Real Radio Stores and ER's Shared Experiences

[Jack-KA3ZLR-]

Good Evening Everyone,

 I know from time to time we have discussed the Loss of Radio stores and radio supply depots, and I dearly Miss my Lafayette Store we had in Bridgeville Pa, and reading ER's article on the HB-2000 Brings it back again.

 Real Radio Stores...man how I miss the one we had here, of course there were quite a few back then, but, I really like reading about others experiences ... way to go ER....

[Pete, WA2CWA]

There's a 24/7 radio store now; it's called ebay.

[Jack-KA3ZLR-]

..Pete I have been Amended...TNX..LOL... it was a fun time...

[Pete, WA2CWA]

:D ..Pete I have been Amended...TNX..LOL... it was a fun time...

You should have been on the other side of the counter if you wanted the real fun.

[GEORGE/W2AMR]

Good Evening Everyone,

 I know from time to time we have discussed the Loss of Radio stores and radio supply depots, and I dearly Miss my Lafayette Store we had in Bridgeville Pa, and reading ER's article on the HB-2000 Brings it back again.

 Real Radio Stores...man how I miss the one we had here, of course there were quite a few back then, but, I really like reading about others experiences ... way to go ER....

As a kid, I remember the Lafayette  catalog being my favorite reading material. My dream was to someday have enough money to buy their top of the line CB rig, the HE-20.

[Jack-KA3ZLR-]

Good Morning George,

 I couldn't wait for it in the mail, or somebody would have it in school, and we all shared it...After the farm chores on a rainy Saturday, sit back and spend an afternoon listening to the hallicrafters sx-99 and just reading away...

Radio...Good times Brother...

[GEORGE/W2AMR]

Good Morning George,

 I couldn't wait for it in the mail, or somebody would have it in school, and we all shared it...After the farm chores on a rainy Saturday, sit back and spend an afternoon listening to the hallicrafters sx-99 and just reading away...

Radio...Good times Brother...

Well I had to rethink this Jack. Actually the Lafayette catalog was my second favorite , the Issue of Playboy hidden in the back of the closet was my favorite.    

[W8ER]

I remember one of the catalogs that was a favorite was an Allied Radio catalog. When I moved to Chicago, way back, I made it a priority to visit the Western Avenue store ... in the middle of a bad area... big building and little showroom .. bars on what few windows and doors they had .. but it was really neat. When I walked out, right there across the street was an Olson Radio store. It was a bright day.   :lol:

--Larry

[WA1GFZ]

We had Harty Electronics in Hartford. My Dad would get home from work at 4:15 and my Mom would take me into the city so I had 15 minutes
to pick up parts. I really had to be a good boy back then because we would race home so she could make suppper before the OM got grumpy.

Tom Vu bought his famous Gotham vertical from Hatry.
Novice license tests if they liked you.

[w3jn]

Minneapolis had Electronic Center, Inc. (ECI).  A large electronics parts jobber as well as a Collins/Hallicrafters/Yaecomwood dealer.

I used to take the bus downtown and spend hours there and at Acme Electronics, around the corner on Washington Avenue.  Acme was a dingy, crappy place with bins of junk and for all the hours I spent looking around I don't recall EVER buying anything there.

My first receiver, a NC-173, was bought at ECI in Jan, 1975.  I remember finding it on one of my forays downtown, saving up money for it, dreaming about it for a month or so, then convincing the old man to let me spend my money for it.  Come the big day to go downtown and pick it up, there was a big snowstorm and the OM was reluctant to drive his Dodge Dart in the snow.  I desperately convinced him and we got there at 4:55 PM, just 5 minutes before closing time.  I remember the receiver was mint except for a sticking S-meter, which scored me a $5 discount.  $94.95 plus 4% tax....  man was I a happy kiddo.

Nothing like that anymore in Minneapolis or the DC/Baltimore area, AFAIK.  St. Paul does have Paul's Radio Ranch which is THE best store EVER for old buzzard parts, boatanchors, used gear, etc.  Like going to a hamfest without having to pick thru the computer crap, knit dolls, etc.

73 John

[Pete, WA2CWA]

Ah yes, I remember all you guys in one form or another prancing in especially on Saturdays. In my area it seemed to be a Saturday ritual. Hours wandering the store, fondling all the radio and audio equipment knobs and "stuff", and then, maybe buying a 10 cent switch or two.  Having been Lafayette's longest part-time employee (even doing double duty for two years working both in a NJ store and the Union Square store in NYC), I was witness to a lot of customer actions each week. NYC store was really an experience. This store was originally at 100 6th Ave. (one of the "original" stores). It was one of the few union shops and I was also the only gentile working there. That was a fun place.

[Paul, K2ORC]

When I first got interested in radio in the early 1960s, I lived in a small town, Oneonta, NY and the nearest electronics stores were in Albany or in Binghamton, 50 or 60 miles away.  So my electronics store was the curb.  

