Wireless Set No. 52 Canadian - Project

[David Dunlop]

A few things have puzzled me this morning about Radiotron, so I did a little digging. It became something of a 'Long Story Short…' sort of investigation.

Between the two World Wars last century, Radiotron was, indeed, a division of the Marconi Company in the United States. In the early 1920's, a massive merger of a number of electronics companies in the USA took place, key among them RCA, Westinghouse and Marconi. What came out the other side was a monster in the industry that thrived until anti-trust legislation in the 1930's forced it's breakup.

During this time, Radiotron became the prime producer of valves for RCA, Marconi and Westinghouse. Interestingly, if one finds vintage valves in original packaging made prior to the 1950's from these three companies, they will be in the same red/orange and black colours, with variations in logo for each company and all showing the same Patent time frames.

I dug out my spare valves for my 19-Sets and sure enough, a few RCA and Westinghouse valves showed up bearing the 'Radiotron' name.

Thought I would share.

David