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Photo from 1918 Compton Union
High School yearbook |
Photo thanks to Victor Rodriguez |
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One day in 1915,
after reading a 10¢ booklet*
about the wonders of a new invention called "Wireless," a 16
year old boy named Elmer G. Osterhoudt began the
construction of a crystal radio. He was attempting to
receive the signals that were said to be invisibly traveling
through space, undetectable by human senses.
He wound a beautiful coil made of 200 turns of 28 gauge
cotton covered wire on a piece of broom handle. Then he
painted it with white lead paint which he had invented
himself. Connecting the coil to a galena crystal, headphones
and antenna, he listened in vain for the wireless signals.
He soon came to the realization that his radio didn't work.
The lead in the paint had ruined the coil. The radio was
stone dead; he couldn't get as much as a click out of the
headphones.
Elmer had a neighbor who was also interested in Wireless and
who was also named Elmer.**
This Elmer also had made a radio that didn't work. He came
by with his radio because Elmer Osterhoudt "knew all about
radio." Elmer put the other Elmer's non-painted coil into
his set and in came a powerful rotary spark signal from
station 6JG! ***
The magic of this single event influenced the entire
remainder of his life. A first-hand account can be found on
Page 2 of "How To Make Coils" by Elmer Osterhoudt, written
in 1957.
Link
* In HB-5 "CRYSTAL SET
CONSTRUCTION" Elmer writes that the magazine was "The
Electrical Experimenter." In April of 1915 the price of this
magazine went from 5¢ to 10¢, which narrows down the volume
that Elmer actually read. The July issue, on page 109, shows
a simple wireless receiving set. There is no coil data, but
the illustration resembles what Elmer described above. Page
109 also has an article on how to blow up a toy boat using
homemade wireless apparatus and a simple mine filled with
gun powder.
Link
**
After searching Los Angeles property records and the US
census for any neighboring household that had a boy named
Elmer of the appropriate age, fellow MRL fan Victor
Rodriguez has determined that this person is Elmer Stevens.
He appears in the Compton Union High School yearbook with
Elmer Osterhoudt.
Link
The two Elmer's were in the high school band
and school orchestra together, but their friendship is
unknown. Elmer referred to him as "a neighbor boy" in his
account.
*** There was indeed an amateur with the call
sign 6JG. The 1916 edition of "Radio Stations of the United
States," issued by the Department of Commerce, lists him as
James A. Homand of 1423 McKinley Street in Los Angeles,
California. This address is about three miles from where
Elmer lived. |
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In 1917 Elmer Osterhoudt and his family
lived at this address at 1936 East 77th Street in Los
Angeles, CA. The 100+ year old house, built in 1908, lies
under the additions and modern exterior of this building.
Elmer wrote
that in 1917, while living at 77th and Crockett (the house
in the photo above), he had erected a 55 foot antenna mast
made of all sorts of 2x4s, 2x3s and pairs of 1x2s. It had a
dozen guy wires made of bailing wire. On top of the mast was
a four wire antenna, each wire separated by 30 inches. (He
didn't say what the other end was connected to.) It was up
for about a year when his father decided to move, so he had
to take it down. That's when he noticed the bailing wire had
almost rusted through. It would have fallen down by itself
in another month, and would have either hit the house or
have fallen into the street!
If that was the case, we're probably looking at the exact
spot where the mast was located.
It was just as well. On April 6, 1917, due to the war, it
became illegal for a private citizen to own a working
transmitter or receiver. In addition, the Department of
Commerce directed that "the antennae and all aerial wires be
lowered to the ground." It's almost hilarious that Elmer's
antenna would have complied of its own accord.
On May 1, 1917, the Osterhoudt's moved to 241 E. Truslow
Avenue in Fullerton, California. Elmer was interested in
entomology and biology, and without being able to use his
radio equipment he pursued these fields instead. He was a
member of the Lorquin Natural History Club, he corresponded
with professional entomologists, and placed ads in the
Lepidoptera, a Boston publication, to trade insects and
butterflies from the east coast. He raised the
butterflies himself.
By 1918 the
Osterhoudt's were back in Los Angeles at 8011 Crockett
Boulevard, a few blocks away from the 77th street address.
This might have been the end of the story of Elmer
Osterhoudt's interest in radio, just another boyhood hobby
set aside.
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However, during his lifetime Elmer Osterhoudt would (in all
probability) hand-wind more coils and design and sell more
crystal radios than anyone who has ever lived. He outlasted
all his competitors in the mail order crystal radio
business. He, along with his wife Mabel, ran a mail order
company named "Modern Radio Laboratories" for 55
years.
He sold thousands of kits, coils, crystals and all parts
related to crystal radios, many of which he made himself. He
published the MRL catalog and wrote many handbooks, "Detail
Prints" and a quarterly publication called "Radio Builder
and Hobbyist." He printed them himself, at first with a
mimeograph machine and later on a lithograph printer.
Everything needed for a radio could be found in his catalog;
coils, capacitors, headphones, switches, jacks, binding
posts, sockets, crystal stands, knobs, batteries, wire, all
sorts of hardware and even vacuum tubes and transistors. He
manufactured over FIFTY-FIVE types of coils, all made by
hand!
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The MRL logo was hand drawn by Elmer, and almost
every one is different. "First use in commerce" of Elmer's
trademarks is listed as December 15, 1932. Today, these
trademarks are owned by Paul Luther Nelson, current owner of Modern
Radio Laboratories®, who registered the
logos to himself in 1999. |
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In the 1970s the
MRL catalog index was five columns wide (compare to 1986
picture on the right). The catalog began to shrink as more
and more products became unobtainable. Click on the catalog
pages for a larger version. (Will open in a new tab.) |
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There is little
information about Elmer available but we can glean some
details from city directories, census records, birth and
death certificates, advertisements, and his literature - and
he wrote a lot of literature. He also included a hand
written note with each order, some of which have survived.
His company, Modern Radio Laboratories, was
established in 1932. It says so, right at the top of the
"EXPERIMENTER'S CATALOG." Oddly enough, Elmer rarely used
the entire name in his handbooks and other literature. Even
on the catalog it is shortened to "MODERN RADIO LABS" and
elsewhere simply to "MRL." Some of his magazine
advertisements listed the company as "Modern Radiolabs" but
later it was shortened to "Laboratories," since these ads
were charged by the number of words.