People used to put old radios or consoles out for me and I'd haul them home, sometimes with a wagon.  I'd take them down to the basement and strip the parts.  Sometimes I'd try to get something working again, especially if it was an old receiver that had shortwave bands.   I even gave a couple of my renovated sets to friends trying to get them interested in SWLing.    

It was a big day when an Allied or Lafayette catalog arrived.  A real thrill was opening a box containing components with shiny, long leads instead of the clipped, short leads my salvaged parts had.   New parts were treasures paid for by lawn and garden work, shoveling snow and other after school jobs I had around town.  No 1-800-SEND IT NOW or magic plastic in them thar days.   I'd go down to the post office and get a money order to send in with the order.   Things have changed....

[K1JJ]

Yep, Hatry Electronics in Hartford took ham gear in trade, thus had a huge display of used gear.  No service dept, so ya got it as is...

In 1964 as I was a 12 year old JN studying for Novice and would take the bus to Hartford and give Corky $1 each week towards a $35 Globe Scout on the used shelf.

As the weeks went by I got greedy and transfered the money over to a $125 Ranger.  Finally, I started thinking really big and wanted to transfer it over to a Valiant. Corky refused to let me, saying I'd be running 275W CW in the Novice band when my ticket arrived. I argued with him that I wouldn't ... :lol: ... but he didn't give in and I bought the Ranger.

The night I was to pick it up they tested it and it didn't work!  I was devastated to the point of almost crying. So a local ham saw the plight and my Dad and I  followed him to his house where he lent me a DX-20.  That's the rig I called CQ on for 3 days with a Gotham vertical getting no replies.

Hatry's was quite the place - even had a Collins dealership. But like all the rest, went out of business about 10? years ago due to their parts business dying and taking everything with it.

Those days in the Winter of 1964 are fond memories of going in there and dreaming of all the wonderful ham gear to bring home some day. Everyone was trading stuff in and trying out the next rig. What fun.

T

[WA1GFZ]

That is what I did Paul. My friend Billy lived up the street in an old farm house. His parents onced owned all the land that became our neighborhood. His house was the highest point in town. We had the whole downstairs after his grand parents died. We hung some wire outside
to the barn and a pole. I remember the jammers on SW thinking they were airplanes. We had piles of dead radios to pull parts out of.
My mother thought we caused the great black out of the 60's. Good thing the battery was good in my little transistor radio to confirm it wasn't us.
How about those gold pin tubes at radio shark. I had another friend who went through their trash for dead tubes then he would walk around the building and cash them in again. He had more tubes than they did.
I remember early transistors from radio shark with no die inside.
2N107s if I remember. Can't trust those new fangled transistors.
Ah that first order from Allied Radio with new parts with new leads.
The TV power transformer A JNs ticket to strap. My first 811 linear with a pair of transformers in series secondary. No they didn't match.

[WA1GFZ]

Gee Tom, I started going there around '64 also.  Fall of '65 I was a freshman and ran into my first grade friend Gary WA1EWQ  who went to a different grammer school after second grade. He had just received his license and motivated me to get on.  I had a crystal controlled homebrew 6V6 rig with a new 3725 crystal. My parents bought me a new Heath GR64
for Christmas '64 because I couldn't convince them to buy a used rig at Hatry. I used to light a bulb with the rig because I was afraid the FCC
was hiding in the woods waiting to bust me as a boot.
(I won 8th grade science fair first prize for the rig in early '65)
I finally passed the code test second try in winter of '66. Then the FCC
busted my butt because I didn't sign my name with middle initial and it took two passes through the system. I remember way too much advice
from Mom about dealing with the feds after that screw up.
I had a real license by Spring and built a big rig. 6L6GT.

[K1JJ]

The TV power transformer A JNs ticket to strap. My first 811 linear with a pair of transformers in series secondary. No they didn't match.

Yep, my first linear also  used them - three 800V TV transformers connected in series. I'm surprised they didn't break down.  For capacitors it was the old TV cans. Every so often I would hear snapping and cracking and had to replace yet another few in the bank.

I remember going to a TV repair shop with my VW bug and telling the owner I needed old TV sets for parts and attended the Univ of Htfd. The guy happened to be a graduate and loaded my bug up full of carcasses until they were hanging out the windows.  Some of those old parts are still being used around here...  :lol:

T

[WA1GFZ]

Yea Tom, We had no idea about mil surplus back then.
I remember Chuck's ART13 wondering how he got it.
I have a void in ham radio. I never built an 813 rig but have the parts.
I went 811 to 572Bs then visited a friend in Ca and bought my first
Penta Labs (Made in USA) 4-1000A at HRO for $22.50 cap and socket included ca-mon. I held it in my lap the whole flight home on a TWA 707.
I was so proud of that radiator cap peaking out of the box.
Almost stayed with a girl I met in S.F. but settled for the tube.
Got my heat radiator stuck in the box.

[W1JS]

Evans Radio
Bow (near Concord) NH

Took a road trip from Mass. in the mid sixties with my Dad to visit Evans Radio.  Little did I know then that I would living up here in this icebox.  

Great store, long since replaced by the local Toyota dealer.

