Fascinated by retro frozen dinners? From Mexican enchiladas to fish and chips, these are the retired TV dinners we wish we ...

From the Swanson TV dinners of the 1950s to the Realgood frozen foods of today, the freezer aisle's stalwarts have evolved over the last several decades.

Whatever their origins, TV dinners were a hit. In their first full year of production, 1954, Swanson sold 25 million of them.

But the nearby sign explaining who invented the TV dinner is another matter. As Swanson celebrates the 50th anniversary of its famous frozen meal, there is no shortage of people taking credit.

Swanson took full advantage of this trend, with TV advertisements that depicted elegant, modern women serving these novel meals to their families, or enjoying one themselves.

The TV dinner represented a change in the way Americans were thinking about food. Introduced in 1954 by Swanson & Sons, of Omaha, Nebraska, it offered women--more and more of whom were working outside ...