In 1962 postmen were bannedįrom taking a transistor radio on their rounds in St Helen's in Lancashire. It was not only teenagers that could annoy with a
Instead, visitors had to put up with transistor music blaring from every second Journalist complained that there were no bands playing in London's parks Few made use of the tiny earphone provided with the set and proudlyīlasted out their favourite pirate radio station hits for everyone to hear. To music on the move, but unlike today's MP3 players and earlier WalkmanĬassette players, listening to music on the trannie was far from a personal Transistor radio meant it could be carried anywhere. Was a week's wages for many people and two weeks' wages for a teenager in their first job. In 1961, the British public bought two million transistor radios most were made in the UK. The Sony TR-610 (1958) was smaller and lighter still. Was just 5 inches by 3 inches and weighed just 12 oz. It weighed 22½oz and costīritish manufacturers lagged behind Japanese and American makers in miniaturisation. The Harrods'Ĭhristmas catalogue of 1958 showed a Pye radio which was 6 inches by 4 inches. The Bush transistor portable, the TR82 from 1959, used the same case as the company's valve portable,īefore the end of the 1950s, smaller-sized transistor radios were available in the UK.
#Transistor radios portable#
Sometimes their products looked the same as portable valve sets of the early fifties. Manufacturers dominated the market in the late 1950s. The UK market was sheltered from the Japanese invasion and British A few years later, Sony established itself as the market leader in the USA. It was also the first 'shirt pocket' radio. Texas Instruments, in the United States, marketed the first transistor radio, the Regency TR1 for Christmas 1954. Made construction of smaller-sized electronic circuits possible. Tube, as an electronic component that could amplify sound.Īs well as the transistor, the printed circuit board (PCB), which was developed in the Second World War, Regency TR1, the world's first transistor radio Joe Haupt from USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons The invention of the transistor Many radios from the 1950s and 1960s show a host of exotic foreign stations on the dial. It was also possible to receive many other overseas stations on AM in the UK. However, many pop listeners tuned intoįoreign stations, particularly Radio Luxembourg and the pirate stations in the middle years of the 1960s. The BBC did play some pop music on the Light Programme and Radio 1 started in 1967. There was only BBC national and regional radio. In the 1960s there were no commercial stations in the UK. You could receive a large number of overseas broadcasts in the UK in the 1960s. Radio broadcasts in the 1960sĭial from a McMichael M103BT Personal transistor radio c1961. Regimes in Europe, Africa and Asia, it was the only way to find out what was really going on.
Radio helped people throughout the world keep in touch with news and opinions. Far Eastern imports from Hong Kong drove the price drop and squeezed out UK manufacturers. In the 1960s its price dropped making itĪffordable to teenagers. In the late 1950s, the transistor radio was an expensive novelty. Outdoors, in the street, in the park or at the beach. Young people used transistor radios to listen to music If there was one object that defined the sixties, it was the transistor A selection of UK market imported pocket transistor radios from the 1960s. The transistor radio was the first significantly popular mass-production consumer product to make use of the transistor, a device arguably considered to be the most significant invention of the 20th century. Included here are some of the earlier transistor radios from Western Europe as well as rarely-seen transistor radios from former Soviet and East European countries manufactured between 19. The 300+ pages on this site display transistor radios made between 19, as well as some of their pocket crystal radio and subminiature tube radio ancestors. Transistor Radios Around the World Timeline - Radios by Country.
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