As a public service, we present the image above. You can print it, and when your car is parked, you can display it, facing out, on the passenger side of your car. The idea is not ours. In fact, it originally appeared 80 years ago this month in the May 1942 issue of Radio Retailing.

Many radio men had written to the magazine lamenting the fact that even though theirs was a vital profession, they didn’t have any special priorities when it came to tires or gasoline. So when they went on a service call, their car parked out on the street was a sitting duck for thieves who could steal the spare tire. In some cases, the thieves were brazen enough as to jack up the car and steal the tires, wheels and all.

Several Western salesmen had come up with the idea of the sign shown here. It would alert passers by that the owner was absent, and anyone tampering with it was unauthorized. According to the magazine, the mere presence of such a sign would in many cases scare off the thieves from making an attempt. The magazine didn’t say so, but, of course, we doubt that any thief would dare target a car after learning that the owner was a radio man. We have no doubt that it would have the same effect today.

There was a time when cops knew Morse Code, and one of those times was 1942, as described in the May 1942 issue of Radio News.

Shown above is the operator of the Indiana State Police radio station, which included three National HRO receivers and separate speakers.

Spanning 40 states, a network of about 100 such stations allowed rapid dissemination of police data from one part of the country to the other. Stations were classified as either zone or interzone. Zone stations generally operated within the same state, with interzone stations communicating nationally. Nine frequencies were available in the 7000, 5100, and 2800 kHz bands. Operating procedures followed those of the Navy, with Z signals used.

Coast-to-coast messages might be relayed up to six times. For example, the article cited a case in which a suspect was wanted for forgery in Tacoma, Washington, and believed to be en route to his home in Niles, Michigan. In that case, the Tacoma department used its interzone station to send the message to Denver, where it was relayed to Kansas City, and then to Springfield, Illinois, and then to Lansing, Michigan. The message was then sent by radiotelephone to Niles. Out-of-state vehicle registrations could be checked, as could emergency notifications.

With the country at war, the police network was also pressed into use for national defense. the Army Quartermaster Corps, fo example, had the duty of providing meals for troops being transported, and arrangements could be made thanks to the police network.

In case of enemy attack with communications disrupted, the police network with its experienced operators could handle communications to practically any place in the United States.

Eighty years ago, the May 1942 issue of Popular Science offered this solution for those who wanted to make sure they heard the latest war bulletins, but didn’t want the radio on at other times. With this system, the radio would turn itself on hourly, at the top of the hour, to play the latest news report. Then, it would shut itself off automatically until the next one.

This was accomplished with a clock (preferably an electric one, for better accuracy) modified as shown here. The glass was removed, and the switching unit here was installed. It consisted of two pieces of springy brass. When the minute hand came around, it would close the contacts and turn on the radio. For larger sets with more current draw, it was recommended to use auto breaker points. A switch in parallel would allow you to turn the radio off and on manually.

The recommendation was to set it to come on about 30 seconds before the hour, and shut off six minutes later, which would ensure being able to hear all hourly news broadcasts, with time for the set to warm up.

Today marks the 80th anniversary of the end of civilian radio production in the U.S. for the duration of World War II, and shown here is the last radio to roll off the RCA assembly line before the company switched over exclusively to defense production.

RCA was actually ahead of schedule, and this radio-phono was manufactured in Camden, N.J., on April 7, 1942. The chassis had been completed on March 5.

This last set was donated to the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation, where it would uplift the spirits and morale of the young patients there.

The picture appeared in the May 1942 issue of Radio Retailing.

As we’ve previously reported, civilian radio production in the United States ended for the duration of the war on April 22, 1942.  The graph above, which appeared on the cover of the April 1942 issue of Radio Retailing, showed how critical the radio repairman would be to keep the nation informed.  As of that date, there were 57 million radios in American homes.  In the years prior to the war, about 10 million new sets were made each year, but about 5 million old sets were scrapped by their owners each year, for a net increase of about 5 million.

With the end of production, the supply would remain at 57 million for the duration–but only if every radio was kept in service.  If the prewar trend of 5 million radios per year being scrapped continued, then the number would be as shown in the graph at the right.  And if repair parts became unavailable, then the situation would be even worse.  The supply of radios would plummet, as shown by the steeply declining graph.

The message was clear:  To keep the American public informed, dealers would need to concentrate their efforts on repairs, and manufacturers and the government would need to make sure that repair parts remained available.

Eighty years ago, the radio servicemen of America were rolling up their sleeves, because as of April 22, 1942, as we’ve previously reported, they would carry the whole load of making sure Americans had access to the vital information and entertainment provided by their radios. Just as before, they would have to keep doing minor repairs. But in the past, there had been some sets that were so far gone that they would just be thrown away and replaced.

But the last new radio would roll off the assembly lines on April 22, so throwing away an old set was no longer an option. Many of the sets needing repairs would be older, so this ad encouraged dealers to order a full set of Rider manuals, which consisted of schematics and service data for virtually every radio built in the USA.

The ad appeared in the March 1942 issue of Service magazine.