-120.

TAPE 5: First few minutes of an episode of The Sopranos taped from A&E in January 2007; two-hour season finale of NCIS taped from WOIO on 5/20/2008 with commercials (already have a partial recording of this on another tape, this one was in mono audio while the other one was in Hi-Fi Stereo); last few minutes of Women's Murder Club and first few minutes of News Channel 5 on the Nightbeat taped from WEWS on 5/6/2008 with commercials; episode of NCIS taped from WOIO on 5/13/2008 with commercials; episode of Women's Murder Club taped from WEWS on 5/13/2008 with commercials; partial episode of The Sopranos taped from A&E on 1/31/2007 with commercials. TDK T-120.

TAPE 6: Episode of The Sopranos taped from A&E on 2/21/2007 with commercials (ends with the first few seconds of an original broadcast of The First 48, which was unfortunately not recorded); two episodes of The Sopranos taped from A&E on 4/4/2007 with commercials. Maxell T-120 (late 1990s stock).

TAPE 7: Rental dud--Lord of the Dance (1997) copied from rental tape. Unknown brand T-120.

On a somewhat different note, I've probably mentioned on this thread the local Internet radio station that I work/volunteer at every week. It's run out of the basement of the station owner's house in Parma Heights. One of the other two guys who lives at the house has a HUGE collection of DVDs in the same basement, a mix of retail DVDs (movies and TV show seasons) and material he has recorded from TV. A couple of years ago, I went to a yard sale that the guy held at the house and picked up two recorded VHS tapes from him (the only two he had at the time, one had three movies recorded from unknown premium cable channels while the other had the Chiefs [1983] miniseries copied from rental tapes). On a couple more recent occasions, I was able to peek at the shelves of DVDs in the basement and, using the Natural Notes app on my phone, type out a list of some, but not all, of the recorded DVD titles I saw. The recorded DVDs were placed in cases that had typewritten labels on the spines. Many of them, not surprisingly, are very recent by comparison (various episodes of General Hospital, mostly during the Nurses Ball in recent years, Amy Schumer hosting Saturday Night Live, Amy Schumer on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Carol Burnett's 50th Anniversary Special on CBS in 2017, last year's CMA Awards, The Story of Soaps on ABC, ABC News 2020 Year in Review with Robin Roberts, multiple Lifetime and Hallmark Channel movies). But some of the titles I saw were of much older programs/events (North and South original and Book II, Dick Clark's Golden Greats, Laverne and Shirley Together Again on ABC in 2002, Carol Burnett Show Reunion on CBS in 2004), so I've got to imagine some of those DVDs may have been dubbed from VHS tapes/recordings that he may no longer have the original tapes of.
Speaking of VHS, though, I also recently spotted a Quasar T-120 VHS at the same place with "The Comeback Kid" written on the case. How cool would that be to find a recording of the original broadcast of that movie as it aired on ABC on April 11, 1980 with the original commercials intact!
 
First of all, disappointment at the Betamax garage sale. There were lots of Beta tapes and about 700 VHS tapes, but they were all factory retail copies. The couple running the yard sale were really nice on the other hand. I mentioned my VHS and Beta collecting hobby to them, and told them about the Sony SL-3030 I own. The two Beta VCRs for sale looked like Sanyo's, which have consistent belt issues, so I didn't pick them up. I also mentioned that most of the tapes I pick up are home-recorded. Sadly, they threw them in the garbage before the start of the sale, saying that 'I'm not sure if we could sell those because of the content'. Fortunately, what was thrown out was mostly the O.J. Simpson Trial and true crime shows like Cold Case Files. No big loss. You can find any minute or hour you want of that trial on YouTube. It would have been a worse disappointment if they said "she taped The Price is Right every morning" or "she taped DuckTales every afternoon for her grandkids".
I still got five movies out of the sale for $1 each. Original Key Video release of Stephen King's 'Cat's Eye' with a young Drew Barrymore, the original Warner clamshell of James Dean's 'Rebel Without a Cause,' 'Nightmares' with a young Emilio Estevez (on MCA Home Video), 'Playing God' with David Duchovny, and the first 'Relentless' with Leo Rossi and Robert Loggia.

I still got a few home-recorded tapes elsewhere. One estate sale in Ellensburg near Rotary Park, and another estate sale near the Borton Fruit warehouse in West Valley. The first estate sale was dirty and full of cobwebs and dust. There were some tapes I didn't even get. Most of the tapes at the first sale were original copies of vintage movies from the 1940s to the 1960s.