Every one of his handbooks has this list of accomplishments
printed inside the front cover: |
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"WITH RADIO SINCE 1915." including:
RADIO Operator, R.C.A. Marine Service.
Radio Mechanic, Maximum, USN.
Technician, Electrical Products Corporation.
Southern California Edison Company.
Majestic Electrical Products.
U.S. Motor Company
Manchester Radio Electric Shop
Modern Radio Laboratories
Amateur and Radio Service
6NW (1919)
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Scotts Mills, Oregon. Photo taken in 1912 by
James Eaton.
(Click for full size - will open in
new tab.)
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Elmer was born in Scotts Mills, Oregon on October 6,
1899, the son of Wilbert and Minnie
Osterhoudt. Wilbert (also known as William) was a
carpenter, cabinet and furniture maker. Elmer had a
brother named Cyril, who was born on April 17, 1901.
The family lived on the farm of Charles Higby
Osterhoudt, Wilbert's father. Also on the farm were
two of Wilbert's brothers, Henry and John.
Note: To be more precise, Elmer was born in
Butte Creek, Oregon. Butte Creek was incorporated
into Scotts Mills in 1916. He was apparently born on
his grandfather's farm and not in the town of Scotts
Mills itself. The population of Scotts Mills at the
time was about 100. Cyril was born in Silverton,
Marion, Oregon, about 5 miles from Scotts Mills.
For reasons not known, the family moved to Spokane,
Washington, sometime around 1902.
Entry
from the 1903 Spokane, Washington City Directory. The house
in the listing, built in 1889, still exists. |
From Spokane
they moved to Yakama City. Charles died there in
April of 1903. Minnie Osterhoudt died of typhoid
fever in September 1903 at the age of 27. A lone
newspaper article hints that Elmer and Cyril had a
three month old brother named Clarence who died two
weeks after their mother died (see page 10). Cyril
was sent to live with Wilbert's sister Nellie
McConnell in Clackamas, Oregon. Elmer stayed with
his father, who along with his brothers Henry and
John, moved to
Vancouver,
Washington, then to
Eugene,
Oregon.
On July 27, 1904, John
Osterhoudt married a girl named Lillie S. Shields in
Vancouver Washington. They lived in Enterprise,
Oregon, but eventually moved to 593 8th Avenue in
Eugene.
Elmer wrote in MRL Data Sheets Vol. 6 that
his father owned a planing mill in Eugene. (A
planing mill takes boards from a saw mill and turns
them into finished lumber.) Actually, Wilbert didn't
own the mill outright, he had a partner named Jim
Smith. The company name was "J H Smith & Co,"
according to the city directory. The mill was
a few blocks from the
Willamette River near Skinners Butte, where the mill
race met Eighth Avenue.
Henry and John Osterhoudt also worked at the mill.
The 1910 census shows that Wilbert and Elmer lived
at
205 8th Avenue in Eugene. This was the actual
address of the planing mill. Accordingly, the mill
was named "Eighth Avenue Planing Mill."
Note: The designations "Street" and "Avenue" are
used interchangeably in old Eugene newspaper
articles and maps, so the mill was also known as
"Eighth Street Planing Mill."
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Entry from
the 1911 Eugene City Directory. |
Cyril was
reunited with his father and Elmer sometime between
1910 and 1912.
An article in
the Eugene Guardian states that Wilbert had
married Lela May Smith in 1911, and the 1914 City
Directory shows they lived at 656 E. 8th Avenue.
Lela May filed for divorce in June of 1914 and the
divorce was granted on August 18, 1914.
Entry
from the 1914 Eugene City Directory. |
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NOTE: It isn't known if Lela May Smith was the daughter of
James H. Smith, Wilbert's partner. There was a Lela May
Smith in Eugene who was the daughter of James Smith, but it
was a different James Smith. She was the daughter of James L. Smith, a farmer who
died in 1907. This Lela May
Smith married Clark H. Hileman in 1903 and was still married
to him when she died in 1933. Her mother's name was Nancy.
The 1920 census states that James H. Smith, 67, of 205 8th
Street in Eugene City, was married to Jessie D. Smith, 48
(not Nancy). His occupation was "Carpenter in a planing
mill." |
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Wilbert
Osterhoudt and Jim Smith at the Eighth
Avenue Planing Mill 1909.
Click for full size.
The mill opened in September of 1908. |
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Left to
right: Jim Smith, Wilbert Osterhoudt, Mr.
Basinette, Henry Osterhoudt, John Edwin
Osterhoudt. Click for
full size. |
Fun facts:
Wilbert was 5'8" tall. Henry was 5'9" and
John was 5'8". (Information from a
census document from Marion County, Oregon,
1895) When this picture was taken Wilbert
was 39 years old, Henry was 44 and John was
34. |
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In 1912, when Elmer was 13 years old and living in
Eugene, he traded in three empty beer bottles for
the deposit and bought a 10¢ book named "The Star
Toymaker." Using the plans from this book, Elmer and
Cyril built a tin talking machine, bird houses,
motors, waterwheels, stilts, telegraph sounders,
electric bells and dry cells. They would also go to
garages and acquire discarded dry cells from Model T
Fords to power their projects. At one time they had
about 100 of them connected together in series for
"a sparking good time." When the cells became
depleted they figured out how to chemically
rejuvenate them using a saturated solution of Sal
Ammoniac.
They also used the cells to set off their cannon,
which was made of a foot long pipe 1" in diameter,
mounted on a 2" x 6" board. One end was closed off
with a big bolt and had a slot sawed into it to hold
the end of a lamp cord. They charged it with Potash
and Sulfur and sent an electric current through the
lamp cord. According to Elmer, they once stuck the
handle from an old umbrella into it, and it was
blown out with enough force to drive it through a
wooden box.
Handbook 8, Radio Kinks and Quips, contains
the following three sentences: "At home, my brother
and I used to drive our poor Dad nuts. We had an
Edison Cylinder record phonograph. We used to
reverse the belt and run it backwards."
Accounts of how to make a canon out of a 1" gas
pipe, how to rejuvenate dry cells with Sal Ammoniac,
how to reverse the belt on an Edison phonograph, and
even how to acquire depleted batteries from
automobile garages can be found in Popular
Mechanics magazines that were published prior to
1912, so it seems Elmer may have been reading
Popular Mechanics in addition to The Star Toy
Maker.
