Scanner Tales: The Other Radio Stores

Radio Shack wasn’t the only place to get scanners, accessories and books. Well, for some it was but there were others here and there and some specialized in scanners or had a particularly good selection of scanners, crystals or other accessories. Here are a few that I frequented over the decades. Some I have mentioned before but they deserve to be included anyway. In no particular order:

Mykroy/645 Electronics (Wheeling, IL)

Mykroy was an all-encompassing electronics dealer catering to the TV and radio repairman. My dad had had a TV shop when I was a kid, so we ended up there often. They had a huge wall of vacuum tubes which accounted for a majority of the repairs back in the day. They also had a “Frequency Wall” basically a corkboard with handwritten frequency lists for the area, you told Fred what crystals you wanted, and he pulled them from a file cabinet someplace in a secret location for you. They also had a “Scanner Room” with all kinds of Bearcat, Regency and other makes of scanners. It was my first experience with programmable scanners, the infamous Tennelec.

This was a very esoteric place; every nook and cranny was full of electronics gear along with the occasional table lamp or car jack from Mr. Simpson’s garage. He owned the place; Fred was his manager and if Fred knew you he would always discount the tagged price by some random amount depending on his mood. They changed the name at some point to refer to the street address and finally closed down in the early 80’s after Mr. Simpson died.

Lakeshore Electronics (Burlington ON)

Lakeshore was pretty much a scanner store, but they also dabbled in CB’s and car stereos. They had one of the world’s largest selections of scanner crystals. I first started going there in the early 1980’s as I railfanned that part of the GTA/Hamilton area often. I was an honorary member of “BARF”, the Burlington Area Railfan’s, a group of folks that would hang out at the old Burlington depot in the evenings to watch trains and socialize. I weas looking for crystals for the local railroad channels and was referred to this place. I went and was absolutely floored by it. I ended up getting not only the crystals I needed but also a BC220 scanner. It had a filter on it that would filter out the pilot tones used by the old OPP pseudo trunking system on 140 MHz. at the time. What I didn’t know until I got home to Illinois was that that filter also worked on the old IMTS VHF mobile phone system pilot tones.

LSE also had a huge wall of crystals but with little drawers like one would use in their workshop for hardware. They also had all kinds of antennas and accessories. They closed up sometime in the 1990’s I think but I would stop in every time I was in the area, a couple times a year then.

Scanner Store in Anaheim, CA

I don’t remember the name of the place but there was a well-known scanner store in Anaheim CA outside Los Angeles back in the 1990’s. When my wife and I got married in Las Vegas in 1995 we honeymooned at Disneyland (her choice, not mine, I wanted to go to Hawaii…) We stopped by this place, and I was amazed by it. From what I heard this was where Gene Costin hung out at times. Of course, we all knew him as Gene Hughes, the creator of Police Call. I picked up the CA edition of Police Call as well as the SoCal Detail Edition (of which I still have). Later I became a “Major Contributor” and got a complete set of Police Call free every year. They too had a wall of crystals (somewhat of a recurring theme here) and the complete line of all the current scanner makes.

My wife bought me a new scanner there as a wedding gift, I don’t remember which one, however. I did visit there once more a couple years later when we visited my sister in Torrance, but I heard they closed not too long after that (another recurring theme). There were several scanner stores in the L.A. area, I remember another up near LAX someplace and I am sure there were others.

EEB (Vienna, VA)

The Electronic Equipment Bank, better known as EEB, was a well-known radio store in suburban Washington DC. They had all the high-end stuff from Icom, AOR, Yaesu and others. The wife and I stopped there a couple times when we were in the area, and I went there when I was in Quantico and had a day off from class. I bought an AR900 there the first time and an AR8000 the next. I also had sent 2 of my Icom R7000’s there for their upgrades. These upgrades modified the power supply to run cooler, changed the scan method so it resume after a short delay following a carrier drop just like contemporary scanners as well as tweaked and aligned the radio. It really made the R7000 a better radio!

Of course, all good things come to an end. Apparently EEB’s came about after some purchasing shenanigans involving some government contracts by one of the principals. It was a shame; they had some neat stuff and the prices (to the consumer anyway) were not out of line.

Command Post (Chicago IL)

The Command Post was a short-lived scanner store owned by the late Ted Moran of CARMA fame. Ted was my best friend at the time, and I helped him set it up, I even worked the store a few weekends to allow Ted and his wife Kim to get out of town for a couple days. His biggest seller was the PRO2006 scanner, and we would do the cellular mod if requested.

While it only lasted a year or so it was a great place to hang out. Ted’s wife was my wife’s best friend as well so the four of us would have a great time there even when we weren’t doing radio stuff. A lot of the local scanner community would come around and chat so there was always someone to talk to. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a good enough business model and they had to close down. Ted had the large metal sign in his garage for years after that and I had the display case that I used as a workbench in the basement of my house.

