Subject: [removed] Digest V2005 #368
From: [removed]@[removed]
Date: 11/29/2005 9:54 PM
To: [removed]@[removed]

------------------------------


                            The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                              Volume 2005 : Issue 368
                         A Part of the [removed]!
                             [removed]
                                 ISSN: 1533-9289


                                 Today's Topics:

  Do-it-yourself TV repairs             [ "A. Joseph Ross" <joe@attorneyross. ]
  Hollywood Canteen Remembered          [ Herb Harrison <herbop@[removed] ]
  11-29 births/deaths                   [ Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; ]
  Re: Radio and TV Repair               [ Christopher Werner <werner1@globalc ]
  Casey's venue                         [ "RadioAZ@[removed]" <radioAZ@bas ]
  Jack Benny Stamp Campaign             [ seandd@[removed] ]
  Radio programming about Dust Bowl of  [ "George Tirebiter" <tirebiter2@hotm ]
  Re: Radio and TV Repair               [ "MICHAEL BIEL" <mbiel@[removed]; ]
  East & West Coast Suspense            [ Rutledge Mann <cliff_marsland@yahoo ]

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 08:27:54 -0500
From: "A. Joseph Ross" <joe@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Do-it-yourself TV repairs

Date: Mon, 28 Nov 2005 09:57:37 -0500
From: Herb Harrison <herbop@[removed];

In the late1950s my "Uncle George" used to repair ours and neighbors'
television sets using some "do-it-yourself" manuals. They illustrated
common picture and/or sound problems, and had printed charts showing
what vacuum tubes or other parts needed to be replaced or repaired in
order to fix the TV's problem. 

That was probably "Telefixit."  There were a succession of editions as long as TV sets came 
with vacuum tubes.  They mainly told how to adjust all the adjustments that TV sets had in 
those days, including the various coils and yokes on the neck of the picture tube, and they 
told how to diagnose a tube problem.  There were tube testers in many drugstores in those 
days, where they also sold tubes.  These things gradually disappeared as solid state 
equipment supplanted vacuum tubes.  They lingered in Radio Shack for awhile longer.

I used to wonder why there wasn't a "radiofixit" book as well, but it wasn't really necessary.  
Radios generally had only five tubes, a couple more if the set had FM, and it wasn't really 
difficult to just take all of them to the tube tester.  

One summer evening when I was home from college, I was reading and listening to a 
phonograph record, when the sound suddenly cut out.  I looked and saw no tubes lit, though 
the motor was still going.  The phonograph only had three tubes, so I just took all three of 
them, got in the car, and went looking for a drugstore.  I found one just about to close up, 
where they let me test three tubes.  One was burned out, I bought a replacement, and went 
home.  When I put the replacement tube and the other good tubes back in the phonograph, it 
worked, and I was able to go back to my record and reading.  I didn't need a "Phonofixit."  
But TV sets were so much more complicated and had so many more tubes that people 
needed those books to be even willing to undertake job of repairing them.

