[Milsurplus] Code machine?

[David Edsall]

Hi Clete and the group,

I was in a AAA battery (90mm guns) in 1954-55 above the Golden Gate. We were 
probably near the bottom of the Army's food chain.
Shortly after I left in December 1955 the unit converted to Nike missiles.
We had the M-209, which we set up daily from a mimeographed sheet that 
covered a month of settings.
Once in a great while battalion would send us a message in cipher which we 
would decipher, followed by our reply in cipher.
Very time consuming at both ends as each letter of a message had to be 
entered one at a time.
Any error in the setup produced gibberish.
You get the idea.
The price of these things keeps going up.  They were half that price just a 
short time ago.
73, David W1TDD

> de WB2CPN
> I saw one in use while in USAF in 1948.
> They were discontinued just after that.
> I understand Macy's in NYC had some for
> sale in the early 50's.
> 73  Clete