Memory Lane Comments Response

Merikay – My wife and I have tried finding an old antique 1930’s Grandfather radio/clock. Here is an example, not a great example but one I found from the web since I don’t have access to my pictures from here. As long as you like the clock as you modified it that’s all that matters! I agree, some of these radio’s are simply not replaceable!

Alan and Marilyn McMillan – I have a few cedar chests my Grandfather carved and one huge chest my Mother inherited that goes back nearly 140 years or so. It sat unopened for decades until my Mother died and my brother and I finally got it open, it contained Christmas decorations going back a very long time. Things we’ll be able to give out to family as time goes by. Not sure what we’ll do with the chests yet, we have a lot of decisions to make there.

DeanO – Yeah, classic electronics are awesome. The tube radios all featured point to point wiring that is better than using circuit boards and the best tube amplifiers today use this old fashioned wiring method.

Sue and Doug – Agreed, getting the back story helps you understand the person you’re reading about.

Teri – I wish I could say no regrets but I’d be lying to myself if I told myself there were none. I agree to take them as lessons which is saying the same thing as you said kinda sorta… sometimes I can’t come up with the right words so I’ll leave it at that.

Mike McFall – Ok, you have me by a few decades! 1935, the middle of the golden era of radio! Perfect time to be born if you ignore the depression. How Zenith could come up with the radios they put out during that bad a decade is simply amazing. That they could profit during that time shows the vision they had! I love Fibber Magee and Molly, Johnny Dollar, Boston Blackie, X-Minus 1, Suspense, Inner Sanctum, Lux Radio Theater, Sam Spade even My Favorite Husband with Lucile Ball. I could name hundreds!

Speaking of battery sets, here is my 1937 Zenith 4B131, it required a pretty large battery! This was part of the collection I bought for $100.00, I completely forgot about it until last night. It doesn’t work but it looks nice!

Mike, I can honestly say, it’s the older generation that we can learn the most from. Your and your parents generation was one of the last to know what true sacrifice meant, the rationing going on during WWII and the things people had to do without because of the war effort, truly inspirational and something we take for granted today.

Diana – Thanks, tell your husband to get his license renewed! The Morse code requirement is gone now so it does make it easier even though I sometimes wonder if that was a good idea or not, but I digress. I listen to Old Time Radio on Sat radio as well, much better than listening to the news which is always bad it seems! Knee surgery, that is in my future as well, I was supposed to have them done a few decades ago but alas I never had it done.

WCFL and WLS, ANIMAL STORIES!! My wife and I were talking about Uncle Larry and Little Tommy a few days ago. I miss those days! Well, I don’t really miss the ‘70s that much, it wasn’t exactly the best decade but we tried to have some fun! Remember, Bob Sirott, John Records Landecker, Steve Dahl and Garry Meijr? The Loop WLUP 97.9 was awesome as well. Check out these sites I found this morning.

http://www.miksanek.com/chicagokidstv/radio/index.htm 

http://user.pa.net/~ejjeff/jeffwls1.html 

Big Matt, You should try HAM radio, I think you’d enjoy it a lot! Granted the initial cost of a rig isn’t cheap unless you buy an old unit but it’s worth it when you do! I have had a lot of fun on the amateur bands that my license spans over. I currently have an Icom 746PRO that I would like to install into the RV, but that will cost a bit antenna wise so putting it off for now.