Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics.
See articles from Radio-Electronics,
published 1930-1988. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
Being a great appreciator of good humor, and
especially technology-related humor, I made sure to scan these electronics-related
comics from the pages of vintage Radio-Electronics magazines. You might
have to have lived through the era of televisions with cathode ray tubes (CRTs)
to fully appreciate the frustration of trying to acceptably grab, align, define,
sharpen, tone, and lock an over-the-air broadcast signal on track*. Stories of people
putting feet or baseball bats through the sets were a big source of situational
humor.
* RCA's "ColorTrak" system advertising pitch.
Electronics-Themed Comics
July 1958, Page 42
July 1958, Page 46
"We've had so much trouble with this set
that my husband installed that permanent mirror!"
"Does that answer your question regarding the high-voltage
section?"
July 1958, Page 48
"That reminds me, I've got an FM alignment on the bench.
August 1958, Page 45
"How do you like my pillow-speaker?"
March 1958, Page 122
"Looks to me like either a bad short or a capacitor on the
blink!"
April 1958, Page 105
"Gassy."
April 1958, Page 133
"Let's see - didn't you put three picture tubes in my set last
year?"
April 1958, Page 136
Posted July 20, 2021 (updated from original post on 5/26/2014)
These Technically-Themed Comics Appeared in Vintage Electronics Magazines. I
personally scanned and posted every one from copies I own (and even colorized some).
247 pages as of 12/3/2024
RF Cafe began life in 1996 as "RF Tools" in an AOL screen name web space totaling
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design engineer. The World Wide Web (Internet) was largely an unknown entity at
the time and bandwidth was a scarce commodity. Dial-up modems blazed along at 14.4 kbps
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