FCC Electronics (Hoffman Estates, IL)

FCC was the first scanner-only store I ever saw. It was in a strip mall off IL-58 next to Jewel. They had all the latest scanners, crystals and accessories. When the local police went to 800 MHz. (the first in the Chicago area to do so) they had a converter available on switchover day as the scanners of the day would not cover 800 MHz. The local police chief was furious and threatened to arrest the store owner until it was pointed out that there was no law against it. Apparently, Motorola told the chief that no one could hear them on the new freqs and when he found out they were wrong he blew a gasket.

Universal Radio (Reynoldsburg, OH)

While not a scanner store per se, Universal was more a ham radio joint. They did have a wide selection of scanners and accessories for years. They also had one of the most useful websites around, other than RadioReference of course. Their product pages were the stuff of legends, they had complete descriptions and photos of just about everything and even if you didn’t buy from them you probably checked their website for info.

I visited them twice on the way to of from my in-laws in Kentucky. The wife enjoyed going there for the cats that roamed the store and seemed to know who was and wasn’t a cat lover. I did buy from them both times we visited, and I have ordered over the phone or internet many times.

Scanner Master (Holliston, MA)

I have to mention Scanner Master of course. I used to get their catalog and drool over the toys listed and finally got a chance to visit them in their old location in Needham, MA many years ago. A couple years later I was asked to help out with some projects like testing the BC245XLT scanner (the first EDACS scanner) and edited the Illinois Communications Guide. Later Scanner Master moved to a new location in Holliston, MA and, while mail, phone and internet orders were the vast majority, they did have a walk-in store. While that is no longer the case they remain as the premier scanner retailer in the USA.

Epilogue

As far as I know there are no scanner-only over-the-counter stores any longer. Other than at HRO and the occasional truck stop there are few places where you could walk in and buy a scanner these days. The days of specialty stores for this admittedly niche hobby are long gone. While I know I missed a few of the good ones these ware the ones I most fondly remember. Please reply below with the stores you frequented.

 

[kc2asb]

Not just the change from discrete components to ICs, but from through-hole to service mount components. Once upon a time ICs came in DIP packages (little black rectangles with legs) and in many cases were plugged into a socket on the circuit board rather than soldered directly. Now? Surface-mount. Unsoldering and re-soldering a large surface-mount IC is bayond the tools and ability of most. Evem replacing a surface-mount resister or capacitor is much more of a challenge than replacing the equivalent through-hole component.

Go look up "DIP package" and "surface-mount" on Wikipedia and you'll see what I mean. Some pretty good pictures that illustrate the challenges.

True. Surface mount components changed everything. In the case of IC's that were replaceable, replacements were often not available from the manufacturer, leaving one to search out the used parts market. A lot of old Electra Bearcat scanners were irreparable because the IC's were unobtainium.

 

[sallen07]

Not just the change from discrete components to ICs, but from through-hole to service mount components.

Typo that I just noticed but too late to fix ... obviously I meant SURFACE-mount, not service!

 

[es93546]

I grew up in southern California and remember many of the stores that some have been mentioned here. Not mentioned because I don't think they sold any scanners, was an epic store. It was a great ham radio and HF listener store. It was called "Henry Radio." It was located northwest of the junction of the 10 and the 405. They sold HF receivers that were of a high quality as well as everything ham. What they were known for were the people behind the counter, they were extremely knowledgeable "Elmers," every one of them. They prided themselves on helping people, no matter how long it took. I went in there one time when I wanted to be able to receive, directly, Radio Hanoi. This in 1967 or 1968 at the height of the Vietnam war. I had a cheap, questionable quality, AM/FM portable radio that had great coverage of the HF bands that had the frequencies that a large number of countries had broadcast stations on. The Elmer that helped me could see that I had intense curiosity about radio. He drew me a picture of what his design of a very long dipole antenna was. We lived on a large lot because it was located on a corner. He then got me what I needed and custom cut copper wire and everything I needed to mount the antenna to a tree in one corner and on the roof of the house. They had everything there including the large eye bolts and cans of tar to seal the roof after you screwed the bolt into the roof. I built it with a little help from my father, an aerospace design engineer. After I completed my homework I would slowly turn the dial and after many evenings I got a moderate signal where the person talking spent a half hour degrading everything about the USA. I got excited as this must be Radio Hanoi. At the top of the hour a recording came on that had the words "Radio Hanoi." I think I received this directly from Hanoi as I don't think the North Vietnamese had any broadcast sites closer to the U.S. That experience hooked me on the radio bug and it lasts to this day at the age of 76. I moved away from L.A. permanently when I was 22 and after 4 small towns in 3 states finds me on the east side of the Sierra Nevada. I think Henry Radio shut down in the 80's or 90's, but I will always remember that store!

