Buffalo media historian Steve Cichon relives that very first day, including a ton of stunning photos. 

WBEN-TV signs-on, 1948

Here's a 1955 WBEN-TV ad that mentions Toronto viewers, followed by a 1963 Toronto Star ad for an antenna installer. (Notice the "RU" prefix in the phone number, which was "78." That sounds very familiar to me, since our home number when I was a kid also started with "RU," which stood for "Russell.")

mace wrote:

May 14, 1948 saw the arrival of the first television station available to Southern Ontario viewers. At least the wealthy ones.  In January 1949 Eaton's was selling GE sets with a 10" screen and 12" speaker for $791 PLUS in the fine print, another $100-$150 depending on location for installation of the outdoor antenna. For its first seven months of existence, ch 4 was an NBC affilliate. In January 1949, it became a primary CBS affilliate, while carrying some NBC and ABC programming. When WGR ch 2 signed on in 1954, ch 4 became an exclusive CBS affiliate. Although today you would never know it. The CBS eye never appears on any of WIVB's station logo's or ID's.

First in the GTA, but not quite the first in Southern Ontario - WWJ in Detroit (now WDIV) signed on March 4, 1947 and WEWS in Cleveland signed on December 17 of that year.

Hansa wrote:

Buzzy Krumhunger wrote:

The cost of televisions back in the day isn’t all that surprising but the added cost of outdoor antennas is a shocker.  Would these be the rooftop or tower antennas?  Our home in the early 60’s Scarberia (as well as everyone else on our street) were the of the tower variety.  
Eight year old me made the discovery that climbing up the tower to retrieve a ball from the roof was much easier than trying to climb down!  A belated nod of grateful thanks to my neighbour Mr. Norton for getting that idiot me down safely.

I recall being told that the cable companies lobbied municipalities to pass laws requiring rooftop and antenna towers be removed. I don't know if that's true but they seem to have largely disappeared in a short period of time and you'd think removing the towers at least wouldn't be an inexpensive operation.

I remember in the early days of Rogers Cable, if you signed up for their service, they would remove your "old unsightly antenna" free of charge. I remember my cousin's family signing up early so they could finally receive WKBW. They had a tower but the antenna was one of the early versions capable of only receiving ch 2-6.