According to Elmer, they sometimes threw their old
dry cells out their 2nd story window at their dogs
below when the dogs were "celebrating." What is
interesting about this sentence is that the
Osterhoudt's had dogs. Elmer and Cyril built "grass
sleds" and used them to sled down Skinners Butte,
which rises 200 feet above the surrounding city.
Skinners Butte is still a recreation spot today.
Near the base of the Butte was a mill race
connecting to the Willamette River, which crossed
8th Avenue. This was the location of Wilbert
Osterhoudt's mill. (There were several planing mills
at the time in the immediate area.) Skinners
Butte is only a few blocks away from the mill (where
they also lived) at 205 8th Avenue. On top of the
butte were the charred ruins of an observatory,
which had been dynamited in 1905, so it must have
been a great place for kids to explore.
Link
A grass sled from the book. Elmer
and Cyril would have had plenty of scrap wood
from the planing mill.
A copy of the book is on Page 11.
Elmer and his brother Cyril were both destined to
spend their careers in radio. By the way, Elmer
still had the book in 1966.
Downtown
Eugene, Oregon in 1912. Skinners Butte rises in the
background. Elmer and Cyril may have walked down
this very street. For all we know, they may even be
in the photo! There are few, if any, of these
buildings still standing as they've been replaced
with modern structures. The Osterhoudt & Smith
planing mill site became the location of Eugene City
Hall in 1964. The building was demolished in 2015
and the site is now a large parking lot.
Eugene was home to the University of Oregon. See
this
map.
Also, see these 1912 Sanborn Fire Insurance maps.
The Osterhoudt planing mill is at the bottom of
Plate 16.
Link
On August 14, 1915, one year after his divorce from
Lela May, Elmer's father married Alice Elsie
Shields, the sister of his brother John's wife,
Lillie. By this time Wilbert and Alice had a
daughter named Wilda Frances Osterhoudt. Lela May
had asked for 1/3 of Wilbert's property and $25 a
month alimony during the divorce. The Lane County
History Museum states that the J. H. Smith & Co mill
stopped operating in 1914, the year the Osterhoudt's
were divorced. It's impossible to know the exact
chain of events, but Wilbert and Alice left Eugene,
taking Elmer, Cyril and Wilda with them. They were
married in Santa Ana California, and would spend the
rest of their lives in Los Angeles.
Elmer and Cyril eventually had six half-brothers and
sisters, though two sisters died young; Nora died of
Whooping Cough when she was almost 4 years old, and
Ada May died of pneumonia the day before her second
birthday. (See page ten for list of siblings.)
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Eugene High School in 1912. Built in 1900, Elmer
would have attended school here. In 1915 a new high
school was built and this building became Eugene
City Hall. It was located at Willamette Street and
West 11th Avenue, a few blocks from the mill on 8th
Street.
The white building on the right was Central Public
School. Today a branch of Chase Bank and a
convenience store are located on the two sites. |
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Willamette Street and West 11th Avenue,
120 years later. Only the fire hydrant remains, and it's
probably not even the same hydrant. |
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Fullerton Union High School |
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In 1917, while living at 241 E. Truslow Avenue in
Fullerton, CA, Elmer attended Fullerton Union High
School. He took biology, was interested in
entomology, and had a large collection of insects.
In a letter to the noted entomologist Fordyce
Grinnel Jr, dated May 21, 1917, Elmer wrote, "On
account of having to take my wireless down when we
were at Florence I have gone into Entomology about
as deeply as ever again." The Junior College was in
the same building as the high school, and he
befriended the teacher who taught entomology there,
Hiram Tracy. Elmer would offer advice and
encouragement to the college students in the class.
He stated they always got plenty of specimens but
did a poor job of mounting them. |
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Compton Union High School. Photo taken in 1903.
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Elmer graduated from Compton Union High School in
June of 1918. At the time, he and his family lived
at 1936 E. 77th Street in Los Angeles. The school
was six miles from their house. |
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Photo of Elmer from the 1918 Compton Union HS yearbook. |
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Elmer
played "First Trombone" in the school orchestra and
the band. Also in the orchestra was Elmer Stevens
(right), who played drums.
We believe Elmer Stevens was the "neighbor boy" who
brought his non-working crystal set to Elmer
Osterhoudt in 1915.
Click on the above photos for the complete orchestra
or band group photo. |
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The Los Angeles 1916 Long Beach City directory lists
W A Osterhoudt as a woodworker at Jones Sash
and Door Company, located at 1101 West Broadway. The
"W A" would be William Arthur. Unfortunately it
doesn't list his address, but the 1915 directory
lists an Alice Shields at 922 W. 6th Street, not far
from the Jones Sash & Door address. Neither of these
addresses exist today.
MRL Mystery: The Osterhoudt's lived at 657 8th Ave in
Eugene, Oregon. After they left for California a woman named Olga Jones lived at
that address, while Wilbert worked for the Jones Sash and Door Company in Long
Beach. Is this just a coincidence due to a common name, or did Olga have some
family connection with Jones Sash and Door Company?
In the preface in his handbooks, Elmer wrote that he
was a technician at "Electrical Products Company."
This was a company in Long Beach founded in 1912
that made electric and neon signs. Elmer wrote that
he worked there during the war, so this would have
been sometime after 1915 but before he was in the
Navy in 1918. Since the Osterhoudt's had moved to
77th Street by 1917, it was probably in 1915 or
1916.
Entry from the 1913
Los Angeles City Directory. This address
is in the Long Beach area. |
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Ad
from the 1923 Los Angeles City Directory |
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In 1918, Elmer worked as a laborer at Southern Board
and Paper Mills, now known as PABCO, located at
Vernon and Santa Fe Avenues in LA. (He wrote this
himself on his draft card.) The building in the
photo above was built in 1912 and would have been
quite new when Elmer was employed there. The actual
address is 4460 Pacific Blvd. The area was known as
Vernon at the time, but is now Los Angeles. 100
years later the building is still there making paper
products.
