Before 1938 the number of portable
radios available was rather small. The
Great Depression was in full swing and most people had little money for an
extra radio. Despite the economic
situation there were a few small radio manufacturers and some hobbyist building
portable radios. Most of those early
portable radios, offered commercially during the early 1930s, were housed in
nondescript wooden enclosures. That
changed in 1938.
In 1938 Philco Radio Corporation
came out with what their advertisements called “An entirely new kind of radio,
invented by Philco engineers”. Well, it
wasn’t all new, but it looked rather snazzy housed in a wood enclosure covered
in “airplane cloth” which was similar to the covering used on luggage of the
period. Airplane cloth was so called
because it resembled the fabric covering used on early airplanes.
Typical suitcase of
the 1930s and 40s.
The earliest known portable radio
covered in “airplane cloth” was a home built portable radio featured in the
September 1936 issue of Popular Science magazine. It was called a “Picnic Portable”. The author of the article, Arthur C. Miller,
had his home built radio housed in an enclosure built and covered in luggage
cloth (airplane cloth) by a “neighborhood trunk shop”. It’s not known if this is the first radio
made to look like luggage, but it was not the last.
The 1936 home built Picnic
Portable radio.
The portable radio advertised by Philco in 1938 as “An
entirely new kind of radio…” was known as the “Little Pal”. It started a portable radio renaissance. The overall look of the “Little Pal” was
copied by almost every major radio manufacturer at the time. From 1938 through 1940 many portable radios
were offered in luggage size packages.
The earliest were designed to operate only from batteries. But, that changed some time around 1940 when
it was possible to add house current operation to the portable radio package.
Two “suitcase” portable
radios of the late 1930s, the RCA Pick-me-Up radio on the right and the Philco
Little Pal radio on the left
After that most portable radios were capable of battery and
house current operation. The exceptions
were the so called personal radios.
Those were built rather small to facilitate easy portability. As a consequence they were too small to
include the parts necessary for house current operation. Suitcase size portable radios operating only
from batteries generally went away after 1941.
There were a few post war attempts to market large portable radios
operating from batteries only. Most of those
were not popular with the public. But,
the idea of a suitcase size portable did not die. The idea of a large portable radio was famously
revised in the 1970s as the “boom box”.
Most “boom boxes” were not exactly suitcase size nor did they appear to
be luggage. So, sadly the music was no
longer in a suitcase, just in a large plastic box.