-- A. Joseph Ross, [removed] [removed] 15 Court Square, Suite 210 Fax [removed] Boston, MA 02108-2503 [removed] ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 08:28:15 -0500 From: Herb Harrison <herbop@[removed]; To: [removed]@[removed] Subject: Hollywood Canteen Remembered Sean Dougherty <seandd@[removed]; refers to the LA Times article about the Brown Derby. The LA Times site also had a link to another site where a subscriber describes his visit as an airman to the Hollywood Canteen during World War II. Interestingly, the entertainers' careers he talks about seem to run the gamut from vaudeville to radio to films (and later to television). Memory of a Lifetime: the Hollywood Canteen during World War II: [removed];rs=2 ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 08:28:23 -0500 From: Ron Sayles <bogusotr@[removed]; To: Olde Tyme Radio List <[removed]@[removed]; Subject: 11-29 births/deaths November 29th births 11-29-1895 - Busby Berkeley - Los Angeles, CA - d. 3-14-1976 choreographer: "Gulf Screen Theatre"; "Whatever Became Of . . . ?" 11-29-1895 - Yakima Canutt - Colfax, WA - d. 5-24-1986 actor, stuntman: "Daredevils of Hollywood"; "Hollywood Rodea" 11-29-1900 - Mildred "Axis Sally" Gillars - Portland, ME - d. 6-25-1988 propagandist: Radio Berlin 11-29-1905 - Chester Erskine - Hudson, NY - d. 4-7-1986 film director: "Lux Radio Theatre" 11-29-1905 - Mario Braggiotti - Florence, Italy - d. 5-18-1996 pianist, composer: "Fray and Braggiotti" 11-29-1906 - Luis Van Rooten - Mexico City, Mexico - d. 6-17-1973 actor: George Priestly "County Seat"; John Perry "John's Other Wife"; Nero Wolfe "Nero Wolfe" 11-29-1910 - Al Schwartz - Passaic, NJ - d. 3-25-1988 writer: "Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show"; "Bob Hope Show" 11-29-1913 - Harry Bartell - New Orleans, LA - d. 2-26-2004 actor: Archie Goodwin "Advs. of Nero Wolfe"; "Adv of Sherlock Holmes"; "Gunsmoke" 11-29-1914 - Hal McIntyre - Cromwell, CT - d. 5-5-1959 bandleader: "Hal McIntyre and His Orchestra" 11-29-1917 - Merle Travis - Muhlenberg County, KY - d. 10-20-1983 singer, guitarist: "Hollywood Barn Dance" 11-29-1921 - Virginia Egnor "Dagmar" - Huntington, WV - d. 10-9-2001 dumb blonde: "Stars On Parade"; "Says Who?" 11-29-1926 - Naomi Stevens - Trenton, NJ actress: Irene Franklin "One Man's Family"; Daphne Royce "Brenthouse" 11-29-1927 - Vin Scully - New York, NY sportscaster (Baseball's Poet Laurate) Play-by Play announcer for the Dodgers 11-29-1932 - John Gary - Watertown, NY - d. 1-4-1998 singer: "Christmas Music - Spots for the National Guard" November 29th deaths 01-18-1904 - Cary Grant - Bristol, England - d. 11-29-1986 actor: Jim Blandings "Mr. and Mrs. Blandings" 02-26-1933 - Godfrey Cambridge - New York, NY - d. 11-29-1976 actor: "Voices of Vista" 04-28-1896 - Edith Evanson - Tacoma, WA - d. 11-29-1980 actress: Helmi "Myrt and Marge" 05-03-1898 - George H. Combs - Lee's Summit, MO - d. 11-29-1977 congressman, commentator: "Now You Decide"; "Spotlight, New York" 05-29-1897 - Erich Wolfgang Korngold - Brno, Czechoslovakia - d. 11-29-1957 "composer: "Contemporary Composers Concerts"; "Railroad Hour" 06-05-1910 - Herb Vigran - Fort Wayne, IN - d. 11-29-1986 actor: Sad Sack "Sad Sack"; Hector Smith "Father Knows Best" 06-17-1904 - Ralph Bellamy - Chicago, IL - d. 11-29-1991 actor: "These Are Our Men" 07-19-1912 - Frank Kane - d. 11-29-1968 writer: "The Shadow" 07-20-1938 - Natalie Wood - San Francisco, CA - d. 11-29-1981 actress: "Lux Radio Theatre" 07-27-1890 - Judith Lowry - Fort Sill, Oklahoma Territory - d. 11-29-1976 actress: Emma 'Stevie' Stevens "Valiant Lady"; Emmy Fergusson "Welcome Valley" 09-05-1916 - Frank Yerby - Augusta, GA - d. 11-29-1991 author: "Best Seller" 09-20-1869 - George Robey - London, England - d. 11-29-1954 music hall singer: "Music Hall" 10-04-1900 - Robert Shayne - Yonkers, NY - d. 11-29-1992 actor: Walter Manning "Portia Faces Life" 11-03-1909 - George Wells - New York, NY - d. 11-29-2000 screenwriter: "Lux Radio Theatre" 12-22-1917 - Gene Rayburn - Christopher, IL (Raised: Chicago, IL) - d. 11-29-1999 announcer, comedian: "Rayburn and Finch" 12-26-1902 - Irene Handl - London, England - d. 11-29-1987 actress: "Hello Playmates" -- Ron Sayles Milwaukee, Wisconsin ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 12:33:28 -0500 From: Christopher Werner <werner1@[removed]; To: [removed]@[removed] Subject: Re: Radio and TV Repair Although Mark Kinsler did a good job of responding to the [removed] I thought I'd add my $[removed] ... The lure of opportunity presented by the proliferation of radios in households and the numerous radio and TV repair business around the country also caught the attention of my father in the late 1950s. A tool and die engineer, he was always interested in the latest technology and subscribed to Radio Electronics and Popular Electronics along with many other Americans. He signed up for a correspondence course in radio repair offered by RCA. Month by month the course booklets came in. He turned to Heathkit to purchase Capacitance meters, a Vacuum-Tube volt meter, a power supply and together with a friend from work - their pride and joy - an oscilloscope. I don't know how many of the lessons he actually read and participated in because I was only a baby at the time. By the time I did get exposed to it, he had five large binders of lessons, about 30 SAMs radio repair manuals and a pile of 20 old radios that needed repair. Near where he worked was an Army surplus store. Here he would browse and purchase wondrous things for this 'lab'. As a 8-10 year old I spent many hours de-soldering old WWII 'computers' and electrical devices to rescue the resistors, capacitors and other components for 'spare parts' in repairing the radios. The de-soldering device was mounted to two asbestos boards so molten solder would not start a table on fire as it fell from the device. My father acquired some plastic tube containers from work and build a rack from samsonite with holes for each tube. Into each tube went the specific value of resistor with the leads straightened. Later as the collection grew, we started saving Alka-Seltzer bottles that fit the same size holes. I learned the resistor color code at an early age, and merrily sorted resistors and capacitors checking each one carefully. Along with this came many screws, bolts, nuts, brackets, and whatnot from the original chassis. We also began acquiring vacuum tubes not only to repair the old Sylvania TV, but also the many radios. We had a portable tube checker to verify the quality of the tubes (good or bad). In the end I had a double-door upright cabinet full of RCA tube boxes. When my father died in 1993 and we 'cleaned up' the basement, the pile of trash included most of the 20 broken radios - never repaired (I retained the few with nice wooden cases). The chassis went out, the old iron capacitors went out, the old iron transformers were lugged out (heavy!) and a chapter in family history came to a close. Even though it was the 1990s, I will say that back in 1977/8 during my college years, a fellow student who actually *did* repair radios had proposed opening our own radio/TV repair business in my parents basement and trying to earn some money doing so. We never did, and in hindsight I'm glad because we were at the end of the curve of the technology. But it did show that tube radio repair was still a viable business almost to the 80s (hey, we could have always repaired 8-Tracks!). In high school, a fresh-from-the-Air Force instructor taught us how to design tube amplifiers. Really useful in 1974 as debates over tube vs solid state audio amplifiers were common in the halls! Never used the knowledge once afterward. For better or worse, I'm happy to say that I still have the RCA course books, the SAMS manuals, the cabinet full of vacuum tubes and the tube checker. Most of the Heathkit equipment (I had added newer equipment during my high school and college years, including many of the fine electronics courses they offered), has been donated to a school for gifted children so they can use it as an electronics lab. I sure spent plenty of hours soldering components and making my own stereo and lab equipment (I can just smell the solder now). An era long past, when we spent our time making things from what was available. The color code, like morse code, may not be learned by students everywhere, but they have other things to think about now. 50 years from now someone will excavate an area an find some old equipment and wonder what all the little colored rings [removed] and the phone will ring. BTW, the old Popular Electronics mags were responsible for my father building an intercom system so he could hear if I was crying in my crib while he worked in the basement woodshop. A fancy pagoda case later had the intercom replaced with a nifty bird-song oscillator circuit. It hangs by the front door of my parents home now, push a button the little bird will fascinate any youngster that comes to visit. Pop Elect also provided a fine schematic for a digital motor controller I used for a college digital electronics course once as well. Very useful magazine in it's day. Back to the reality of the present, Chris. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 14:46:55 -0500 From: "RadioAZ@[removed]" <radioAZ@[removed]; To: "OTR Digest" <[removed]@[removed]; Subject: Casey's venue Casey, Crime Photographer must have been one of the few "dramas" on radio that had a live audience. Detective shows, in particular, were seldom heard with an audience in attendance. What strikes me about Crime Photographer is that it always sounds like the performers are in an echo chamber. Other shows with audiences never sounded like that. Does anyone know from where the show was broadcast? Why couldn't they do a better job of dampening the echo of the room? Ted ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 18:23:05 -0500 From: seandd@[removed] To: [removed]@[removed] Subject: Jack Benny Stamp Campaign The Jack Benny 39-cent stamp campaign rampages on with more media coverage in Georgia and California today. From approximately coast-to-coast, it's Laura Leff! Sean Dougherty SeanDD@[removed] [removed] [removed] ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 18:23:34 -0500 From: "George Tirebiter" <tirebiter2@[removed]; To: [removed]@[removed] Subject: Radio programming about Dust Bowl of 1930's I don't know about THE GRAPES OF WRATH, but in 1940 there was a CBS program called FORECAST which did what were essentially audition programs for potential series. One show done on FORECAST was BACK WHERE I COME FROM, a folk music program. This featured Woody Guthrie and there was a sort of semi-dramitized version of one of his songs dealing with the Dust Bowl. (It's been a while since I've listened to this, so sorry I can't be more specific.) BACK WHERE I COME FROM was, in fact, picked up a series, but there are no circulating shows from the regular run, only the FORECAST episode is available. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 23:50:50 -0500 From: "MICHAEL BIEL" <mbiel@[removed]; To: [removed]@[removed] Subject: Re: Radio and TV Repair I think that Mark Kinsler unfortunately has much of the story wrong in his explanation about radio repair because very few of the facts mesh. First of all, Howard Sams was the Johnny-Come-Lately in the field. His Photofact folders were a post-war development. His first publications came out in early 1946 covering some of the early post-war models, and he NEVER went back to cover any of the pre-war sets that were still being used and were ever the more needing repair. While it is true that Sams did do things differently from the other publishers by buying and actually dissecting sets, creating his own electrical schematics and mechanical disassembly photographs without relying on the manufacturers' publications, just about everything else discussed in relation to Sams is not