Shown here a hundred years ago today, in the August 9, 1925, issue of the San Antonio (TX) Light is Miss Annie Bommer of 312 Frasch Street, San Antonio.

Even though she was still in her teens, she thought nothing of building this five-tube TRF receiver with a regenerative detector.

She had three years experience in radio, starting with a crystal set, and had worked her way up to more complex sets. She was also skilled at automobile mechanics, the result of chumming around with her brothers. She had been put in charge of the radio department at Grant’s Department Store and the size of the department had greatly increased under her management.

Sixty years ago this month, the August 1965 issue of Radio-TV Experimenter carried the plans for this three-transistor shortwave regenerative receiver. The parts would set you back only $14, and the completed set was said to be the size of a QSL card.  As shown here, it covered 4-15 MHz, although it could be modified to cover any range between 500 kHz and 30 MHz.  Even a beginner could have it together in about 8 hours.

The set called for a 50 foot antenna and high impedance headphones, although on strong signals, a speaker could be used, in conjunction with a matching transformer.

If you were looking for a portable radio 85 years ago, you could get this one for $9.95, as seen in this ad in the August 3, 1940, issue of the Tacoma (Washington) Times. The set was billed simply at the “Tom Thumb,” and I haven’t been able to track down the manufacturer.

But the main selling point was that the “A” battery was a normal flashlight battery, which could be replaced for a dime. Of course, there was also the B battery (of perhaps 45 or 90 volts) which would have been more expensive. But in fairness, the A battery would run down faster, and when it did, you could get one at any gas station or drug store.

You could get the radio at the Weisfield & Goldberg jewelry store, and if you credit was goo, it was only 85 cents a month.

If you were a radio dealer 85 years ago, you wanted to be the one on the left, and not the one on the right. But it wasn’t quite that simple, as discussed in the August 1940 issue of Service magazine.

There was a wide variety of non-standard batteries for radios, and if a dealer stocked them all, there would be the problem of selling stale ones when the customer for one of the rare ones came in. So first of all, when selling new portables, you would keep your customers satisfied in the long run by selling only sets using standard batteries. In some cases, it was an underhanded trick by the manufacturer–they would design the set so that only their proprietary batteries would fit (not unlike printer manufacturers today, who make their profits from selling ink cartridges, a practice which can be beat by taking the advice on our website).

Customers were often reluctant to have you permanently change the wiring of their set to add a plug that would fit standard batteries. A good solution was often to sell them an adapter. Some were available off the shelf. In other cases, you could make an adapter by removing the socket from the old battery and connecting it to a standard plug.

Seventy-five years ago, many would-be hams were applying themselves to learning the code, and the July 1950 issue of Radio-Electronics obliged them by providing the plans for this simple code practice oscillator. The circuit is simplicity itself, and is built in to a jam tin, complete with speaker. The 6-volt tube ran fine on 4.5 volts from three flashlight cells, and the circuit required no additional B+ voltage.

It featured adjustable pitch, and put out a clear tone through either loudspeaker or headphones.

One hundred years ago, it was the rare breed who did not have a radio set. And that was true on both sides of the Atlantic, as demonstrated by this cartoon in the July 1925 issue of Wireless Constructor.

Under pressure, this man had to admit that he didn’t own a wireless set. As the caption notes, we also wonder what he lived for.