ELLENSBURG
Tape 1 - 'Samson & Delilah' (1949) taped off AMC circa 1994 with Bob Dorian's intro, 'Black Legion' (1937) and most of Shelley Duvall's Bedtime Stories taped off Showtime circa late 1994 with a few promos in between. Safeway T-120
Tape 2 - 'Lenny' (1974) taped off TNT on 8/8/1995 with commercials (local cable inserts for TCI Yakima); 'From Here to Eternity' (1953) taped off Showtime circa August 1995; partial broadcast of Time-Life's Lost Civilizations taped off KNDO/NBC on 7/23/1995 with commercials (the episode is on the Roman empire, with narrator Sam Waterston); broadcast of Masterpiece Theatre taped off KYVE/PBS in July 1995 with a couple of promos prior to the program and several more after; partial broadcast of Terra-X taped off The Discovery Channel circa 1994. Sony T-120
Two others were duds.
OTHER NON-VHS FINDS MADE...USA Today from the day after Nancy Kerrigan won the silver medal at the infamous Lillehammer Olympics; a French movie magazine/tv guide called 'Cine Revue' from 1978, a nice older wrench, an ABC coffee mug, an October 1991 CWU 'Observer' newspaper (in good shape!), a 1985 CWU drinking glass from their Wild Boar dinner event for students, and a 1996 Dairy Queen sippy cup with Kermit the Frog dressed as a soccer referee. Apparently, it was part of a series of four cups that were in kids' meals.

WEST VALLEY
Tape 3 - 'Liar Liar' (1997) taped off Direct Ticket PPV circa early 1998; partial clip of Saturday Night Live taped off KNDO/NBC on 12/13/1997 with some commercials; 'Evita' (1996) taped off Direct Ticket PPV circa early 1998; part of 'La Bamba' (1987) taped off KIMA/CBS on 1/9/1990 with commercials; ends with about 10 minutes of an unknown 1980s movie off pay cable. Maxell T-120
Two others were duds.
OTHER NON-VHS FINDS...A Grand Coulee Dam dinner tray from the 1970s!
 
Well, I picked up more tapes at a moving sale yesterday, this time in Medina. Three keepers out of nine tapes found, although many of these findings were disappointments, as they were much more recent recordings than I'm used to finding, albeit on older stock tapes from the '80s and '90s.

TAPE 1: This was taped over an instructional demonstration/instructional video on a T-60 tape--starts with a short clip from a broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning on WJW on 7/23/2017, then cuts to most of that day's Fox News Sunday with commercials.

TAPE 2: Two episodes of Newhart taped from WJW-DT2 in June 2014 with commercials; partial 9AM broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning, Fox News Sunday, 11AM broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning (anchored by Autumn Ziemba, who graduated from my high school!--albeit about a decade before I did) and partial Omega XL infomercial with the late Larry King taped from WJW on 1/25/2015 with commercials; partial 11AM broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning and partial broadcast of Real Estate Showcase TV (local program) taped from WJW on 6/8/2014 with commercials. Fuji T-120 (1980s stock).

TAPE 3: Victor Borge: Then and Now II taped from WNEO/WEAO circa 1995, pledge breaks were shown during the broadcast, but were cut out on the tape; partial broadcast of Survive the Savage Sea (1992 ABC made-for-TV movie) taped from WAKC on 8/6/1995 with commercials (no local news teasers found, makes me wonder whether WAKC even aired newscasts on the weekends at that time); part two of A Woman of Independent Means (NBC miniseries) taped from WKYC on 2/20/1995 with commercials; end of Dateline NBC and part three of A Woman of Independent Means taped from WKYC on 2/22/1995 with commercials. Fuji T-120.

Two of the duds were movies taped from the Disney Channel during a Free Preview Weekend sometime in the early to mid '90s. Ironically, those two tapes were recorded in Hi-Fi Stereo sound, while the others I found were recorded in mono sound. The other tapes I ended up tossing out ended up being too damaged for me to want to watch all the way through, which I obviously didn't notice until I put them in the VCR.
 
