I tested Tubes in Marra's Drugstore. How about you?

[tomwed]

In the 60's when the tv, radio or amplifier was on the fritz my Dad would remove all the tubes, put them in a shoe box and send me to the drugstore. The drugstore had a tube tester. Each tube had a number printed on it and I would look up the number on the chart. The chart told you where to set a bunch of levers and then you pulled down the "Good or Bad" lever.

The druggest would sell me replacement tubes and Dad did the rest when I returned.

That came to mind today because I read that Radio Shack's days may also be numbered.

[Rickg]

I remember taking all the tubes up to the drug store to test them also!

[tomwed]

I remember taking all the tubes up to the drug store to test them also!

Thank-you for concurring. When I tell my boys this story they say “Yes Dad we believe you. When the TV got sick Grandpa sent you to the drugstore for some tubes and when you got back he made it all better.” :)

[Bizdoc]

We took the tubes to a store for a while. Then, my dad bought a tube tester and we could test them at home. We even kept spares for tubes that went bad on a regular basis.

[redwitch]

We had the at-home tester and a box with spare tubes. Good things when in areas where you couldn't easily purchase tubes. Of course, when we were in those areas the odds of finding a tv station were slim to none.

[philnpat]

In the 60's when the tv, radio or amplifier was on the fritz my Dad would remove all the tubes, put them in a shoe box and send me to the drugstore. The drugstore had a tube tester. Each tube had a number printed on it and I would look up the number on the chart. The chart told you where to set a bunch of levers and then you pulled down the "Good or Bad" lever.

The druggest would sell me replacement tubes and Dad did the rest when I returned.

That came to mind today because I read that Radio Shack's days may also be numbered.

Marra's Drugstore?...Cohoes?

[alanmcdonald]

I remember keeping more than one TV and radio going with trips to test tubes.

On the other hand, we had one of the original Emerson portable transistor radios.

[Bizdoc]

We had the at-home tester and a box with spare tubes. Good things when in areas where you couldn't easily purchase tubes. Of course, when we were in those areas the odds of finding a tv station were slim to none.

I remember watching, among other things, Leave It To Beaver in Japanese while we were stationed in Sasebo...

[Villages PL]

I was never sent to the store to test tubes. But I was told that in the early days of radio, my father bought a kit and built his own. Whatever that involves I don't know.

[alanmcdonald]

I'm watching Leave It To Beaver on Netflix right now. In those days a season was 39 episodes. Just finished Season 3, so I'm up to Episode 117.

[JoelJohnson]

My father use to repair radios and TVs. When he died he had buckets and buckets of old tubes.

I put them out for trash and they were picked up in1 day (BTW, that was 1980).

[rdhdleo]

I was always so proud that as a young single woman on my own I could take the tubes to Walgreens test them buy new ones and fix my TV myself!

[villagetinker]

Wow, I remember those days, and believe it or I still have the tube tester I bought for my own use. Actually used it recently to test tubes for 2 of the neighbors with Juke boxes.

[senior citizen]

In the 60's when the tv, radio or amplifier was on the fritz my Dad would remove all the tubes, put them in a shoe box and send me to the drugstore. The drugstore had a tube tester. Each tube had a number printed on it and I would look up the number on the chart. The chart told you where to set a bunch of levers and then you pulled down the "Good or Bad" lever.

The druggest would sell me replacement tubes and Dad did the rest when I returned.

That came to mind today because I read that Radio Shack's days may also be numbered.

My father fixed all of the radios & then televisions for his entire family in N.Y.C. simply by testing & replacing the tubes. Plus ours, of course.

My husband's father built his own television set......was the first in their neighborhood to have a t.v.

I believe I was four years old or thereabouts when we got a television set.
Circa 1949? 1950? I recall the testing of those tubes for a very long time thereafter...............

Like "Ralphie" in A Christmas Story, we both remember looking into the store windows, gazing at all the new gifts, toys, televisions for sale.......in the early 1950's.

This came to mind after reading the thread about the radio tubes, etc. which was a blast from the past. (Thanks for sharing that memory)


http://socialdance.stanford.edu/syllabi/teen_dances.htm (http://socialdance.stanford.edu/syllabi/teen_dances.htm)

Keep scrolling downward after clicking above hyperlink...........for the dance steps...

TEEN DANCES of the 1950'S..........

Who recalls rushing home from school to watch AMERCAN BANDSTAND?
We were not yet teens..........but nevertheless...........great show.

[tomwed]

My grandfather didn't fix his TV's, he stacked them. One had a picture and the other sound. I take that back. He would stack them if whacking them on the side didn't work.

[Taltarzac725]

In the 60's when the tv, radio or amplifier was on the fritz my Dad would remove all the tubes, put them in a shoe box and send me to the drugstore. The drugstore had a tube tester. Each tube had a number printed on it and I would look up the number on the chart. The chart told you where to set a bunch of levers and then you pulled down the "Good or Bad" lever.

The druggest would sell me replacement tubes and Dad did the rest when I returned.

That came to mind today because I read that Radio Shack's days may also be numbered.

I remember seeing these lying around various homes but never really thought about why they were there. I was born on 2-24 in 1959, however, so that period of TV repair was not familiar to me.