One additional item
Our black and white TV of the time was, I believe, an Admiral.
What was so cool about it was its remote. You had to flip a switch in the back of the TV to use it, and a small light would glow on the front panel, letting you know remote was on. Oddly, the light stayed on even with the TV off, so of course, my mom did not want the remote used!
When we did use it, you took it off the side of the TV. It nestled in a little socket for it, held with magnets. It was a black plastic affair, with four keys. One would turn it off, one would bump it up four volume levels, then back to the first, the 3rd button was channel up, the 4th channel down.
Jason was quite right about the tuning. Ours was a motor, and from the front panel you pushed a "see saw" type plastic tab--one end went down, the other up the channels of 2-13. These numbers lit up in a green window. You manually "programmed" the stops for a channel by preselecting tabs inside a little door. The motor bypassed the other channels.
The remote used a "sonar" type arrangement. My dad opened the case for some reason, and there were little tuning fork type things in it. The push of the buttons did provide a variation of different wierd tones. The TV would pick these up and execute what you wanted. It was also great fun because if you "screamed like a girl" the TV would change stations!
I loved this TV, and I really hope it is still somewhere where someone cares for it.
There was another TV that had a remote that was simply a flashlight! In each corner of the TV was a light sensitive port that when you shined a light at one corner, it would do whatever function it was set to do. Not very popular, as lights and sun tended to create problems!