Telesaar
Telesaar is the name of the first German-speaking private television broadcaster . It was launched in 1954 by the Europäische Rundfunk- und Fernseh-AG , which also operates the Europe 1 station. This was possible because the Saarland was not part of the Federal Republic of Germany until December 31, 1956 and was therefore not subject to German broadcasting sovereignty. The company headquarters, technology and studios were located at Richard-Wagner-Strasse 58-60 in Saarbrücken , broadcasting was on VHF Band I from December 23, 1953 to July 15, 1958 from Saarbrücken-Eschberg with insufficient 500 watts of power Channel F7 and from January 15, 1958 until the compulsory shutdown of the transmission systems on January 25, 1958 on channel F1b from a transmission mast with 5 kW radiated power on the Felsberg-Berus transmitter system that was specially built for television broadcasting .
After the incorporation of Saarland as a federal state , the German authorities checked the continued operation because Telesaar argued that only the French television standard (819 lines) was broadcast, i.e. German devices (625 lines) could not be received. However, because the program was exclusively in German, it was decided to stop broadcasting in mid- 1958 ; the broadcasting systems on the Felsberg were sealed by the Deutsche Bundespost , which had the broadcasting monopoly at the time , because CCIR channel 2, which had almost the same frequency, had already been used since January 1st 1957 was assigned to the Saarländischer Rundfunk. The reception of the SR experimental 100 W transmitter in Saarbrücken Schwarzenberg, which had been in use since January 6, 1957, had to be given up from January 15, 1957, because the Berus-Felsberg transmitter "outshone" thanks to its 50 times higher transmission power and better location. From October 1959 the Saarländischer Rundfunk , the public broadcasting corporation ( ARD ) of the Saarland, broadcast its own regional program, according to the German line standard, on FS channel 2 from the Göttelborner Höhe location with 100 kW radiated power. In the meantime (from July 16, 1958 until November), the SR used the transmission systems in Saarbrücken-Eschberg on channel F7 to broadcast its own program. This short interlude was special, as otherwise all analog ARD television broadcasts were made according to the CCIR standard.
The few surviving footage of the Telesaar broadcasts is now in the SR archives.