It was a bust.Ī number of manufacturers introduced transistors to their aftermarket car radios in the early 1960s, but Becker’s Monte Carlo was the first to be fully “solid state”-no vacuum tubes. Starting in 1955, Chrysler offered a small turntable in its high-end cars, playing proprietary seven-inch records with about 45 minutes of music. It had AM/FM and the first fully automatic station-search button. Prices for radios sold in this fashion far exceed those paid by collectors.AM was the undisputed king of the airwaves in 1952, but that didn’t stop Blaupunkt from introducing the first in-car FM radio.īecker’s iconic Mexico radio launched this year, arguably the first premium in-car radio. Some dealers refinish radios and sell them as decorative accessories. There also is a viable secondary market in radio parts. In addition to the actual radios, collectors also seek advertising, banners, booklets, brochures, instructions, magazines, manuals, pinbacks, promotional giveaways, schematics, and signs. Collector interest in console radios is modest. Some collectors specialize in police band radios. General Electric was one of several American manufacturers of transistor radios between 19. Avocado, golden harvest, and rust were popular colors in the 1960s.Ĭlock radios became popular in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Following World War II, GE introduced a wide range of colored plastic cases.
Consulting manufacturers’ catalogs and pictorial identification guides is critical in determining if a radio is consistent with how it came off the assembly line.īy the early 1940s, General Electric offered its tabletop radios in the traditional brown wood finished cabinets or in an ivory plastic case. The same mechanism is often found in a variety of cabinet designs. Radio manufacturers offered dozens of different models. Cabinets divide into consoles (upright radio), tabletop radio, and entertainment center (radio combined with a record player or another electronic device).įor a radio to be considered complete, it must be housed in its period cabinet, playable (albeit tubes and some electronics can be replaced), in very good or better condition. It requires a high level of expertise to determine the precise classification into which a radio belongs.Ī radio divides into components, primarily (1) the cabinet or covering housing the radio mechanism, (2) the radio mechanism, and (3) the power source. Parts radios with the only value being salvageable tubes and other parts Like antique vehicles, radios can be divided into five classifications: In 1954, GE entered the UHF 450-470 MHz range. In 1940, Fred Link and Daniel Knoble introduced the large-scale VHF FM two-way (actually three-way) radio system. In 1934, GE produced its first two-way AM equipment. General Electric entered the land mobile (police) radio market in 1931. After a brief return to RCA, Westinghouse began making its own radios in 1946. Westinghouse used American Bosch and Emerson as suppliers. In 1936, General Electric introduced its brand of radios. Other innovations include the first practical loudspeaker and a method for recording sound on films. Irving Langmuir developed the electron tube. RCA sold vacuum tubes under its Radiotron brand. RCA marketed GE made radios under the Radiola brand and sold its first radios with the superheterodyne chassis in early 1924. General Electric began manufacturing and distributing radios through its RCA brand starting in 1919. General Electric withdrew from the partnerships in 1932. In 1922, General Electric launched WGY in Schenectady, its own radio station. In 1919, General Electric formed with AT&T, Westinghouse, and the United Fruit Company, the RCA patent partnership to develop radio technology. General Electric bought out a subsidiary of Marconi and reorganized it as RCA (Radio Corporation of America). The arrival of the vacuum tube revolutionized modern electronics and the home radio. Until the early 1920s, the most common form of radio reception was through the use of a crystal set. Marconi received a patent for the radio from the US Patent Office in 1904. In 1901, Marconi achieved the first transatlantic radio communication.
Guglielmo Marconi built the first commercially successful wireless telegraphy system in the mid-1890s utilizing Heinrich Hertz’s 1888 proof of transmitted airborne electromagnetic waves.
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