[NJARC] Radio Shack and telephones

[oldradio at comcast.net]

2000-2009

When my middle school classes had extra time, I would talk about ham radio, Titanic radios, telegraph, cellphones, etc.

I would hold up a cell phone and ask how many had one - almost all did. then I would ask how many used the texting features, again almost all did.

Then I would tell them that I texted when I was their age.  I could always count on someone to say, "They didn't have cellphones when you were our age." - which opened the door about ham radio and Morse code.

Eventually I would ask, is a cell phone a telephone or a radio?  Of course they said telephone.  Then I would explain the differences by example.  I had a dial telephone with a wire on it connected to the wall, and said this is a telephone, it has a wire on it.  It was fun.

And so was it when they asked me how to dial a number on that "rotary' telephone, that there are no buttons on it.  And the lessons continued.

Now I occasionally see my old students in stores while shopping.  They always say hello to me and tell me how they loved my classes.

I'm a happy man.

73, John



----- Original Message -----
From: "Harry Klancer" <klancer2 at comcast.net>
To: "NJARC" <njarc at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Thursday, April 2, 2015 10:49:48 AM
Subject: Re: [NJARC] Why the Internet didn't kill Radio Shack

Well, it just shows that not enough of you come to the museum. 
We have one of those, and a bagphone, and flip phones and some of the 
later cellphones too. 

And by the way Dave, here's a factoid for you. Consensus is that there are 
over 6 billion (with a b) cellphones -- and each one is a radio -- in the world. 
And did anybody say that radios (not radio) were a thing of the past. 

Harry K