In honor of National Radio Day, celebrated annually on Aug. 20 in the U.S., Radio World’s editorial team and longtime contributors are sharing a behind-the-scenes look at how they tune in at home.
From family heirlooms to emergency radios to trendy Target finds, we have it all.
You’ll find that the RW team is also a big subscriber to the motto “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” so please enjoy the quick trip down memory lane.
Here at Radio World, we know there’s no right or wrong way to listen in the comfort of your own home — as long as you do! Happy National Radio Day.
From James Careless, RW contributor: “This is my second floor radio room, with access to a 100′ longwire antenna in the attic above, and a Magnetic Loop antenna on the right side of the table.
“My much-loved but now dead Panasonic RF-2200 AM/FM/SW radio sits on the top shelf to the left. Also in view (from left to right) is a Grundig Mini PE 100 AM/FM/SW radio, a Baofeng BTECH UV-25X4 Mini Mobile 25 Watt Tri Band Mobile Radio, a Grundig replica AM/FM/SW radio, a Sangean ATS-909X2 AM/FM/SW radio, a CCrane CCRadio 3 AM/FM/HAM/Weather radio, a windup spring-driven Freeplay Plus AM/FM/SW radio (up top, a classic) and my laptop connected to an SDRplay RSP-1B software-defined radio unit.
“The World map shows the locations of SW stations I have received. The North American map shows AM stations I have received. One can never have too many radios!”
From Carter Ross, RW contributor: “On the bookshelf in my basement office is my old Fisher MC-715 audio component system. I’ve had it since high school and it’s traveled with me from Louisiana to Maryland to Massachusetts and back to Maryland. It’s dusty and scratched up, but still provides a steady background of NPR or college radio for my workday. I don’t remember how much it cost me back in the 1980s, though I’m sure it wasn’t cheap to me, but it’s been worth every penny.”
From Paul McLane, RW editor in chief: “I listen via various radios at home and in the car, but my old living room standby is this GE tabletop model. It predates HD Radio, Bluetooth and pretty much everything else not labeled FM or AM. We also have a Midland SAME Digital Weather/All Hazards Alert radio, for those summer thunderstorms common here in northern Virginia. And it gets a lot of use.”
From James O’Neal, RW contributor: “This rather special radio lives out at my country home, and is stored in a not-very-accessible part of the house. It’s a Philco model 4-1256, and was manufactured in 1948 (beginning in the late 1930s, Philco used a model numbering system, with the first two digits indicating the year of manufacture). The radio’s tubes are all ‘loctals,’ short for ‘lock-ins,’ a vacuum tube developed by Sylvania in the late 1930s and used more for commercial (mobile radio) applications than in consumer devices. Philco was one of the few set producers to adopt loctals.
“This receiver is special to me, as it’s the radio I grew up with in the 1950s and 60s. I was born in 1947 and we were in a part of the country that did not get its first television station until I was six years old. However, that station operated only a few hours a day, as AT&T Long Lines was busy connecting major population centers for network video; smaller markets had to wait their turn. As a result, network radio remained a large part of our family’s at-home entertainment well into the decade of the 1950s. I recall the many hours spent in front of the Phico, listening to the Lone Ranger and other after-school children’s fare.
“The Philco is special in another way, too, as it likely represents my parent’s first major post-WWII purchase. Consumer items were in short supply in the years immediately after the fighting ended in 1945, as most U.S. production had been centered on supplying the military’s needs for nearly four years. Consumers were eager to replace worn out appliances with new models which had been unavailable for the ‘duration.’ A slow return by industries to peacetime production and the multitudes of GIs returning home with money to spend didn’t help the supply chain either.
“My parents commented more than once as to how lucky they had been to find this Philco for sale in a general store in Fulton, Ark., a very small town on the Red River, about 14 miles from our home in Hope, Arkansas. (I have no idea what the set sold for.)
“In addition to providing radio entertainment, the Philco also doubled as a record player, with a changer that accommodated the then-standard 78-rpm records. My father was a music lover (he’d been a professional musician before the war) and also did woodworking. Using his woodworking skills, he concocted a stand or base for the Philco from the top portion of a late 1920s or early 30s console radio, adding dividers for storing his collection of 78s.”
From Dan Slentz, RW contributor: “You may or may not like this one … but because I monitor a 100-watt station from 90 miles away, I do so with their (awesome) Inovonics 541 FM Modulation Monitor, which is capable of 10 private streams. Yes, it’s ‘not radio,’ but it IS an off-air receiver (tuner), and the quality is truly FM quality and nearly the same as what the listeners hear.
“So this screen shot is my Galaxy smart phone streaming the station, and Bluetooth-tied to the car radio in my Mazda RX5 SUV (with excellent sound system). It sound great enough that my wife reminds me ‘we DO have neighbors!’ when I get home. One note on this image. Where the web address would be located at the top, I replaced it with the Inovonics Model 541 stamp (because I didn’t want to publicize that private IP address out of an abundance of web security).”
From David Bialik, RW contributor: “I got this 1934 Philco [below] in 1985 for $5. [Underneath the Philco photo], this 1962 Fisher 500-C still sounds great! This was my dad’s. It has the optional Walnut case. I wish I could get the replacement tuning knob or knob cap for the loudness contour.”
From Nick Langan, RW contributor: “I’ve carried around FM radio portables since I was in kindergarten, and by far the most amazing to come around is the TEF6686, which I purchased in 2023. There’s a whole online community dedicated to supporting it, including where you can buy it and maintain firmware updates for it. They go for $129 on Amazon. The RDS display, in particular, is remarkable. I now have two of them. You can control one of mine online that I have hooked up to my rooftop APS-13 antenna. The other you see pictured gets fine reception of Philadelphia FMs with a whip antenna about 30 miles away.
“As an FM DX’er, I am also heavily into SDRs. Off a variety of antennas, I’m running four different ones right now, including two Airspy R2s and two SDRPlay RSPDuos. With the SDRUno software, I used an RSPDuo to receive 97.5 WIOB(FM) Mayaguez, P.R., via E-Skip propagation, through local 97.5 WPEN(FM), pictured from July 30.”
From Elle Kehres, RW assistant editor: “Adding to my collection, for my birthday this month my fiancé gifted me with this retro-styled portable radio from the Hearth & Hand collection at Target. I’ve loved seeing radios make their way back into popular chains. This lil’ guy runs for about $40 and comes with Bluetooth. Said Bluetooth is not the greatest, but the AM/FM signal sound is surprisingly good! Nice and clear. I tend to take it out for a good picnic whenever the weather is nice here in Atlanta, Ga. While I do most of my listening via online streams, who doesn’t love a good tabletop radio? ”
From Paul Kaminski, RW contributor: “I listen via my Eton AM/FM/NOAA weather radio, which I picked up on sale quite a few years ago. As you would expect during hurricane season, it’s tuned to the NWS station in Ruskin, Fla., to alert when a warning is posted. This has simple controls, unlike some of the radios I find in newer vehicles.”
We want to hear from you! How are you tuning in to the radio at home? Email radioworld@futurenet.com with fun pictures and stories.
[Related: “What to Do With That Old Antique Radio“]
