You have an hour to kill, and you like old communication technology. If you happen to be in Windsor, Connecticut, you could nip over to the Vintage Radio and Communication Museum. If you aren’t in Windsor, you could watch [WG7D’s] video tour, which you can see below.
The museum is a volunteer organization and is mostly about radio, although we did spy some old cameras if you like that sort of thing. There was also a beautiful player piano that — no kidding — now runs from a vacuum cleaner.
One notable piece of gear was an old tube tester of the sort you used to see in pharmacies, and the guide mentioned that they have 100,000 tubes in storage! If you are a ham radio operator, you’ll appreciate the vintage code gear and teletypes. The amount of old gear here is impressive, including unusual record players, movie theater projectors, and lots more.
The guides are clearly not used to having someone like [WG7D] in the museum as they explained things like Morse code and magic eye tubes. If you happen to be in the area, we are sure a real tour would be better than a video, but we did enjoy the virtual visit, too.
If you are planning a museum trip, don’t miss the Obsolete Technology Museum or the Large Scale Systems Museum.
It’s interesting how much it looks like the Pavek radio museum in Minneapolis. There must be something about the use case.
During 1990s we used to break tubes from old TVs made in CCCP that people dumped outside when cheap japanese TV became available in stores. I remember there was a story that some of tubes are radioactive and we shouldn’t smell them. However 30 years later and I didn’t get cancer so they were probably empty anyway.
Considering what tubes cost today I bet you wish you’d saved some.
Interesting to see a radio/phono/piano prewar! Sad to hear the vacuum cleaner roaring as loud as the player itself, needs work. Pedaling it is fun and good for you.
Nice museum! Great artifacts!
Here is another in Guelph, Ontario: https://hammondmuseumofradio.org/