A history of the General Radio Company

129 Pages·1965·1.392 MB·English

by  Arthur E Thiessen

AA HHiissttoorryy ooff tthhee
GGeenneerraall RRaaddiioo CCoommppaannyy
1915-1965

A

History

OF THE

GENERAL RADIO
COMPANY

BY

ARTHUR E. THIESSEN

WEST CONCORD, MASSACHUSETTS
1965
PDF version: 1.15 September 1, 2001
Dick Benson
18776 Wood Dell Court
Saratoga CA, 95070
[email protected]

Copyright 1965 by General Radio Company

TABLE OF CONTENTS

............................................................................................................................... Page
FOREWORD..................................................................................................ix
I. The Early Days.....................................................................................1
II. General Radio Gets Its Start...............................................................5
III. Back to Instruments...........................................................................15
IV. Mostly Biographical...........................................................................21
V. Years of Development and Growth...................................................29
VI. The Great War....................................................................................49
VII. The Postwar Years.............................................................................53
VIII. The Past Decade.................................................................................65
Appendix.......................................................................................................93
Index............................................................................................................113
ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The author gratefully acknowledges the help of all those
who so willingly supplied certain of the facts and
background for this history, and especially of Frederick T.
Van Veen for editing and Veronica A. Krysieniel for
preparing the manuscript.

vi
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Page

Melville Eastham, founder of General Radio Company xii
General Radio's first home 4
The Type lO1L Variable Air Condenser, from Catalogue A 7
Henry S. Shaw and Melville Eastham 10
Plan of Cambridge plant with date of occupation of each building 16
General Radio's first capacitance bridge, the Type 216 of 1921 17
Henry S. Shaw 24
Errol H.Locke 26
Harold B. Richmond 27
General Radio in the middle 20's 30
The Type C21H Primary Frequency Standard, introduced in 1928 31
The Type 559-A Noise Meter of 1933 37
The final assembly of an instrument 44
The Type 1310-A Oscillator 46
Presentation of Army-Navy E Award to General Radio in 1943 48
General Radio's final Cambridge plant 54
General Radio's Sales Engineering Offices 60
General Radio's plants at Concord and Bolton 66
Aerial view of General Radio's main plant 70
Two popular GR impedance bridges: the modern Type 1650-A
and its predecessor, the Type 650-A of 1934 71
GR's Management Committee in 1960 72
General Radio's Bolton plant 77
A Session at Sales Week 78
General Radio's overseas representatives at International
Sales Seminars 86
Arthur E. Thiessen 84

vii

FOREWORD

THIS is the story of an unusual company and a maker of unusual things.
Unavoidably, I am afraid, when one talks about some of them, the language gets
rather specialized. If (like my wife) the reader finds those passages to be pretty
incomprehensible, they may well be skipped; this story is principally about the
company itself and the men who made it.
This history is being published on the fiftieth anniversary of an electronics
company. That is a mature age for any organization, but it is more than that in the
electronics industry-it is a record. No other electronics manufacturing company in
this country, perhaps in the world, has been so long continuously in the business.
But longevity, while interesting, perhaps even commendable, is itself hardly a
virtue. It is the future that counts. Unlike people, organizations can renew
themselves. We at GR believe that new people, new ideas, and progressive
management are the things that will make the future in this fast-moving art even
more productive and more interesting than the past.

A. E. T.
March 30, 1965
ix