Carl Evans, the owner, was a strictly CW op. with a nice set of towers and wire antennas off Route 3A in Bow.

[W1GFH]

As a kid, I remember the Lafayette  catalog being my favorite reading material. My dream was to someday have enough money to buy their top of the line CB rig, the HE-20.

Damn straight! Lots of daydreaming a kid could do with a mid 60's electronics catalog in hand. Allied, Lafayette, Burnstein-Applebee, Olson, Fair Radio, and Radio Shack catalogs were read and re-read over and over.

A trip to the Lafayette Radio store meant a 45 min ride to Lowell, Mass. The smell of tube gear and electronic components as you entered the store was intoxicating to me. The young guys who worked there were hams themselves, and really knew their stuff. They could demo 20 wpm morse, sketch out a circuit on paper, etc.

After weeks of begging, I successfully lobbied my parents for a little Hallicrafters S-119 (being closed-out at $19.95 ea) and was in hog heaven (first ham AMer I ever heard was "W1ZYZ" on 75m) until I stumbled across QST in the drugstore magazine rack. Seeing the gear in the ham shack photos blew me away, and the new equipment ads in the back -- Collins, Hammarlund, Gonset, WRL, EF Johnson -- Holy S*%$ I had no idea such stuff existed. I studied every word in QST religiously, regardless of whether I understood it or not.

The TRIGGER Electronics ads with the pic of the woman in the bullet bra always got my attention.

Yep, them wuz the dayz.

[Jack-KA3ZLR-]

Hi Guys,

 All great stuff here, and I never made it to the Heath store over in Monroeville, But us kids wished we had...Bummer Deal though, I just mainly had Lafayette, Sun drug for testing toobies.. Remember SunDrug...Oh man this is going back afew...LOL..

[kc2ifr]

Anyone remember Fort Orange Radio in Albany NY....it was owned by "Uncle" Dave Marks......cant remember his call. I used to go there as a kid and just drool. I think that was about 1955 or so.
Bill

[VA3ES - Piss-Weak Ed]

[...]  (first ham AMer I ever heard was "W1ZYZ" on 75m) until I stumbled across QST in the drugstore magazine rack. Seeing the gear in the ham shack photos blew me away, and the new equipment ads in the back -- Collins, Hammarlund, Gonset, WRL, EF Johnson -- Holy S*%$ I had no idea such stuff existed. I studied every word in QST religiously, regardless of whether I understood it or not.

Same here. I stumbled across Jack, W1ZYZ on a modified AM table radio, (I swapped out the coiled antenna on the back for a 100' wire!). I heard Jack and Ellie on the Green Mountain Net (3855 kc) every afternoon.  Jack had a bad habit of farting, and his Johnson rig (can't remember if it was a 500 or a Desk) broadcast every fart, every click of Ellie's knitting needles and every squawk of that parrot as clear as day! (Awwwk - phee-phaw-bye-bye).   And so many others too - W20Y, W3PHL, W3YAM, and so many others.

I lived in Montreal then, and the main electronics house  was Payette Radio Ltd., which carried QST.  They also had an excellent ham department, where I drooled over Collins, Johnson and Drake gear.

I felt the same about QST too. "I studied every word in QST religiously, regardless of whether I understood it or not."  Ahhh.... sweet memories.

[W1GFH]

Reminded me of another place, ASSOCIATED RADIO in Overland Park, KS, (still in business) had a huge "used gear" dept. in the 70's/80's. I bought a Collins S-Line at Deerfield one year for $500, kept it for a while, then "traded" it up (+ cash) for a newfangled Icom. The Associated guys had Collins coming out of their wazoos, racks and racks of the stuff, nobody wanted it. Consequently, they didn't give me much for the S-Line.  

[W3SLK]

We have and always had Moyer's Electronics http://www.moyerelectronics.com/. Bill Moyer Sr. prior to his death had the most definitive collection of broadcast and B-battery radios. He also had the SAMS Photofact collection for them as well. Although they never sold complete radios, they are very informative when it comes to obtaining parts. Plus Bill Jr. has been know that if any of the local radio stations go off the air during the night, the engineers are to contact him at home and he will open up the store to get them back on the air again. Once he opened the store at 3AM to help WKOK get airborn again.

[K1MVP]

Evans Radio
Bow (near Concord) NH

Took a road trip from Mass. in the mid sixties with my Dad to visit Evans Radio.  Little did I know then that I would living up here in this icebox.  

Great store, long since replaced by the local Toyota dealer.

Carl Evans, the owner, was a strictly CW op. with a nice set of towers and wire antennas off Route 3A in Bow.

Evans Radio,--Now that place brings back memories, from the late
50`s even into the mid 70`s.
That place was "ham heaven" as far as new gear, and lots of good
used gear.--Last I knew it was turned into an electrical supply outlet,
in the 80`s, but I guess from what you said its now a car dealership.
It was always easy to spot from the highway, as I recall those "big
beams" at the store back then.

                                  73`s, Rene, K1MVP