Presently, this
building is one corner of a huge complex of
buildings, some of them very dilapidated. |
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On September 12, 1918 there was a U.S. Military
draft registration (the 3rd one of the war) for men
aged 18 through 45. Prior to this third draft, the
minimum age was 21. Elmer would have fallen into the
new category. Apparently, working at PABCO didn't
suit him, because he registered on the very day the
new draft went into effect, Sept 12, 1918. (He and
his brother Cyril registered at the same time.) It
seems he was immediately accepted, as the US
military was in desperate need of radio technicians,
but had no time to train them. He was stationed at
the Alameda U.S. Naval Base. The war was over "at
the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month of
1918."
Draft Card
According to Elmer, he attained the
title "Radio Mechanic, Maximum" while in the Navy.
Escaping both the war and the 1918 Spanish Flu
pandemic with his life, he was 20 years old when he
got his Amateur Radio license in 1919, with a call
sign of 6NW. (It wasn't until November of 1919 that
it became legal once again for an amateur to own a
transmitter.)
He never mentioned whether he had (or needed) a
license while in the Navy, but all radio licenses
for Amateurs had to be reissued in 1919. Since he
was at Alameda in 1919 he probably went to San
Francisco to take the test, which is a short
distance away. If he had been back in Los Angeles he
would have had to travel 382 miles back to San
Francisco. Millions of men were sent home after the
war, and by examining the dates of the known details
of his life, he had not been at the Naval base for
the whole two years of his enlistment. When he left
the navy he moved back home to his family at
Crockett Boulevard in Los Angeles.
1919 was during the age of the spark gap
transmitter. Elmer's first transmitter was a spark
plug coil from a Ford automobile that was fed with
an AC doorbell transformer. The tone changed during
transmission as the points got hot! His second
transmitter, which he called his "handsome homemade
rotary spark," was fed with a 1/2 kilowatt
transformer from Sears and Roebuck. At the first
press of the key the spark jumped to the shaft of
the motor, burning it out. One can imagine the look
on his face as the rapidly spinning motor slowly
came to a stop - permanently. Later he "got a new
rotary spark gap" and "proceeded to jam up the air."
There were only a handful of operators on the air
back then, and the best distance one could get was
about 30 miles. His self-designated call letters
were "EO" till the government made amateurs get a
license because they were having "too much fun."
NOTE: A spark gap transmitter basically transmitted
bursts of static. These bursts were created by
rapidly opening and closing the connection to the
low voltage side of an induction coil. Elmer used
the spark plug coil from a Ford, possibly a Model T.
(The coils were so plentiful that you can still buy
one today.) The tone was determined by how quickly
the circuit was interrupted, and this is probably
what Elmer's AC doorbell was used for. The rotary
spark transmitted a higher pitched tone, but it was
still just a controlled form of static.
When Elmer wrote that he "proceeded to jam up the
air" he wasn't kidding. These signals were so broad
that two transmitters operating within a short
distance of each other would drown each other out,
blanketing the airwaves with noise.
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A Ford Model T spark plug coil and an
antique doorbell. Of course, it wouldn't
have been antique in 1919.
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Not all Model
T coils look exactly like this one, but they
are similar. The Ford Model T had four
coils, each one in a wooden box. Millions of
Model Ts had been produced by 1919 so there
were plenty of coils to be had. There is a
vibrator mounted on the top to create a high
voltage spark, but Elmer used a doorbell
(hopefully, minus the bell). |
The "Pacific Radio News" issue of May 10, 1920 lists
Elmer as holding the radio call letters 6NW. He is
also listed in the "Citizen's Radio Call
Book" of November 1922 with the same call sign.

Listing in the May, 1920
issue of "Pacific Radio News" |
According
to "Amateur Stations of the United States," in 1920
and 1921 Elmer had a 1000 watt station at 8011
Crockett Street in Los Angeles. Elmer later wrote
that the power was actually 500 watts.
So, how did he fund his radio hobby, research and
experiments?

Osterhoudt entry in the 1920
Los Angeles City Directory. |
An entry in
the Los Angeles 1920 City Directory shows an E. G.
Osterhoudt working as a laborer at Hammond Lumber
Company. Both his father and his Uncle John (who
lived in the same house with Elmer) were carpenters,
and would probably know if a job became available at
a lumber yard. Though Hammond Lumber was about four
miles from his house on Crockett Blvd, Alameda
Street was only a few blocks away. A trolley car
could have transported him up Alameda Street in less
than a half an hour.
As for his roles at Majestic Electrical Products and
U. S. Motor Company, Elmer never mentioned these in
his writings, nor did he ever mention working in a
lumber or paper mill, nor did he mention how hard it
was for a veteran to find a job after the war.
Likewise, he never mentioned that in 1920 he was a
member of the California Academy of Sciences.
The January 1920 US Census shows Elmer working for a
power company in Fresno, CA as a wireless operator.
In June of 1920, he traveled to San Francisco hoping
to land a job as a radio operator aboard a ship. He
arrived on a Saturday. By Sunday he was down to his
last $20. By Monday he was employed at Southern
California Edison Company as a wireless operator.
Apparently, he wasn't there very long.
According to Elmer's application to the Society of
Wireless Pioneers, in 1920 he was at the RCA
wireless station at Marshall, California, about 40
miles north of San Francisco. Today the station is
an historic landmark in a park-like setting, but
when Elmer was there it was surrounded by barren
coast land. He was only there a week. In July of
1920 he finally obtained a wireless operator
position aboard a ship.
Elmer relates in MRL Data Sheets Vol. 6 that
in 1920, while in San Francisco and waiting to go to
sea, he had $25 and spent $20 of it on a Kodak
camera to take a picture of a Japanese ship named
"Tenyo Maru."
The Japanese
passenger liner SS Tenyo Maru docked at
San Francisco in 1920. The photo Elmer
took may have looked very much like this
one. This photograph was taken at the
Brannan Street Wharf in San Francisco on
October 5, 1920, which places Elmer at
this very spot around the same date.
Source.
Elmer may have had an interest in this
ship because it was the first turbine
driven steamship ever to enter the port
of San Francisco. It carried Asian
immigrants to Angel Island Immigration
Station, an island in San Francisco bay.
Note: In this photo the ship is docked
between piers 34 and 36. Built in 1909,
the piers have since collapsed and have
been replaced with a public park. |
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This crop from the 1920
Compton Union High School Alumni page shows
Elmer as a 1918 graduate. He's working for
Standard Oil. (Watts, CA is where he lived
when he attended the school.) Notice that
Elmer Stevens, whom we believe is the
neighbor boy who brought his radio to Elmer
Osterhoudt in 1915 (see top of page), is a
plumber.
