It’s a weird one – it was a news broadcast (possibly The Huntley / Brinkley Report). It’s one of the memories I have from the house where we lived until just before my third birthday, so it would have been late 1967 or early 1968).
Other very early ones are the first episode of Sesame Street and the Apollo 11 landing (both in 1969).
I’m surprised at the wide range of ages.
You could pick two people here that have similar interests, politics, etc., who can debate Dr. Who or team up against racists… and they’d have no idea how they’re from such totally different upbringings/generations.
I mean, one poster was watching “Howdy Doody” as a kid; the next one was watching “Return of the Jedi”.
I love this place!
Man, I have no idea what my first TV memory is. Maybe Pappyland, which was a kids show based around drawing? But I remember watching that in my parent’s basement of their current house and I definitely remember watching TV in the house previous to that and we moved when I was 6ish. I just don’t remember what I was watching.
Ding Dong School, Kaptain Kangaroo, Howdy Doody, I Love Lucy were “my” shows.
My mom had the soaps on while she did the household chores so I remember also The Guiding Light, Search for Tomorrow, As the World Turns, Secret Storm, The Edge of Night. Then The Loretta Young Show and The Early Show (old movies)–all before the 6pm news. 
Yeah, I grew up on television. All these years later nothing has changed. 
I remember watching Captain Kangaroo and Miss Frances’s Ding Dong School, but I think my earliest might be an episode of Your Show of Shows.
Sometime in 1954, Friday Night Fights, sponsored by Gilette. At least I think it aired on Fridays. Three hours of boxing. We walked to a neighbor’s house to see it. A year later my parents bought their first T.V. I remember watching a sitcom entitled “Oh Susanna” on that set.
Having to hang out in the kitchen when “Gunsmoke” was on. I could hear it though, and I conjured up a terrifying and forbidden world.
The 1953 Coronation of Elizabeth II. We watched it on our black-and-white Zenith with a 12’ round screen. My mother told me to watch it because it’s something I’ll always remember. She was right. I remember Elizabeth riding in the Coronation Coach, and I remember how beautiful she looked in a close-up.
The earliest thing that I can definitely remember watching was Lee Harvey Oswald getting shot. I was lying on the floor watching it live and remembering the announcer saying that Oswald had been shot over and over.
The earliest TV memory that I have is watching Star Trek as a family in our TV room. Whenever it got too scary I would run out of the room and hide my eyes until someone told me that it was safe to come back in.
We oldsters have been staring at the magic box long before BSG and Firefly, yes, we even experienced Star Trek in its best, original incarnation back in olden times!
I just thought of another early memory, when I was home from school, very ill, watching a show with grandma starring Joan Davis and Jim Backus, in the mid-50’s. Called “I Married Joan” and I remember the theme song as if I’d heard it this morning. Now there’s an early memory AND a long-forgotten TV oldie!
I don’t know when exactly it was, but I remember crawling on the floor and seeing Walter Cronkite on the big black and white console TV. I’m assuming it was one of the moon landings as I was born in 1967.
Yeah, first remembered filmed historic event would be interesting too.
Mine would be the Oliver North trial.
Probably Captain Kangaroo around 1960 or so.
I’m torn -
first TV show ? Kolchack - Zombie episode
first movie on tv? Five Million Years to Earth
I remember watching them both in black and white with mom - early 70s -
There may be an even more recent poll than these two for getting a handle on the demographics, but at least these provide clues:
How old are you?
03-02-2010, 04:55 PM
Giles
#102 06-07-2010, 08:31 AM
Giles
How old are you?
06-02-2011, 03:33 PM
Anaamika
#168 10-29-2011, 01:29 AM
AHunter3
Best I can tell that second one is still open for new votes.
Star Trek. I still vividly remember listening to the voice over "Space, the final frontier… " and seeing the ship whizzing by.
Instantly hooked, still a Trekkie mumble mumble years later 
I honestly couldn’t say. I’m a child of the 80s, so I was born into the television age. My mom loved Nick at Nite, and my dad was into the Stooges. I grew up watching old reruns of Gilligan’s Island, the Dick van Dyke Show, I love Lucy, The 3 Stooges, etc.
Here’s a definite memory, not quite as early as the one I previously posted: The premiere of How the Grinch Stole Christmas was just starting, but I didn’t get to see it because we had to leave for a cantata at church. I saw it the next year, however!
Truman’s inauguration. 1948. Only set on the block, everyone came over. Live