As many of you know, there were many areas of the country, especially rural areas, that did not have electricity. For those customers, there were battery operated tube radios available and the most common variety of these radios operated from a battery pack that provided 1.5V and 90V. From what I'm told, there is a community about 30 miles from me that didn't receive electricity until '53 and I suspect that not many "non electrified" areas remained after the early '50's.
Recently, I picked up this Silvertone (built by Warwick) 4-tube farm radio from '52-'53. It uses 4 miniature tubes and operates on the same type of battery pack as the older farm radios. This radio needed the usual service and is a decent performing radio, given what it is.
I figure that this is probably one of the last table model battery operated farm radios that was made (does anyone else know of any later examples for the US market?). Within a couple of years of this set being introduced, transistor radios hit the market and these rapidly replaced tube battery operated radios. Anyone who didn't have electricity and needed a battery operated radio after the early '50's probably bought either a transistor set or a 3-way tube portable (I think tube portables were made until around '60-'61).
One thing about this silvertone that I don't like are the antenna and ground leads simply dangling off of the fragile antenna coil; so, I added a terminal strip to help protect the coil in the event of an "accident."
I have a friend who picked up his first tube radio in the early '70's, a Firestone battery operated farm set that he obtained from the trash. He said that the local hardware store was able to order him the correct battery pack; but, it was expensive and didn't last long. He said that when he tried to get another one, he was told that they were NLA. Frankly, I'm shocked that these packs were available into the '70's.
