RCA Victor was quite a brand in its day.
There was the dog that stood beside the Victorla. And the early use of an acronym for a product. Add to that the excellence of the product, and you have a dynasty. The recording arm of the company is still in production. The “talking machines” have basically been abandoned.
In exploring our demo house, we found an old RCA Victor tube radio. Not the large console type. More the small kitchen counter type.
Yesterday I cleaned the worst of the remnants of dirt from the cabinet of the radio. As I ventured into the guts of the machine, everything looked intact. The tubes were unbroken, the soldering still in place and the wiring all in one piece.
When everything was cleaned and polished, I plugged the radio in. Nothing happened. At least for the first few moments. Then a hiss began. I turned a knob or two. All of a sudden the local radio station was clearly broadcasting through the speaker.
I forget that before solid state electronics, tubes took time to warm up. The power we expect to provide immediate reactions takes a few moments to vibrate through the system. Then you get a very clear signal.
I suppose our electronic age has conditioned us to only tolerate immediacy. I wonder if a previous age had something better than us. Time to reflect, to vibrate and recalibrate before we have to react. Then our signals can be quite clear.