 

[kc2asb]

I grew up in southern California and remember many of the stores that some have been mentioned here. Not mentioned because I don't think they sold any scanners, was an epic store. It was a great ham radio and HF listener store. It was called "Henry Radio." It was located northwest of the junction of the 10 and the 405. They sold HF receivers that were of a high quality as well as everything ham. What they were known for were the people behind the counter, they were extremely knowledgeable "Elmers," every one of them. They prided themselves on helping people, no matter how long it took. I went in there one time when I wanted to be able to receive, directly, Radio Hanoi. This in 1967 or 1968 at the height of the Vietnam war. I had a cheap, questionable quality, AM/FM portable radio that had great coverage of the HF bands that had the frequencies that a large number of countries had broadcast stations on. The Elmer that helped me could see that I had intense curiosity about radio. He drew me a picture of what his design of a very long dipole antenna was. We lived on a large lot because it was located on a corner. He then got me what I needed and custom cut copper wire and everything I needed to mount the antenna to a tree in one corner and on the roof of the house. They had everything there including the large eye bolts and cans of tar to seal the roof after you screwed the bolt into the roof. I built it with a little help from my father, an aerospace design engineer. After I completed my homework I would slowly turn the dial and after many evenings I got a moderate signal where the person talking spent a half hour degrading everything about the USA. I got excited as this must be Radio Hanoi. At the top of the hour a recording came on that had the words "Radio Hanoi." I think I received this directly from Hanoi as I don't think the North Vietnamese had any broadcast sites closer to the U.S. That experience hooked me on the radio bug and it lasts to this day at the age of 76. I moved away from L.A. permanently when I was 22 and after 4 small towns in 3 states finds me on the east side of the Sierra Nevada. I think Henry Radio shut down in the 80's or 90's, but I will always remember that store!

What a great story! I can imagine the excitement when you heard the positive ID on Radio Hanoi, having experienced it myself listening to shortwave. Sad that stores like Henry Radio, with knowledgeable salesman who are also mentors, are nearly non-existent.

Henry Radio sounds familiar. If they lasted into the late 80's or 90's, it's possible I saw their ads in Popular Communications. I got my first issue in 1988 and my parents soon after bought a subscription for me.

 

[ratboy]

We had a couple of local places, one was "Warren Radio", which was definitely on the downhill slide by the time I started going there about 1971. Insane prices. Last time I went in, I needed some high voltage capacitors to build an AM broadcast band filter. I needed two for each one, and I planned on buying 6 so I could make 3 of them. I asked the sales guy and he comes back with a box of them, at $13 EACH! I passed on them and found them online somewhere for $2.86 each, for the exact same cap. Everything in the store was full list price, and if I would have bought the aluminum box, coax connectors, caps, and coils, each filter would have been about $45. I built all three for about $50.

There was a place that hung on into the early internet days, I can't remember the name, but I bought a lot of substitute transistors there and they had a lot of NOS tubes and stuff. A guy and his wife ran it.

Another local place was "Lifetime Electronics" owned by a relative of mine, my dad's second or 3rd cousin. His brother owned the Radio Shack I went to most of the time. Most of what I remember about "Lifetime" was the old old men who were always there, and the kid salesman who would buy the business and be it's last owner. Lifetime had some very odd used stuff and a lot of oddball kits that I think they made themselves. I missed Lifetime a lot more than Warren.

I went to a place in Chicago that had both ham and CB about 1970-73, and I spent a lot of money there the first time I went. That was the year I had saved a bunch of money up and my dad had let me and my sister clean out his top drawer which he dumped his change into every day after work. There was about 3" of quarters, dimes, and nickels in that drawer, and I had like $400. I was very well financed the last couple of years my dad was alive when we went to Chicago. I had money in general, I was selling stereo stuff and was a 15 year old with 2 credit cards! Burstein-Applebee, and Sears.

 

[CECR1992]

And probably nothing like it will ever appear either. We don't repair electronics anymore, probably for several reasons. The electronics are cheaper now and have become like Bic lighters. When it breaks, you throw it away. Also, electronics don't break down like they used to. Related to that is the fact that everything has at least one little computer in it now. Sometimes they call them ECUs or electronic control units. In the event it breaks down, no one knows how to fix it and that reverts back to the "when it breaks, you throw it away" concept.

The real culprit (if you want to call it that) is what they used to call "solid state." I don't think anyone uses that term anymore because tubes are 99.99% gone and everything is pretty much assumed to be solid state. Remember tube testers? A lot of businesses had 'em: drug store, hardware stores and, yes, Radio Shack. If the TV went out, anyone with just a little electronic awareness would look at the tubes because you could usually find the culprit. Once you got it out, you went to the nearest tube tester. Now, you can't even look for the transistor (not that it would help) because it's buried in an integrated circuit with a couple of thousand other components. TV repair people have gone the way of coopers, cobblers, blacksmiths and country doctors.

I know about those and yeah, modern electronics are pretty dumb to wear down that quickly and it is pointless for that "when it breaks, you throw it away" concept.