A Stolen Crystal Set

and still is.

My brother at that time had a paper round and use to get up early each morning and so he began to earn his own money. I remember him obtaining all sorts of new things like writing cases, pens, pencils, ink cartridges, etc. all the little things one would like but could not afford. I soon realized that my brother was not buying them but stealing them from the shop where he worked.

On the odd occasion I would go and help him deliver the papers. I enjoyed this as it took me to places I had never been before.

On one occasion we had to deliver papers to a hospital or residential home, and around the back of the building we could see the kitchens and we helped our selves to the cakes, which had been freshly cooked. I learn from my brother how easy it was to get things I wanted.

I always looked up to my brother and often envied the things he did and had. I remember him going to Switzerland, with the school and him coming home with all kinds of goods. Like a walking stick, flick knives, and badges etc. Flick knives were illegal and to have a flick knife was a good thing.

My brother soon got in to bows and arrows, and air rifles and pistols swords and sheath knives, which seemed good to me. In fact we use to hide all these weapons under the floorboards in our shed, which was at the bottom of our garden.

At this time I remember my mum and dad buying me a new bike. It was a red Californian, with curved crossbars etc. I thought it was great and was ever so pleased with it. One day the bike went missing, and I knew some one had taken it, so I was very upset.

When I went out looking for it I noticed up the road an accident had taken place, as there were cars stopped and people milling around. To my horror I saw my nice new bike crumpled and just lying at the side of the road. The boy who had taken it had been knocked off the bike and was lying in the road awaiting an ambulance and every one was trying to take care of him.

I thought to my self never mind about him, as he had stolen my bike, but look at my new bike, all bent. I was very upset. No one however took any notice of me, neither were they concerned about my bike being damaged. The boy’s name was Michael Abbes and we had been friends until recently and I seem to remember that he had broken his legs in the accident.

A Stolen Crystal Set

My interest in radio, which we now call electronics, started the day I heard a crystal set operate. I must have been 10 or 11 years old.

My mum and dad belonged to the Camping Club of Great Britain and

48 every weekend we would go camping to Chertsey, where we had a tent pitched.

One weekend my brother stole a crystal set from a camper’s tent. It consisted of a small tuning capacitor in a blue plastic case and a crystal diode, together with a set of headphones. I was amazed as it worked and became interested in radio from that day forward.

Camping at Chertsey

Dad at Chertsey Camp-site Dad By Our Canoe

I sent away for a set of parts to build a two transistor reflex receiver, and put the thing together as best I could. I wired the circuit as I thought the diagram showed, and crushed it all together to fit inside its plastic case. It didn’t work and I was most disappointed. I didn’t realize that all the wires were shorted together when I crushed it into the plastic case. Another friend of mine’s dad helped me out. He was a radio technician in the Royal Air force and he rebuilt the receiver and showed me how to wire circuits up. From that time I began to learn about how things worked and taught my self-many things with the help of others.

Another friend of mine had a dad who had a radio workshop and I was very envious of all the equipment that he had in his garage. I remember the boy being confident enough to take apart out of an old radio for me, without any sense of fear. I was quite impressed. I taught my self quite a lot and began to learn about transistors.

One day on the way home from school we climbed over the fence of someone’s back garden and discovered a shed full of radio parts, and equipment. There were valves, tuning condensers, transformers etc., we took what we wanted and thought no more of it.

This hobby was to last me a long time and helped me to get a job in radio and television servicing and to Technical College at a later date. During this time I had no sense or knowledge of God and I had stopped going to Sunday school.