$60 bi-annually for Newspapers.com will definitely help. Decades' worth of the Akron Beacon-Journal is included as well as about a hundred other papers around the country. The August 6th, 1995 TV insert from the Beacon-Journal showed WAKC airing a program called 'Roundtable' (likely an incomplete title) at 11:00 after the ABC movie. No news on weekends, you are correct. On Saturdays, they aired Comedy Showcase at 11:00.

And goodness, do I hate seeing these oldie but goodie tapes being destroyed and taped over by 2015 and 2017 recordings. I'd be sending them right to the sell piles for eBay.
 
@crainbebo I really hope the vhsgoodiesWA4 channel gets restored soon, but I am not counting on it. Once your done with the ones from the first channel on Internet Archive, you should get to the ones from vhsgoodiesWA3 and then to the ones you uploaded on the first account when that channel got a copyright strike.
 
Scott2013 said:
Well, I picked up more tapes at a moving sale yesterday, this time in Medina. Three keepers out of nine tapes found, although many of these findings were disappointments, as they were much more recent recordings than I'm used to finding, albeit on older stock tapes from the '80s and '90s.

TAPE 1: This was taped over an instructional demonstration/instructional video on a T-60 tape--starts with a short clip from a broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning on WJW on 7/23/2017, then cuts to most of that day's Fox News Sunday with commercials.

TAPE 2: Two episodes of Newhart taped from WJW-DT2 in June 2014 with commercials; partial 9AM broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning, Fox News Sunday, 11AM broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning (anchored by Autumn Ziemba, who graduated from my high school!--albeit about a decade before I did) and partial Omega XL infomercial with the late Larry King taped from WJW on 1/25/2015 with commercials; partial 11AM broadcast of Fox 8 News Sunday Morning and partial broadcast of Real Estate Showcase TV (local program) taped from WJW on 6/8/2014 with commercials. Fuji T-120 (1980s stock).

TAPE 3: Victor Borge: Then and Now II taped from WNEO/WEAO circa 1995, pledge breaks were shown during the broadcast, but were cut out on the tape; partial broadcast of Survive the Savage Sea (1992 ABC made-for-TV movie) taped from WAKC on 8/6/1995 with commercials (no local news teasers found, makes me wonder whether WAKC even aired newscasts on the weekends at that time); part two of A Woman of Independent Means (NBC miniseries) taped from WKYC on 2/20/1995 with commercials; end of Dateline NBC and part three of A Woman of Independent Means taped from WKYC on 2/22/1995 with commercials. Fuji T-120.

Two of the duds were movies taped from the Disney Channel during a Free Preview Weekend sometime in the early to mid '90s. Ironically, those two tapes were recorded in Hi-Fi Stereo sound, while the others I found were recorded in mono sound. The other tapes I ended up tossing out ended up being too damaged for me to want to watch all the way through, which I obviously didn't notice until I put them in the VCR.
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Are you sure that it was from June 2014? Because Newhart did not come to Antenna until 2016.
 
It had to have been. An ITT Technical Institute commercial on one of the episodes verifies it for sure and the tape cuts to Fox 8 News and Fox News Sunday from 2015 after the two Newhart episodes.
 
bobgoodbob said:
@crainbebo I really hope the vhsgoodiesWA4 channel gets restored soon, but I am not counting on it. Once your done with the ones from the first channel on Internet Archive, you should get to the ones from vhsgoodiesWA3 and then to the ones you uploaded on the first account when that channel got a copyright strike.
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I can't delete posts on here, but what i meant to say is that I still miss the VHSGoodiesWA YouTube channel. I really enjoy the content he posted on there. Really unfortunate that the channel got deleted. I actually DON'T know if the channel will get restored. But I really hope he reuploads the ones on the VHSGoodiesWA3 channel as well as the rest of the videos on the first channel when the VHSGoodiesWA3 channel got a copyright strike.
 
My old channels 3 and 4 are in the hands of a YouTube appeal that seems to be going nowhere. If there continues to be no response by the end of the week, I will send in another appeal to their email AND to the appeal link in the initial termination email.
If they restore those two channels, great! If not, bye Felicia and good riddance to YT.

Internet Archive reupload count as of today - 650 videos
 
crainbebo said:
My old channels 3 and 4 are in the hands of a YouTube appeal that seems to be going nowhere. If there continues to be no response by the end of the week, I will send in another appeal to their email AND to the appeal link in the initial termination email.
If they restore those two channels, great! If not, bye Felicia and good riddance to YT.

Internet Archive reupload count as of today - 650 videos
Click to expand...