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From 1920 to
1923 Elmer was at sea employed as a wireless radio
operator. On July 6, 1920 he was the operator aboard
the S. S. Rose City. This was a passenger ship named
after the city of Portland, Oregon.
On July 20, 1920 he was the radio operator on
"Standard Oil Barge 93."
On January 25, 1920 he served aboard a steam ship
named the J. A. Moffett, also owned by Standard Oil
of California. The J. A. Moffett, named after the
former president of Standard Oil of California, was
launched in 1914 and was the largest oil tanker in
the Pacific at the time. Elmer made $225 a month,
which he said was "good money." On November 2, 1920,
during the Harding-Cox presidential election, the
ship was docked at Vancouver, British Columbia. At
the request of the captain, Elmer remained at the
radio in contact with station NPG in San Francisco.
When the election was over he gave the Captain the
results, then left the ship and "ran up and down
Hastings Street."
In 1921 there
was some sort of strike, which backfired. The radio
operators lost $20 a month, and on July 21, 1921
Elmer ended up on a lumber scow named the
"Willamette." Apparently, life aboard the
Willamette wasn't very pleasant due to the light
ship lurching in the waves. Elmer wrote that he got
six meals a day; "three down and three up." A good
part of his time was spent "hanging over the rail."
(A Radio Service Bulletin dated October 1, 1921
lists a "Willamette" with a transmitter range of 200
miles. It had a Gray and Danielson radio. Gray and
Danielson, also known as Remler Company, was founded
in 1918 in San Francisco, so this seems to be the
correct ship. Searching on the Internet for
"Willamette" will lead you down many strange paths.)
On August 31, 1921, Elmer was aboard the tug named
"Sea Lion." In a newspaper article published by the
Oregon Daily Emerald on November 29, 1921 it
states that radio operator Elmer G. Osterhoudt is
working aboard the tug "Sea Lion," plying up and
down the Pacific coast, where he is also studying
botany and physiology. (He was taking a
correspondence course from the University of Oregon
at the time, ergo the newspaper article.)
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The
tugboat "Sea Lion," built in 1920 at the
Main Street Iron Works, San Francisco, CA. |
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On September 28, 1921, Elmer was in the radio room
of the SS Atlas, owned by Standard Oil Co. of
California. By June 17, 1922 he was aboard the
F. H. Hillman, an oil tanker built in 1921 at the
Alameda Works Shipyard, also owned by Standard Oil
of California.
From July 3, 1922 to September 4, 1923 he worked
aboard the "El Segundo," an oil tanker built in 1912
and owned by Standard Oil.

Entry from Radio Service Bulletin, US Department of
Commerce, January, 1915. Page 12.
(NOTE: Marconi Wireless was incorporated into the
Radio Corporation of America in October, 1919)
Though the SS Atlas, the J. A. Moffett, the F. H.
Hillman and the El Sugundo were owned by Standard
Oil , Elmer actually worked for RCA. Elmer wrote
that in the 1920s he reported to a Chief Radio
Operator named Dick Johnson, who worked for RCA. On
the next page is a letter Elmer wrote while aboard
the ship, signed "care of Radio Corporation of
America."
Aboard ship, Elmer was known as "Sparks," a common
nickname for the radio operator. Elmer wrote that he
"quit" in 1923. By then, almost every other ship on
the Pacific coast was a Japanese cargo ship. Elmer
wrote, "After an OP spends several years at sea, he
gets sick of the monotony of sea life and looks for
a land station job."
In addition to the correspondence course in botany
he took from the University of Oregon, he was
enrolled in a correspondence course in Pharmacy
during his time at sea. In Elmer's own vague words,
"Read up on Pharmacy for 2 yrs. with phones on." He
attended one semester of USC College of Pharmacy in
Los Angeles. Afterwards he became "official janitor"
(his own words) in a drug store, and contemplated
the idea of owning his own drug store. His ham shack
sat on a property he owned. Elmer wrote, "I had a
lot with my 6NW on the back." He sold the lot for
$1000. With that and the money he saved while at sea
(he called it Ship money), he opened a store.
Thankfully, it wasn't a drug store.
In January
of 1924 he opened the "Nadeau Radio Electric Shop."
We have an address for this shop from the
Los Angeles Times as 1928 East Nadeau Street.
This was just up the block and around the corner
from Elmer's house at 8011 Crockett Boulevard! In
Radio Builder & Hobbyist #38, Elmer related that
he built many crystal sets while at this location,
and sold them with a cabinet for $15.00 (equivalent
to about $270.00 in 2023.)
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This advertisement, from
the Los Angeles Times, is dated June
18, 1922.
It
seems the Nadeau Radio Electric Shop already
existed before Elmer took it over in 1924.
According to the 1922-1923 Los Angeles
directory, it was owned by Lou and Eva Kipp.
Their residence was next door at 1930 East
Nadeau Street. On the other side of the
radio shop, at 1926 Nadeau, was a hardware
store owned by William Kipp. The buildings
no longer exists.
After selling the Nadeau Avenue store to
Elmer, Louis Kipp opened another radio and
electric supplies shop at 1749 E. Florence
Ave, two blocks away from the Nadeau
address. |
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This correspondence to "The Practical
Druggist" is dated December 27, 1923. Elmer
opened the Nadeau Radio Electric Shop
a month later. Modern Radio Laboratories may
never have appeared in 1932 if Elmer had
opened a drugstore instead of a radio store.
The country was in the middle of what is
known as the "radio craze" of the 1920s,
which certainly would have influenced his
decision. |
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Later in
1924 Elmer moved the radio shop to Manchester Avenue
in Los Angeles, and named it the "Manchester
Radio Electric Shop." This shop was one mile
from his house. He worked in the store from 9AM till
9PM six days a week, and a half day on Sunday.
According to Elmer, (Radio Notes No.1, page 16 and
MRL Data Sheets Vol 3, Page 11) he made hundreds of
Harkness Reflex sets. Back then you could trade in
your old radio when purchasing a new one. Elmer
would disassemble the old sets and build a Harkness
Reflex using his own coils. He then added a power
supply, batteries, a cabinet and a speaker, and sold
them for $65. He was also a dealer of
Stewart-Warner, Federal, Sparton, Ungar & Watson,
Edison, Grebe, and Majestic brand radios.
