1970 - Happy New Year! 40 years ago as seen on TV.

[GhostlyGravestones]

Wow! That's amazing. I actually remember this. Me, my girlfriend, my best buddy, and his date watched this very scene on TV. I remember the "1970" flashing on the screen.

[james65508]

my parents were born in 1977 trying to imagen how that was. I was like dam thats a long time.

[bidox3]

i was blood

[mishelly38]

Born on Nov.22 1967 i was 2!!

[777justinlover]

I was still a spurm

[formerbritneyfan]

i was two and a half years old when the ball came down that year and read "1970 ",im sure i was sound asleep as well, i wasent allowed up past 8:00 at night back then ,pretty willd.

[altfactor]

KRON was at the time an NBC affiliate, so I suspect this was a live (on the East Coast; this was probably seen at 12 Midnight PST) cut-in on a special edition of "The Tonight Show".

[WilliamNoack]

Made with my Super 8 camera (which had no sound in those days) on a tripod facing the TV - a camera-copy of live TV. I did the same thing on the first moon landings and other things. That was the only way we could duplicate TV shows in the old days before the miraculous invention of the VCR in the late 70's. I also made camera copies of Star Trek and Doctor Who just in case they never showed up on TV again ever. Boy was I wrong!

[heine71]

How did you make this?

[ralphh56]

I was 5 going on 6

[WilliamNoack]

Yes, it is '69 turning into '70... the exciting new number at the start of a new decade, a "seven!" Ten years after that it was another exciting change of the '70's to 1980... saw Blondie on TV for the first time at midnight. 20 years after that was the exciting change from 1999 to 2000 watching about 26 hours of TV as Peter Jennings hosted the Millennium change in all time zones on live TV. I wish I had taped all of that. If anyone has videos of all 26 hours, please let me know!

[PaluaWahine]

I can't tell, is this NYE going from 69-70 or 70-71? It seems like 69-70 because most NYE things celebrate the NEW year, and it's be weird if it was flashing "1970" when it was turning into 1971. Anyway.. if it IS 69-70, this was 41 years ago, because I was born in May 1970 and am 40.5 y/o right now.

Just saying! :)

[hyancinth70]

THE YEAR I WAS BORN, WOO-HOO!!! lol! In August, that is! :D

[rentslave]

That was the last time I went to Times Square on NYE.The crowds had begun to get bad.It was a very cold night.The ball was dropped from the Allied Chemical Building near 42nd ST.Afterwards,I went to a local book store and bought a paperback about the Beatles who were about to break up.Auld Lang Syne didn't work for them.

[WilliamNoack]

Thanks. I made a note on his video upload. His copy is OK with me, but he should have given me attribution. Yes, they didn't have sound Super 8 cameras back when I bought my first 2 Super 8 cameras. Sound came in later. I didn't start making sound films until I got my first Video camera, about 10 years later.

[Ant29]

Are you the real owner of this video? If so, DISCOLARRY125 just copied it and uploaded it to his/her own channel. Isn't that stealing? Also, the super 8 camera doesn't record sound at all which is a shame because it took good video footage.

[bwitz72]

As my dad warned me, the older you get, the faster time flies!

[noqualms1960]

Wow! I remember that night vividly. I was 9 yrs. old and staying with some friends. We were banging pots & pans with spoons when it turned midnight. We thought that was just the ultimate staying up to see a new decade arrive.

[hyancinth70]

@noqualms1960 Ditto on that. I was born later on in the year, but I also thought that it was the coolest thing, to stay up 'til the wee hours of the morning, on New Year's Eve.

[Ibusers1]

Can someone post a video of the Times Square ball drop on new years 1969-1970?

[johnson9dantheman]

Unfortunately, I don't think that will be likely, since no one had VCRs back in the late 60s/early 70s. :(

[Ibusers1]

@johnson9dantheman Then if the user is posting this video on the internet, then why wouldn't this video show the ball dropping? I wonder if the user that posted this video can record it off of a VCR though just like you said, that there were no VCRs back in the late 60's/ early 70's, I wonder if the user can or did record this on VCR these days, I mean now or recently. Did he really record this from his camera when this was on TV or did he record it off of VCR just recently?

[WilliamNoack]

This was recorded by me using a Super 8 camera - and I think it may vaguely show part of the ball drop - I see the Sony Building in Times Square in the film. As has been noted, there were no VCRs until about 10 years after this, when I bought one of the early VCRs for about $1,800. (Technology obviously gets cheaper and cheaper!)

[Ibusers1]

@WilliamNoack Ok, now I get the point. You were really using a super 8mm camera instead of a VCR!? Now that definitely makes sense to me as I was wondering why this video seemed to be so quiet without sound and also the images in this video looked a bit like it was being recorded off of an old camera. Now that seemed pretty weird to me at first when I was watching this video as I first saw this.

[joint323]

cool