About this collection

The Radio Corporation of America (RCA)’s Picture Tube Division, later known as the Video Component and Display Division, was headquartered in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. In 1987, the French firm Thomson Consumer Electronics acquired RCA’s consumer electronics business, including the Lancaster plant, and operated the facility until Thomson shut down its consumer electronics operations in 2005.

The RCA/Thomson Lancaster records (Accession 2462.74) collection documents a diverse array of activities at the RCA/Thomson Lancaster plant between the facility’s early days of operation and its closure. It has not been digitized in its entirety.

This collection is part of the David Sarnoff Library collections (Accession 2464). These collections were the holdings of the David Sarnoff Library, founded in 1967 as part of the David Sarnoff Research Center. When the library closed in 2009, its archival collections were donated to Hagley Library.

Image: How a Color Picture Tube Works, 1996. Click here to view in the collection.