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In
various issues of "Radio News" and QST
magazine, it was reported that the call sign
6NW was heard all over the country
from 1925 to 1928. 6NW was also heard in
Venezuela, Japan, Alaska, and even on a
submarine docked at a port in Honolulu,
Hawaii. 6NW made the "Brass Pounders League"
in the March 1926 issue of QST with 117
contacts.
However, these contacts weren't made
by Elmer Osterhoudt. Elmer had been issued
the call letters 6NW in 1919. The
call 6NW
was reassigned sometime around 1922
to James F. Upchurch of Vallejo, California.
The March 1922 issue of
Radio contains a report from station
7LR in Albany, Oregon, of stations he
received. One of them was 6NW. It was likely
James Upchurch who was heard.
In 1924, 6NW was assigned to Emry C. Stuedle
of Vermont Street in Los Angeles,
California. Emry Stuedle seems to be the
person who made the contacts heard all over
the world.
Elmer apparently let his license lapse. At
the time, he was a radio operator working
aboard various ships at sea and would have
been unable to renew it. Coincidently (or
not) when he opened the Manchester Radio and
Electric Shop in 1924 it was also the end of
the era of the spark-gap transmitter.
In December 1915, the year Elmer made his
first crystal set, the Bureau of Navigation
had issued 6NW to Morrison R. Webb, of 541
18th Street in Oakland, CA. Imagine if Elmer
had heard 6NW instead of 6JG on that fateful
day, then ended up with the first call
letters he ever heard!
Early call letters were frequently
reassigned. Since the first digit
represented the area of the country, there
were only two letters available for the call
sign in each of nine districts. California
was "6." There are 676 combinations of the
26 letters in the alphabet (26 x 26).
However, the letters X, Y and Z were not
used as the first letter, limiting the
number to 598. The number of stations
quickly exceeded that amount and a third
letter was added in the 1920s. 6NW became
W6NW some time between 1928 and 1929.
Three letter combinations beginning with the
letters K, N, W, X, Y and Z were not used,
as well as "SOS" and "PRB." Also not used
were calls beginning with "QR" or "QS," as
well as anything determined to be vulgar or
objectionable. This still left over 10,000
call signs per district. |
Elmer wrote that the Amateur Radio guys wanted him
to set up a station in his shop, but he refused
because the shop would always be full of loiterers
and no work would get done. He said that calling
"CQ" far into the night would be a waste of time
that could be put to other uses. "Running a radio
shop took all your time if you wanted to stay in
business."
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In 1924 Elmer's radio store, the
Manchester Radio Electric Shop, was located at 1522
Manchester Avenue in Los Angeles. Manchester Avenue was
renamed East Firestone Boulevard around 1927, after the Firestone Tire & Rubber Co
opened a factory on a 40 acre site
about a mile away on the same street. The city directories
for the Watts-Compton area of California show the store was
there till 1928. Elmer moved to Oakland CA later in 1928. |
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From "Radio Doings" March 20, 1927 |
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From "Radio Doings" November 25, 1928 |
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1522 Firestone Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA.
Site of the Manchester Radio Electric Shop in 1924.
Photo from 2011.
Firestone Boulevard was named Manchester Avenue prior to
1927. |
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1522 Firestone Boulevard in 2021. According
to Paul Nelson, Elmer's father Wilbert built this building. |
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Watts-Compton City directory entries for
1927. The "r" next to the address number indicates this was
Elmer's residence. The other Osterhoudt's all lived on
Crockett Boulevard. |
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Elmer had at least two salesmen working
for him. In 1925 Victor E. Harvlie, who was an electrician,
worked in the store. In 1927 Victor left to work at Graham
Electric Shop, two blocks away at 1704 Manchester Ave.
(Notice the name doesn't have the word "Radio" in it. They
occupied a large building at the corner of Manchester and
Graham.) Victor was replaced by Herman MacMillian in 1927. |
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Two electricians worked for Elmer in
1927/28. Barnette's address was three blocks from the store. |
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In 1928 Elmer moved to
Brooklyn Township, in Alameda County, Oakland,
California. He moved the radio shop to 5805 Foothill
Boulevard,
two blocks away from where his brother Cyril
lived with his wife Ellen Leona Peer on Kingsley Circle.
Cyril was a radio repairman.
Elmer never mentioned Foothill
Boulevard in any of his
literature, or whether Cyril ever worked with him. The
address is now a Walgreens. Whatever building was there in
1928 is long gone. Around this time, the rest of the
Osterhoudt family moved from 8011 Crockett Blvd to 8019
Crockett Blvd.
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An advertisement in the Oakland Tribune
(September 25,1929) for Spartan radio dealers gives us the name of
the store. A similar ad for Grebe radio states the shop is open in
the evenings and a telephone call will "bring a set tonight."
Notice the address. |
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An advertisement in Broadcast Weekly magazine
(May 17, 1929) for Spartan radio dealers gives us the same address.
Elmer and Mabel lived at 5809 Foothill Blvd, while the store was at
5805 Foothill Blvd. If they lived on Foothill Blvd it was only for a
short time.
They moved to 2125 E 28th
Street in 1928.
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On October 7, 1929, Elmer and Mabel Elizabeth Smith were
married by Rev. C. O. Lundquist in the Ebenezer Evangelical
Lutheran Church in San Francisco, and they moved into the
new house on 28th Street, in Oakland.
The church at the time had a Swedish congregation.
Mabel's mother (maiden name Alma Anderson) was born in
Sweden.
Ebenezer Swedish Evangelical Lutheran Church in
San Francisco.
This church survived the earthquake of 1906 but
burnt down in 1993. |
This was a time of unprecedented prosperity and
innovation in the United States. What a great time to get
married! In addition to the booming radio business, the
Osterhoudt's could look forward to a life of new inventions;
everything from an electric washing machine, refrigerator
and vacuum cleaner to sliced bread and Penicillin, and even
a personal Kodak motion picture camera. The most exciting
news was that Television had evolved from a system of motors
and spinning disks to an electronic version invented by
Philo T. Farnsworth. Soon, everyone would be able to "see by
wireless" in their own homes, and The Manchester Radio
Electric Shop could add the word "Television" to its name.
The future must have appeared very promising.
