VOLGA One old Brookings County Museum radio has its voice back.
Of course, the aging Philco 41-280Xf, encased in its impressive but age-marred walnut console, isnt actually broadcasting the news of long ago. But its operational again and still depends on the same obsolete vacuum-tubed technology that made radios popular 85 years ago, before the transistor came along in the mid-1950s.
While touring the museum last summer, Ed Weninger of Brookings became intrigued with the museum radio collection and volunteered to return one to working order. He restored the Philco that in 1941 retailed for $69.95, equivalent to about $1,500 today.
Although searching for and installing new but antique parts to the old radio was delicate and time-consuming, it became another welcome challenge for Weninger, whose 40-year career with Daktronics included electronic design and development. He retired in 2010 as manager of the worldwide firms customer service department
Weninger donated his time and the cost of over 30 original replacement parts to the museum. He also contributed an original copy of a Philco magazine Christmas advertisement that introduced the 1941 model to the soon-at-war American public, and he also found and donated a rare copy of the radios original instruction manual.
On its now-lighted control panel, the museums radio has programmed push-button station assignment, a fairly new feature in 1941 Buyers requested that the retailer install the seven push-buttons, which were embossed with the stations call letters.
On the museums radio, these favorites include WNAX, Yankton, established in 1922; WCCO, Minneapolis/St. Paul, established in 1924; KSOO, established in Sioux Falls in 1926 and currently operated by ESPN; and what was then station WOW of Omaha, established in 1923, now KWWP. The three other programmed stations no longer exist or lack the broadcast range into central South Dakota.
One of the most interesting of the original push-button stations is KFNF. It was started in 1924 in Shenandoah, Iowa, by seedsman Henry Field. It was one of just 300 radio stations in the nation. Fields assigned call letters, KFNF, were said to express his philosophy: Keep Friendly, Never Frown. KFNF changed ownership, most recently to Nebraskas McCook Radio Group. Its signal is insufficient to reach this area.
A search of the museums Philco dial also reaches many of todays area stations other than those old favorites with marked buttons. The radio also has dial indicators for what the company in 1941 referred to as American and overseas wave-bands and police, amateur and aircraft station reception, both still operable.
Brookings County Historical Society President Shirley Deethardt of Aurora said the now operable Philco and accompanying historic documentation are wonderful learning tools for museum visitors. Until now, none of the museums more than a dozen antique radios were operable, but the Philco brings a new dimension to the display, she said.
Deethardt noted that people touring the museum today, especially younger visitors, have little knowledge of commercial radios golden age in the 1930s and 1940s. They can now experience what it must have been like for families to gather around the radio for an evening of entertainment, musicals and news of the day, she said.
The refurbished Philco was part of a radio collection donated by former Sinai merchant, the late Marcus Eastby. Because its programmed buttons locate mostly Iowa stations, the radio buyer wasnt originally from the Sinai area but probably lived near Yankton, an area which had REA electricity starting in 1937.
In the 1920s as radio gained popularity, Brookings college radio KFDY aired its first broadcast on Christmas Eve 1922, featuring Handels Messiah. In 1923, a college Radio Listening League was organized, and in 1928, a short-lived commercial station, KGCR, began broadcasting from the Dudley Hotel at 3rd Avenue and 4th Street.
The most successful radio in Brookings is KBRK, which began broadcasting July 15, 1955.
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