Was fumbling around in the attic one day a couple of weeks ago and came upon a Uniden CB radio I thought I'd lost. Although I don't have any immediate plans to install it in my car (I drive a Honda Accord so there's absolutely no place to put it) I got to thinking about my very first CB radio I owned when the craze really took off in the early to mid 1970s. I was a Johnson Messenger 23 channel which I could talk skip on up to 25 miles away. Anyone out there remember the old school CB radios (Johnson no longer makes them) and the distance you could talk up to? Myself I was a Johnson man and had a long whip antenna on the bumper of my Pontiac Catalina.

 

A friend of mine had an old Uniden until a few years ago. He finally ran out of places that had parts. I remember the two of us were running together about 10 years ago. I had a Cobra and he had his Uniden. He had conversations with people that I couldn't even hear. I don't recall the model, but it was probably made in the late 1960's. Radios were much more powerful back then.

 

The Johnson Messenger was a very coveted radio back in the 70's.

 

I remember my father had a Royce base station with a big ol' 3 pole antenna thing + a booster. That thing would get out. I remember him talking to guys in Kentucky and we are on the north shore of Lake Ontario. Also had a 23 channel Royce base/mobile combination with USB & SSB. Talk about POWER!

 

I heard that! I had a buddy of mine who had a Royce upper and lower sideband 23 channel base station and when he keyed that mike he'd blow your ears off! Whatever happened to the good 'ol days of CB radio?

 

I still have two 23 channel base radios from the '70's here. One's a Pierce Simpson Super Lynx with a Turner desktop power mic and a clock radio in it,(hahaha) and the other's a Trinidad base with a chrome Astatic D-104 lollipop mic. Still work, both look cool too.

I ran a Hi-Gain radio up until about 10 years ago I bought at a flea market for $5.00 in a bunch of trucks, bounced countless miles. It finally gave up and when I brought it into my repairman to have it looked into, he laughed at me and embarrased me into spending some money on a newer, updated radio. I gave the High-Gain a decent burial in some fuel stop trash receptacle later that day.

Still have a cabinet in the garage stuffed full of old junk radios...like a Radio Shack, couple Unidens and some others just for keepsake.

My very first CB radio (circa 1972, as a kid...needed an FCC license even, until the following year when they cancelled that,) was a Lafayette 23 channel TUBE type radio...had to turn it on and let it warm up first before you could use it...at night you could see the tubes glowing through the louvers in the cover. Those were the days. We used to talk skip and would talk long enough to send/recieve "QSL cards" from the guys we talked skip to. I lived in Connecticut at the time, and got QSL cards from Colorado, Texas and some others I can't remember due to "CRS". Had an Astro Ground Plane fiberglass antenna up about 30 feet in an oak tree, and I had enough elevation where I lived to really "get out" back then. Wow, what memories...:thumbsup:

Now I'm in the Green Mountains of southern Vermont up around 2300 ft. above sea level. I had the bright idea of giving my son (about 14 at that time,) a newly built, peaked, tuned, echo boarded, upper&lower channels added, Uniden Grant XL just like the one in my Pete at that time. I also added a little whollop to that, with a 600 watt linear and an inline power meter all strategically hooked up in his bedroom.

He used to kill all the neighbors TV's at night talking on that thing, including our own I would be watching. He finally got it all out of tune by messing with all the adjustments and blew a tube in the linear. Now it all just sits collecting dust. He's 21, and has a life all his own...The end.

 

That's not old school................ this is. The other day while coming up 95 in MD I saw a tow truck with One car up top, one on back, and one dragging behind. His brakes were smokin, and I noticed he had no radio. So I maneuvered up beside him and motioned to him to get his attention. When he rolled his passenger window down I shouted "YOUR BRAKES ARE SMOKIN!!"

That's old school :lol:

 

I've got an old LaFayette Telsat SSB-80 here in the truck thats a good talker.

I've also got the base version (LaFayette Telsat SSB-140) sitting in a box at the house....along with an old Moonraker 4 that hasn't seen the light of day since about 1985 when I moved back South.

 

I have a 23 channel SBE that I bought used in 72, it still works like a champ

 

I use a........ Oh wait, I'm a dispatcher now.. :lol: :lol2: :smokin: