RadioBanter - View Single Post - Did Radio Shack start out selling ham stuff?

February 2nd 05, 11:28 AM

On Wed, 02 Feb 2005 03:18:41 -0600,
wrote:

Did Radio Shack (the store) start out selling Ham Equipment and stuff?
Based on their name I sort of suspect that.

I know they used to carry a decent stock of parts, but now they just
sell lots of toys and a few overpriced useful home electronic items.

From their web page at
http://www.radioshackcorporation.com/about/history.html

The First RadioShack Store
Two years later and half a continent away, two brothers, Theodore and
Milton Deutschmann, opened a one-store retail and mail-order operation
in the heart of downtown Boston. They chose the name, "RadioShack,"
which was a term for the small, wooden structure that housed a ship's
radio equipment. The Deutschmanns thought the name was appropriate for
a store that would supply the needs of radio officers aboard ships, as
well as "ham" radio operators.

Beginning in 1921, RadioShack would grow to a handful of stores
clustered in the Northeast, and become a leading electronics
mail-order distributor to hobbyists. This is how it would remain until
the company and a young Texan named Charles Tandy crossed paths four
decades later.
***

It would seem that the focus was on radio operators from the very
start, professional as well as amateurs, as you suspected from the
name.

It has changed somewhat since then.

Happy trails,
Gary (net.yogi.bear)
------------------------------------------------
at the 51st percentile of ursine intelligence

Gary D. Schwartz, Needham, MA, USA
Please reply to: garyDOTschwartzATpoboxDOTcom