true. There were no "secret codes" on electrical parts by the post-war years. And if there had been, it would have been back twenty years earlier, in the earliest years of radio receiver manufacturing before standards were set by the RMA, Radio Manufacturers Assoc. Mark mentions the Rider manuals, dismissing them as merely competition to Sams, but John F. Rider's Perpetual Troubleshooters Manuals were already being published for fifteen years before Sams even entered the field. Rider did tend to depend on the schematics published by the manufacturers, but each HUGE annual edition included a thousand or more different sets, and often cut-and-pasted information and diagrams from the manufacturers repair manuals. (Yes, most manufacturers DID supply repair manuals--RCA started their hardbound Red Books around 1928, and I have examples from almost all the major companies, including the ones that Mark accuses of having "secret codes." ) Rider began publishing around 1930, with these huge hardbound annual volumes and an abridged catch-up manual for sets from the 1920s. A set of unabridged manuals for those years did appear shortly thereafter. A full set of Rider manuals is now available on CD-Rom! Also around 1930 another publisher, Morris N. Beitman's Supreme Publications started publishing the annual Most Often Needed Radio Diagrams Manuals, which were much less expensive. However, they only included the electronic schematic chart. But they did remain in print -- and in fact, might still be in print. I know that Beitman's daughter continued to supply copies in the 1990s from her warehouse stock, years after her father's death. My copy of the 1920s volume is a reprint from the 1960s. In addition to these manuals and those published by the set manufacturers, there were a number of magazines for the radio repair trade, such as Radio News and Radio Retailing, which included hints for repairing specific models based on experiences sent in by repairmen. These were later compiled into a large book which is still very useful when troubleshooting old sets from the 20s and 30s. Perhaps Mark's story about "secret codes" comes from a misunderstanding of stories told about Atwater Kent radios. They made most of their own parts and used markings that where all their own, not related to the RMA color stripe codes (which Mark puts down but just about everybody else thinks is a fine idea.) The Atwater Kent system was complicated and needed a manual all its own to decode -- and Atwater Kent DID publish these manuals. I have facsimile reprints of two of them right here. One is a mechanical parts list dated Oct 1927, and the other is "Electrical Values of Resistors and Condensers in All Receivers, 1924 - 1932 Inclusive" published December 1932. I remember reading stories about the mysteries of the Power Supplies in the first Atwater Kent electrical socket plug-in sets from 1927 and on because these power supplies were in tin canisters that were filled with tar that would supposedly prevent disassembly and repair. But here in that 1932 manual are the lists of all of the parts that were contained in those tar-filled power supplies, so they were NOT secret after all! I don't know why Mark does not like the colored stripe markings. They are easy to decode and are MUCH easier to see than printed numbers and letters. The stripes go all around the part so you do not have to twist it around to read like you would if there were numbers. If you can memorize the colors and their values, they used to sell little cardboard color-wheel decoders very similar to what Little Orphan Annie used. As for the demise of the manual system in the 1970s that he describes, it really became partially a function of our throw-away society. It was becoming to expensive to repair things, and once integrated circuits started to take over from the use of discrete parts like resisters and capacitors, the manuals published by the manufacturers became much more useful. An owner or repair shop could order the manuals from the manufacturer for only the models he needed, rather than buying a Sams folder or book of twenty to fifty sets when only one of them would be needed. I should add that most people had their radios repaired by servicemen and dealers. It only cost between 50 cents and maybe $[removed] for an estimate, and the repairs were usually under $10. Some of the radio repair trade press had a series of repair shop "adventure" stories that would relate funny or interesting tales of dealing with customers. On the other side of the coin were a series of articles done by Readers Digest similar to what some TV news departments do. They would do a simple disabling of a radio and take it around to ten repair shops and see which ones were honest enough to just reattach the loose wire for a quarter, and which shops would change three tubes, two resisters, and a capacitor for ten bucks. I've come across a series of interesting articles and letters to the editor in the radio repair trade press in answer to those Readers Digest articles. And those tube testers that were asked about to start this thread? Yes, they did start appearing in drug stores in the pre-TV days, but until labor costs started climbing, most people still brought their radio to the repair shop. Michael Biel ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 23:50:56 -0500 From: Rutledge Mann <cliff_marsland@[removed]; To: [removed]@[removed] Subject: East & West Coast Suspense HOw come East & West coast versions aren't in circulation on Suspense? Every Suspense 1940s era Radio Recorders transcription I've seen has an east and West coast recording. I've only seen one version of each show in general circulation. -------------------------------- End of [removed] Digest V2005 Issue #368 ********************************************* Copyright [removed] Communications, York, PA; All Rights Reserved, including republication in any form. 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