VOLUME 15            SEPTEMBER 1998                NUMBER  9

RADIO MISCELLANEA -- September 1998

From Antique Radio Classified for September 1998
(Copyright 1996-8 by John V. Terrey - For personal use only.)

"Antique Radio Classified" invites its readers to contribute letters and information for inclusion in "Radio Miscellanea" and elsewhere in the magazine. "In The Marketplace" is based on information submitted by the businesses themselves. All topics should be of general interest and sent to A.R.C., P.O. Box 2, Carlisle, MA 01741. All material submitted should be verified for accuracy and may be edited for publication, which is not guaranteed. See the masthead for more details.

Bravo Douglas Re: Zenith History
Dear Editor:

I absolutely loved Alan Douglas' tart response to Cones and Bryant regarding Zenith history in the August '98 A.R.C. Each author obviously must decide how to interpret the shreds of info uncovered by research. I believe that Douglas has the most pragmatic (and persistent!) approach, steeped in a very broad knowledge of the the history of the radio business. His sharp wit makes his writing personable and refreshing. I look forward to each of his articles and hope to see many more.

--Mark T. Oppat, Plymouth, MI

Embrace the Internet
Dear Editor:

Hope you will continue to assess the merits of going completely worldwide on the internet with your magazine. I am 66, a USN veteran of the Korean War era, and see no need to be a Luddite [a person opposed to technological change]. We need to harness the massive reach of PC communications. With satellite emanation of the internet coming, the tiniest hamlet in Timbuktu will have access to battery-powered, laptop reasons to buy your radios. Let's embrace, envelop that market.

Hertz, Marconi, De Forest, and FM's Edwin Armstrong would leap for joy over the internet. Take a month and learn the internet with a used $500 computer [or under $200 WebTV box.] You will never see anything like it again for creating knowledge and wealth.

--Bill McCusker, Cedar Rapids, IA

Internet -- Sooner, not Later
Dear Editor:

I have been following the debate about the advantages or disadvantages of having the net online for some time. It seems that no matter what methods of staggering your mail you use, someone will always get his copy first. One writer complained that he did not have access to the internet at work and would be at a disadvantage to those who do. I do have access at work but would not have access to my job for long if I were to spend my time searching for antique radios. My employers have a strange indifference to my hobby.

I could argue that retired people have an advantage in being able to read their mail before the working people get home. Perhaps they should be required to sign an agreement not to read the ads until 7:00 p.m. Obviously, this is carrying the argument to an absurdity, but it illustrates that no method can be entirely fair to everyone.

Having A.R.C. ads online is one of the few ways of getting them simultaneously to everyone who has internet access. One of the advantages would be the capability to search the ads for keywords, which the computer can do very efficiently. It would seem inevitable that sooner or later, your ads will be on the internet. I prefer sooner rather than later.

--Michael Arthur, Pearl River, LA

On the Baldwin Horn Speaker
Dear Editor:

Regarding Dave Crocker's April 1998 article on the Master-Baldwin Clarophone, I have a horn speaker unit with the patent date or dates on it. The patent is on the balanced armature type of driver unit. The later ones use an aluminum instead of mica disc. Some companies made semi-balanced units, but they were no match for the "full" type. I use only Baldwin headsets with my crystal sets. They have much more output than any other type.

It seems to me that Baldwin later manufactured speakers under the Utah name. Utah must still be in business, since I have a late permanent magnet speaker with the name "Utah" and labeled "Made in Utah."

--Herb Elltz, Juniata, NE

Internet -- Collecting is More
Dear Editor:

I am responding to a letter from Mr. Tom Neely in the July 1998 issue. Mr. Neely seems to have concluded that folks who do not use the internet are a bunch of humorous troglodytes [cave dwellers] stricken with class envy.

Collecting radio is about much more than owning objects. It's about fellowship, new friends, catching up with old friends, seeing new and different places, planning a vacation, getting your sale stuff together over winter nights with a soldering iron and a schematic, talking to friends across the country by phone or e-mail, learning the intricacies of forgotten technologies and more. It's about lemonade on hot summer afternoons, the chant of the auctioneer, and communication across the generational lines that have set up so many barriers between all of us. It's also about the many adventures and memories that each piece in a collection represents, and not just hardware. I may get to only one meet a year, but that doesn't matter.

--Robert Luedeman, Des Moines, IA

Internet -- Part of Evolution
Dear Editor:

I might as well join in the fun about classifieds on the internet. To me the internet is just a part of the evolution of the world. Just as the pump organ was replaced by the player piano, crank telephones by rotary dials, and now Touchtone. Wind-up phonographs went to electric phonographs and LPs to CDs. Checks and credit cards are replacing cash, and now we have debit cards.

I agree that the word "antique" sounds strange when used with the internet, but as much as I love my old radios, I do watch TV. When I was a kid in a small town in Illinois, my phonograph was a wind-up, and the telephone was a candlestick. I still have the telephone.

The internet is just a new way of getting the ads out to people who prefer to surf rather than read the publication. I do both and feel there is a place for both.

--Joel G. Anderson, San Diego, CA