National Radio Company
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The National Radio Company, headquartered in Malden, Massachusetts, was an American manufacturer of radio equipment from 1914 to 1991.
[edit] History
The company was incorporated, in 1914, as the "National Toy Company", but by 1916 had included household appliances in their product range. This expansion led to the name change to the "National Company, Inc.". By 1923 the product line included toys, food mixers, and radio components.
Radio components were to play an important part in the company's growth in the mid 1920s as they moved in to the large scale manufacture of capacitors. It was at this time that two engineers from Harvard University, Fred H. Drake and Glen Browning, approached National to manufacture components to their specifications for a radio receiver of their own design.
This relationship led to the production and sale of the "National Regenaformer" kit for home construction of the Browning-Drake design. The set was capable of tuning the standard AM broadcast band only and could not achieve shortwave reception.
Based on this introduction to radio, National made the design, manufacture and sales of radio equipment their principle line of business. By the early 1930s they had established a reputation with the amateur radio community based upon their line of regenerative receivers, including the SW-3 and SW-5.
In 1935 National introduced their top-of-the-line HRO receiver. This radio included two RF stages and a crystal filter. The distinctive dial allowed KC (KHz) resetability and was a National trademark into the 1960s. With few changes other than to keep up with changing tube technology, this same basic design survived for over 20 years.
Because of their many "state of the art" products at that time, radio amateurs began to regard this company as a premier supplier of "ham" equipment. This reputation caused National to become a key supllier to the US government.
During the period in the 50's and 60's primarily, the National Company advertised extensively in the Amateur Radio ARRL publication "QST" in order to promulgate their products. Usually new equipment was first shown in this publication in order to initiate marketing of a new item. The company would mainly opt for the inside back cover which they believed would gain prominence for their new wares. A typical example appears in the June 1966 edition of QST, wherein a full page display of much of their then current equipent installed on the vessel "the Compromise" owned by W2MDQ was displayed. They talked about their NCL-2000 2 KW linear amplifier @ $685, their NCX-5 SSB transceiver @ $685 among others. In addition, around Xmas time each year National would produce even more tempting advertisements festooned with holly leaves and the like. For many years thereafter, the equipment built by this company was much desired. Today, these "antiques" are much sought after by the "boat anchor" community and many of their products can be seen on eBay and elsewhere.
In 1965, National introduced the solid state HRO 500 - which did not incorporate the famed dial system but relied on a direct readout. No longer was a conversion scale or chart required. Upon it's introduction, Popular Electronics magazine reviewed it as 'possibly the best amateur receiver ever'.
Through the 1970s and 1980s, National survived as a government contractor and ceased development and production of civilian equipment. However, by 1991, after continuing difficulties, the company ceased trading.
