This photo, from the September 1939 issue of Radio Today, shows Helen Keller at her GE radio. Even though she was both blind and deaf, she was a zealous advocate for radios for the blind. The magazine suggested that many blind and invalid persons had the financial means to buy a radio.

But it also reminded dealers that they should “see that every blind person has a radio,” and made the following suggestion:

Junior League and other workers are, therefore, approaching their well-to-do friends with this proposition:

“That old radio of yours is out-of-date and should be replaced with a modern set. The radio man who sells you the new set has agreed with us that he will overhaul the old radio and put it in the best possible condition. Then we will send it to poor, old blind Mrs. Jones–as a gift from you! In this way you will have the double satisfaction of having a fine new 1940 radio for yourself, and giving a helpless blind person uncounted hours of pleasure.” The offer usually works, and a fine new radio is sold.

According to this 1929 article, Helen Keller “listened” to music on the radio by placing her fingers on the speaker.

This ham 60 years ago is putting some CW contacts in the log thanks to the transmitter described in the September 1964 issue of Electronics Illustrated. The article promises that the ham with a well stocked junkbox of parts from old radios and TVs can put it together for $5. Even if all parts are bought new, the cost would be about $25, including the cake pan. It uses a 6V6, although a 6F6 or 6K6 could be substituted. It also calls for a 5U4 rectifier. The coil is wound on a toilet paper tube, using normal bell wire. An 80 meter crystal can be used on either 40 or 80 meters.

The small box next to the transmitter is a transistorized keying monitor. It seems to use a diode to rectify the RF to key a code oscillator.

Seventy years ago, the cover of the September 1954 issue of Radio Constructor carried the plans for this two-tube receiver, dubbed the Easi-Build. It was so named because, well, it was easy to build. The magazine noted that it often carried articles on how to build sophisticated test equipment and even televisions, but they received many letters letting them know there was a strong demand for a “simple receiver which may be constructed by the tyro who has little experience and few facilities.”

This set used a regenerative detector. It noted that was not really necessary for the local stations for which the set was designed, but might be helpful in some cases. It was strictly a local set. It was sensitive, and could be expected to pull in some continental stations. But the simple tuning arrangement meant that it might be hard to separate the weak stations. A four-foot antenna was said to be adequate for both the medium and the long waves, both of which were tuned on the same tuning range.

Seventy years ago, this mariner was placing a radio call from this well-equipped shipboard station. The transmitter is below deck, and shown on deck is the receiver and direction finder. The illustration appeared on the cover of the September 1954 issue of Radio-Electronics, which carried an article explaining how servicemen could take advantage of some recent FCC rulings to drive some business during the off season.

According to the magazine, the model in the photo is one Mary Gardner. She is apparently calling on the intership frequency of 2738 kHz, rather than the more congested 2638 kHz channel. The FCC had recently ruled that to use the 2738 frequency, the second harmonic (5476 kHz) radiation of the transmitter must be down 40 dB, whereas the requirements for other channels was somewhat more lax. This presented an opportunity for the radio man to add the additional channel, and the article showed some pointers on how to make sure the second harmonic was sufficiently suppressed, and how to measure it.

This quiz appeared a hundred years ago this month in the September, 1924, issue of Science and Invention magazine. Can you figure it out? The answer will be posted tomorrow.