You missed Knight Kits and Eico Electronics. To quote Professor Henry Higgins in the movie "My Fair Lady": "Damn, damn, damn, damn, and DAMN!". Sad beyond words to see them all go. Clarence, WA5SWN. Licensed since 1967.
I remember buying a 7” P7 phosphor CRT tube from Fair Radio for my W6MXV SSTV monitor. Today I did the same with a sound card and some SW. Times change, my experimenter needs now are fulfilled by Digi-Key and others. Fair had a great run and I wish the owners the best in retirement. I’ve discovered over time that nostalgia is not my gig. I really do appreciate the efforts of others to restore old ham gear, stereos, cars and houses. I can vicariously enjoy what they’ve accomplished.
I agree, the end of an era. Having grown-up with abundant WW II and later surplus, seeing Fair Radio go away makes me thankful that I grew up during the later part of the available and USABLE radio surplus era. There was just something about cracking open the case of a GRC-9 and smelling the anti-fungal spray, have real radium dial markings and green crackle paint. Sure, my present ham transceiver would be seen as science fiction when the GRC-9 was current issue, but performance isnt everything ( which I keep telling myself as I approach 70 years old ;-) Ah, for the days of a 55 gallon barrel, filled with various J-37 & J-38 straight keys, many with knee-key fixtures attached., priced at maybe 75 cents a piece for the really good ones. My first Novice key was a knee key with the J-37 on it: cost my 75 cents from my lawn mowing money, because it WAS a really good one. 73 de Ray ..._ ._
What was really nice and sometimes a hinderance was the availability in some places and not in others. In my area none were available unless you went with mail orders. It was a gamble to mail order anything and expect it to arrive within a couple months time frame. Radio shack was a go to for many components. One store was located 14 miles from my home, and one was 35 miles from my home. When you had to have someone drive you there, you had to wait until they were going that way. Now both of those places are closed and you have to order online. A plus now because you can get them sooner and often a bit lower in cost, but a bit of a negative because you cant physically examine it before you buy. Kits yea they are great but even many of those are a risk. Some of the better ones such as a mountain topper are nice but the price for limited function radios may put a lot off. There are a lot of nice radios out there i would like but many other things take priority in the expenditure of my money. Losing stores like that hurts. Because you could see or listen to before you buy so you knew what you got. Evil bay! more than once ive gotten ripped off by fly by night sellers and just sent a shell without contents. And most ham fests are usually too far for me to justify traveling.
Because a lot of the time they're not a viable business investment, they're a mom and pop "hobby" business. An investor who takes over a business wants fast return on their investment. Mom and pop do it because they love the hobby and it brings in a small revenue, hopefully enough to pay them a modest income for their time and pay the bills. Small enough to support itself, but not large enough to make the owner rich. I seriously doubt reselling surplus radio gear brought in millions in revenue. Investors don't want to buy a hobby. They want to buy an ROI. Those kind of places are awesome because they're "personal". Unlike going to other "big box" corporate retailers like DXE or ARS. Unfortunately, when mom and pop decide to retire, so does the business usually.
I can remember in the early 60s salivating over the goods, and when the catalogs came I would spend hours poring over the manna within! Good times, and I DID purchase many items.