Two weeks after they were married the stock market
crashed, followed by the Great Depression. Sales of
clothing, cars and radios collapsed. Industrial production
fell by 47% and nearly 25% of American households did not
have a single employed wage earner. Business became so bad
Elmer decided to go back to sea. He spent a month at Pacific
Radio School brushing up on his code. but when he tried to
get a job at RCA on a ship, the Chief Radio Operator
laughed. There were 150 guys on a list waiting for the same
job.
The US Census shows that by April, 1930, Cyril and Leona had
two children, Everett and Raymond. They lived at 510 28th
Street in Oakland with two of Leona's brothers, Virgil and
Frank Peer. Cyril is listed as being a Radio Mechanic in a
radio shop, but he was not working at the time of the
census. (The address is now a parking lot.)
Later in 1930 Cyril and Leona moved back to
Los Angeles, to 8019½
Crockett Boulevard, where Elmer and Cyril's father,
stepmother, uncle John, and four brothers and sisters lived.
On June 18, 1930, John Osterhoudt passed away. Cyril and
Leona were officially married on August 23, 1930. On
December 3, 1930, Elmer's father Wilbert passed away.
To add to the misery, Mabel's mother passed away on April 1,
1930. She was 52.
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Alma Anderson
Smith - Mabel's mother. |
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Elmer kept the
radio shop open but moved it from Foothill Boulevard to 1508
23rd Avenue, much closer to where they lived. No longer
named Manchester Radio Electric Shop, the new store was
named Modern Radio Laboratories. In 1932 he
"invented" the celluloid plug-in coil and the No.1 and No.2
crystal sets. The trademarks for MRL and Modern
Radio Laboratories were granted on December 15, 1932.
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The store phone number, from the 1932 Yellow
Pages. |
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1508 23rd Avenue, Oakland, CA (second
door from the left) This was the site of the "Modern Radio
Laboratories" radio store in 1932.
Modern Radio Laboratories was born the same year, so the
name of the radio store preceded the name of the company.
Photo is from 2016.
This building was less than a mile from Elmer and Mabel's
residence. The building was built in 1891 and renovated in
1911, so we can imagine it looked very much like this in
1932. It currently contains 10 one bedroom apartments. |
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1508 is the downstairs
apartment/storefront. Of course, there wouldn't have been
bars on the windows in 1932. The store was only here for a
short time. By 1934 The Osterhoudt's were in San Francisco.
20 years later Elmer and Mabel would own an entire 9 unit
apartment complex of their own in Redwood City, California. |
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Year 1933 Oakland, California City Directory entry.
Notice h2125 E 28th is their home address. |
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Here's the home phone number. |
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Elmer and Mabel Osterhoudt's residence at 2125 East
28th Street, Oakland, CA.
The house was built in 1928, the year Elmer moved into it.
This address is about 1 mile from the 23rd Ave store location. |
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From RADIO magazine, June 1933. The address is
Elmer's radio store.
$1.00 in 1933 is the equivalent of $20.00 in 2020. |
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1934 San Francisco phone book entry
1938 San Francisco directory entry
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In 1933 Elmer and
Mabel closed the radio shop and moved to 151 Liberty Street
in San Francisco, owned by Mabel's parents. (Mabel lived
there before meeting Elmer.) Modern Radio Laboratories was
now a mail order business. In 1938 Elmer and Mabel moved
back to Oakland and opened another store, once again named
Modern Radio Laboratories.
The 1934 Los Angeles directory lists Cyril Osterhoudt in the
section for "Radio Sets and Supplies - Retail." The address
was 7705 S. Central Ave, about one mile from the Osterhoudt
residence on Crockett Blvd. The location is now a parking
lot. It lists Cyril's home address as 8610½ Compton Avenue.
That address no longer exists, but it seems it was within
100 feet of 1522 Manchester Avenue, the site of Elmer's
Manchester Radio Electric Shop ten years earlier. More
mysteriously, in 1932 8610 Compton Ave was the home of
"Western States Radio Repairs," owned by William Mack. |
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Mabel Elizabeth Smith, age 23.
Photo from her passport, March, 1923. Brown hair, brown
eyes, 5' 1" tall. |
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MRL Mystery: From
1924 to 1928 Elmer's radio store was in Los Angeles,
California. In 1928 he moved to Oakland, California.
On October 6, 1929 he married Mabel Smith of San
Francisco, in a Lutheran church in San Francisco.
San Francisco isn't far from Oakland, but it's 380
miles from Los Angeles. How and when did they meet?
According to the Osterhoudt's marriage license,
witnesses to the wedding were Elmer's brother Cyril,
and Robert Lee Sala of 106 10th Avenue in San
Francisco. Who was Robert Lee Sala? It turns out
there was nobody with that name present at the
wedding!
There is a mistake on the Osterhoudt's marriage
license. Robert Sala was actually Roberta Sala. She
was 24 years old at the time, and worked as a nurse
in a hospital. Her maiden name was Chapman, daughter
of Robert Chapman. She was divorced, living with her
parents, and had an infant baby. Logically, she was
a friend of Mabel's, since Elmer wasn't from San
Francisco.
Trivia: The San Francisco - Oakland Bay Bridge and
the Golden Gate Bridge did not exist in 1929. Trips
to San Francisco from Oakland were made by ferry or
by driving all the way around the bay. |
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In summary... |
1899 - |
Elmer Osterhoudt is born
to Wilbert and Minnie Osterhoudt in Butte
Creek, Scotts Mills, Oregon.
The Osterhoudt family, consisting of Charles
Higby Osterhoudt, his sons Henry, Wilbert,
and John, Minnie and Elmer, all live in the
same farmhouse. |
1901 - |
Elmer's brother Cyril is
born. |
1902 - |
The entire family moves
to Spokane, Washington. |
1903 - |
Charles, Wilbert, Minnie,
Elmer and Cyril (and possibly Henry and
John) move to Yakima City, Washington.
Elmer's grandfather, Charles Osterhoudt,
dies in April, age 73.
Elmer's mother, Minnie Osterhoudt, dies in
September, age 27, of typhoid fever. |
1904 - |
Wilbert, Elmer, Henry and
John move to Vancouver, Washington.
John marries Lillie Shields and moves to
Enterprise, OR. |
190 - ? |
Wilbert, Elmer, and Henry
move to Eugene, Oregon. John, Lillie, and
their three children eventually move there
as well. |
1908 - |
Wilbert is part owner of
a planing mill in Eugene, Oregon. Elmer is
enrolled in Eugene High School.