Screw YouTube! You do not need those Nazis! Don't give up on your appeals hut seriously they are like an abusive spouse.
 
Not one, but two lots from eBay have arrived this week. One of them was halfway decent with some hits (albeit with not too many commercials intact), near-misses and duds, but the other, from magnav30 (based in Ohio) was a 100% zonk with nothing but bulk erased tapes! That was the first time I've ever encountered that problem, and the seller's description never mentioned that. The labels were either faded or ripped, which implies that as a new warning sign, but the labels showed nothing but common movies and Caron Burnet & Friends, so it didn't looked like I missed much there. At least I'm only out shipping with that lot due to a return policy like that other one there.

But back to the Detroit-area lot (with some out-of-market content from Houston):

TAPE 1: Rental/pay TV duds of Curly Sue and Man Without A Face, followed by about an hour of MTV from 4/23/1994 w/commercials, with numerous hits from Salt-N-Pepa featured among the videos, including special appearances by the classic hip hop group.

TAPE 2: Caddyshack (rental dub), followed by part of the local Detroit rock show The Beat from 2/19/1983 with no commercials and some of the VJ segments cut, followed by another rental dub of Silver Streak, and then about half of the M*A*S*H finale with no commercials before the tape runs out.

TAPE 3: A random assortment of rock/pop videos from MTV, The Beat (see above), and USA's Radio 1990 from late 1983 for about 90 minutes (very few VJ segments and no commercials), then various excerpts from New Year's 1983-84 from several stations (including CBS, ABC, and MTV), followed by part of the USA Night Flight feature of Koko Taylor and the Blues Machine from early 1984, wrapping up with USA Hot Spots with one commercial break. One again, commercials/more consistent segments would have been preferred, but Night Flight isn't easy to find, as are some of the VJ segments. It's pure joy for the '80s music lover though.

TAPE 4: Rental/pay TV duds of Firestarter and Footloose, followed by the MTV Saturday Concert feature of Dire Straits: Alchemy from 8/3/1985 with some commercials prior to the start of the concert (these were presented commercial free).

TAPE 5: A Huey Lewis and the News concert circa 1982 off an unknown station, followed by the MTV Sunday Special documentary The Doors: The Fire's Still Burnin' from 1983 with a few commercials prior to the feature, then wrapping up with most of the USA Movie Janis from sometime in 1983 with one commercial break.

TAPE 6: PBS Soundstage: The Slaters (1982) off WTVS circa late 1984/early 1985 with no intermissions or pledge breaks, followed by John Waite: No Brakes concert (1984) off an unknown station with no commercials, followed by an Austin City Limits episode of Neil Young off WTVS/PBS in early 1985, then wrapping up with the MTV Saturday Concert feature of KISS Animals Live from 1/26/1985 (taped 12/84) with no commercials. I wish there were ads, but MTV from this era is still nice to have even if there aren't any ads, even if the KISS fans disagree with this being from their "no makeup" period.

TAPE 7: Two parts of the Centennial miniseries recorded off KHTV with no commercials, followed by episodes of The New Scooby-Doo Mysteries (1973) and Heathcliff (1984) off KTXH circa 1985 with some ads.

TAPE 8: Episodes of Days of our Lives from 1/21, 1/23, 1/25, and 1/28/1985 with various amounts of commercials present (the 1/23 and 1/26 had the most) off KPRC/NBC, followed by episodes of Heathcliff "Brainsprain" and Superfriends "The Water Beast" off KTXH circa early 1985 with some commercials.

TAPE 9: A (nearly) full week of Days of our Lives from 4/1-4/5/1985 off KPRC/NBC (the Mon-Wed. episodes have only a few commercials, the Thursday show about 50/50, while the Friday show has most commercials intact), followed by part of a movie recorded off KTXH from June 1984, including a promo for the Graffiti Rock special.

As it turns out, the two taped labeled "Soap" yielded the best results, while the tape with "Alice" among the labels was not the '70s/'80s sitcom, but a vintage B&W movie that was among the dud tapes.

Two of the other duds included not VHS/Beta copies, but DVD dubs of a couple movies from the early 2000s (including LotR: The Two Towers), with one of the tapes ending with several minutes of MTV from late 2001 with one commercial break. Yep, some people at the time didn't have a DVD player, but since VHS copies were still readily available until around 2005, it just doesn't make sense to be backward compatible with dubbing!
 
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