Televisión Pública (Public Television, abbreviated TVP) is a publicly owned Argentine television network, the national public broadcaster. It began broadcasting in 1951, when LR3 Radio Belgrano Televisión channel 7 in Buenos Aires, its key station and the first television station in the country, signed on the air. History 1951–1978: Foundations Jaime Yankelevich, businessman and operator of radio station LR3 "Radio Belgrano", received the approval of the Perón family to import television equipment from the United States. The final approval came from Eva Perón, who, when informed of the importation of the new equipment, said "Sí, sí, todo muy lindo pero yo lo que quiero es que televisen el acto del Día de la Lealtad" ("Yes, yes, all very good, but what I want is for them to televise the acts of Loyalty Day"). With the support of Minister of Communications Oscar Lorenzo Nicolini and the Radio Belgrano executives, preparations were made to start the first television station in Argentina. Yankelevich imported Bell equipment, DuMont cameras, and a horizontally polarized antenna initially mounted on the MOP Building. On September 24, 1951, Radio Belgrano announcer Fito Salinas was put behind a camera and backed by a musical group, and the first test transmissions commenced. On the first days of tests, televisions were set up in department stores in a 500-meter radius around the site, and the transmitter put out 500 watts of power, but the signal was ramped up and brought to 40 kW power. At that power level, reception was clear for around. Finally, October 17, 1951 came, and once more, channel 7 signed on for the first time under the name it would bear for a decade: LR3 Radio Belgrano TV. The first broadcast was conducted on Loyalty Day, as Eva Perón wanted, from the Plaza de Mayo; the remote cameras were connected to the studios by a cable link. 2,500 televisions were in place in the country to watch the events. For the first time in 24 days, Eva Perón rose from her bed to attend, dressed in black. The CGT awarded her the Distinction of Recognition and to president Juan Perón the Great Peronist Medal of Extraordinary Class. Doses of tranquilizers, administered by the education minister, were necessary to allow Eva to deliver a brief address, her final political testament, in which she mentioned her own death nine times. On November 4, 1951, LR3-TV began regular commercial telecasts,