Wilbert's brothers Henry and John work at
the mill. |
1911 - |
Wilbert marries Lela May
Smith. Cyril is reunited with his father and
Elmer around this time. |
1914 - |
Wilbert and Lela May are
divorced. |
1915 - |
Wilbert moves to Los
Angeles with Elmer, Cyril, Alice Shields,
and their new daughter, Wilda. Wilbert and
Alice get married there. Elmer builds his
first working crystal radio. |
1917 - |
The US enters WWI. It is
illegal to own a radio or erect an antenna.
The Osterhoudt's move to Fullerton, CA.
Elmer attends Fullerton Union High School
and pursues biology and entomology. |
1918 - |
Elmer graduates Compton
High School. He works at Southern Board and
Paper mills.
In September Elmer and Cyril join the US
Navy. Elmer is a radio technician (Cyril may
be one as well). WWI ends in November. |
1919 - |
Elmer obtains an amateur
radio license with call letters 6NW. |
1920 - |
Elmer is employed as a
laborer at Hammond Lumber Company in Los
Angeles.
Elmer is employed as a wireless operator at
a power company in Fresno, CA.
Elmer is employed as a radio operator at
Southern California Edison Co. in San
Francisco. |
1920 to |
1923 - Elmer is employed
by RCA as a radio operator aboard 8
different ships. |
1924 - |
Elmer is employed in a
drug store, where he gets the idea to open a
store of his own.
Elmer opens the
Nadeau Radio Electric Shop
in Los Angeles, around the corner from the
Osterhoudt residence..
Elmer moves the store to 1522 East
Manchester Ave and renames it Manchester
Radio Electric Shop |
1928 - |
Elmer moves to 28th
Street in Oakland and opens a radio store on
Foothill Boulevard. It is still named
Manchester Radio Electric Shop. His
brother Cyril (a radio repairman) lives two
blocks away from the store with his wife,
Leona. |
1929 - |
October 6 - Elmer marries
Mabel Smith. They live at the 28th Street
address in Oakland.
October 28 - The stock market crashes and
the Great Depression begins. |
1930 - |
Wilbert and John
Osterhoudt both pass away, as does Mabel's
mother. Cyril and Leona move back to the
Osterhoudt
residence in Los Angeles. |
1932 - |
Elmer moves the radio
store to 23rd Avenue in Oakland. It is named
Modern Radio Laboratories.
He "invents" the celluloid coil form in
1932, which becomes the basis of a mail
order business. (See page 7)
"Modern Radio Laboratories" is trademarked
in December. |
1933 - |
Elmer and Mabel move to
Mabel's old home, an apartment owned by
Mabel's father at 151 Liberty Street in San
Francisco.
(Note: The radio store has closed at this
time. They will remain in San Francisco till
nearly the end of the Great Depression. In
1938 they move back to Oakland and open a
radio store on 14th Street. During WWII this
store also closes, and Elmer works once
again for the US Navy. The store never
reopens, and they move to Hayward, CA in
1944. More details on the following pages.)
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Modern
Radio Laboratories was a mail-order company. You
mailed your order to MRL and Elmer sent the order
through the US mail back to you. Most of the MRL
advertising consisted of sometimes vague three or
four line advertisements in radio magazines. His
"business plan" was brilliant and will be explored
on Page 6.
Long after the crystal radio was made obsolete by
the regen radio, the Superheterodyne and FM, Elmer
Osterhoudt via MRL continued to sell radio parts,
kits and plans to crystal set "fans" who made their
own radios. According to Elmer, the "golden age" of
the crystal radio ended in 1924. As time marched on
and many parts became commercially unavailable, he
made them himself.
Of paramount importance to him was keeping the cost
down for the experimenters who bought from MRL.
Elmer wrote that nobody can make money by cutting a
small piece of plywood and reeling off 15¢ of magnet
wire, but he knew what the "Dabbler" was up against
when he had to buy a 4x8 sheet of plywood or "buy
out the company" because he needed a few feet of
wire.
Elmer spent 54 years making radio parts by hand. He
may have been an artisan, but he wasn't was an
artist in the ink on paper sense of the word. He
admitted his handwriting was awful. There are
hundreds of drawings in his catalogs and handbooks
but unless you know what the parts look like, the
drawings are hard to fathom. On the rest of this
site we'll compare some actual MRL parts with the
drawings.
This is not to criticize Elmer's drawing skills. If
he had taken a drawing class perhaps his catalog and
handbooks wouldn't possess the uniqueness they do.
Instead, the goal is to show what a fine product
you got compared to the drawing of the same product
in the catalog. Those of us still alive who
purchased from MRL will see what they were actually
looking at in the catalog. Unfortunately, most of
the 10,000 MRL customers have already passed away,
along with Elmer and Mabel.
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WAIT! |
To fully
appreciate the MRL products shown here, you
may want to look at an actual catalog
published by Elmer Osterhoudt. |
CLICK HERE. |
See you back
in an hour. |
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Welcome back! Did you
see that guy on Page A-5? For years I wondered if
that was Elmer. Why would EO have a picture of some
random guy in the catalog? It's NOT him. It's a
radio operator at a police station. Elmer took the
picture from a National Radio Institute publication. |
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His name was Donald H. Peters of Findlay,
Ohio.
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Here's another MRL mystery: Did Elmer take a
course in radio repair? Only NRI graduates received National
Radio-TV News. Where did he get his copy? The entry in the
catalog advertises HB-11, "Radio Operating as a Career,"
which was copyrighted in 1961, but this photo is from 1951.
The photo also appears on page 5 of the handbook. |
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This is
the only picture of a human being in all of Elmer's
surviving library of literature. Why did Elmer
choose this picture? Did Donald Peters resemble
Elmer? According to his 1942 draft card, Elmer was
5' 10" tall, weighed 195 pounds, and had a light
complexion with blonde hair and blue eyes. (His 1918
draft card stated he had light brown hair.) The ship
manifest from the J. A. Moffett, dated January 28,
1922 states he weighed 175 pounds, so he gained 20
pounds in 20 years!
In one of his publications Elmer stated that he
might include a photo of Mabel and himself in a
future edition. Whether he did or not is one more
MRL mystery. |
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