[GreenKeys] Secret DC Basement in NYC - Great History

[Jim Haynes]

An aside to all this - some years ago I bought some old 1930s issues of 
QST at a hamfest.  The very first one I opened had an article about a
technology I had never heard of before or since.

If you lived in a DC powered area of a city it was hard to build a ham
transmitter of any power because you needed a motor-generator set to
develop the high voltage DC for the amplifier tubes.  Raytheon developed
a special gas-filled tube which was not a thyratron but could carry high
current at low plate voltage and operate at radio frequencies.  I'm away
from my library right now but if you want to know more I can supply
references next week.

Another aside concerned a broadcast transmitter in New Mexico reported
by James O'Neal in Radio World.  To get high voltage for the tubes they
had motor-generator sets stacked up and wired with the DC outputs in
series.  There was a tendency for the generator brushes to get stuck.
The engineer in charge had a yardstick with which he would swat the brush
holders when necessary.  On one occasion the yard stick was apparently
damp and he was electrocuted.
RadioWorld.com->Columns->Roots of Radio and then find "They Put the Juice
in Powerful Radio"