With most of the world locked down due to the threat of COVID-19, places of worship have been scrambling to deliver the Word of God to the faithful at home. But long before Zoom and YouTube were a thing, churches have relied upon technology to connect with members, as shown by this illustration from a hundred years ago this month, in the May 1920 issue of Electrical Experimenter.

Zion English Baptist Church, Pen-y-cae, Wales, the likely origin of the 1920 transmissions.  Wikipedia photo.

Shown here is miner Sam Pritchard of Penycas, Ruabon, Wales. In 1919, he was injured by the fall of a rock. Undaunted, he was able to hear the service at the Baptist Church thanks to a telephone rigged by three of his friends.

A button microphone and batteries were strategically placed near the pulpit, with wires run to Mr. Pritchard’s bedside some distance away. A telephone receiver was strapped to his head, through which he was able to take part in the service. The magazine noted that the apparatus required was not expensive, and that such a setup could prove valuable in the northern or western United States where deep snows often cover the country.

Of course, over the years, churches have moved on to radio, then audio recordings, then television, and then the internet to deliver their message to those shut in at home. Incidentally, the OneTubeRadio Laboratories are currently hard at work preparing a 100 mW AM transmitter which will operate, with a 9 foot antenna, to broadcast church services within a parking lot. The internet works well for those who are at home, but everyone signal is slightly out of synch with everyone esle. At such time as it becomes possible to congregate a bit more closely, in parked cars, radio will allow everyone be able to listen simultaneously (or as simultaneously as the speed of light allows).  We have verified that the transmitter is up to the task, and today, we received the parts necessary to provide a high-fidelity audio feed.  We’ll post updates as the project is completed.

Sixty years ago, the occasional publication Radio-TV Experimenter carried this interesting project. As the enclosure, it used an already antique crank-type wall telephone as the housing for a radio receiver, but put the telephone back into service as a home intercom.

According to the magazine, the phone was rapidly vanishing from the American scene, and interior decorators had been busy snatching them up to convert into spice cabinets, pin-up lamps, and liqueur chests. Instead, the magazine showed how to preserve the original communication function by providing an intercom between floors of a house, between house and garage, etc.

The radio function was added by use of something found in almost every home, “a small table-model radio set of the ac-dc type that has been set aside because of a broken cabinet, missing knob, or a minor circuit defect.” Such a radio was squeezed in, with the controls mounted under the phone’s writing desk.

Obtaining the phone was a matter of ordering one from Telephone Repair & Supply Co. of 1760 W. Lunt Ave., Chicago, where it was available for $7 plus postage for the 20 pound instrument. Most such surplus phones came with the crank, but not the magneto, since apparently the phone companies still needed some of those for their rural customers.  The phone will have been in service for fifty years, so the article gave details on how to refinish the wood and metal components.

The article next explained how to wire the phone back up. Even without the magneto, the ringer could be made to work by including a button on the side of the phone (where the crank used to be), wired to the bell through an induction coil. Presumably, the phone would ding once when the button was depressed. A three wire circuit (or two wires plus ground) was used to hook the phones together, with one wire for the voice connection and one for the ringer. The wiring diagram is shown here: