Guy’s History Book: Your Car Radio

Let’s Tune Out by Turning on the Radio

Today’s cars are more technologically advanced than ever before. They are safer, more efficient and burn fuel cleaner than any other cars in history.  They also have some of the most advanced audio systems around — not just in cars, but high end systems strive to be compared to the best in-house systems to be found.  And while audiophiles may find that idea ludicrous it cannot be denied that in-car audio systems are better than ever.  Automakers are also using in-car audio and electronics as main selling points for their vehicles.  Acura touts its ELS Sound System (crafted by a Grammy winner — and no, not Lady Gaga), Ford and Microsoft teamed up to create Sync, and almost all high-end luxury makers have some sort of fancy third-party audio system from Harmon-Kardon or Bang & Olufsen, etc.  The way you listen to your entertainment  in your car is part of the modern car market for better (hard drives) or worse (“infotainment” as a word).  But this technological explosion of the past 5 years, along with countless other advances before then would never have happened unless somebody had thought to try to put a radio in a car.

Although “firsts” can always be debated, apparently the first person to do this on a commercial level was one Paul V. Galvin of the Galvin Manufacturing Corporation.  In 1930, after his company spent a solid month building and testing the radio (which was surprisingly complicated – think vacuum tubes and separate batteries and think of those big wooden chest size radios people had in their homes at the time), he drove his Studebaker outfitted with the radio from Chicago, IL to Atlantic City, NJ to demonstrate that it both worked and the system was sturdy enough to survive a long trip.  Paul was also driving it to New Jersey for a convention of the Radio Manufacturers Association of America but, because his company was very small, he was not registered and he did not have a booth. He just parked his car outside of the front entrance, opened the car doors, and turned up the volume.  He drummed up interest (his wife helped) and gained enough sales orders to start producing radios for cars.  He drove back to Chicago and knew that he would need a new a marketable name for his brand of car radios that he hoped would be a success.  The name he came up with is one you might have heard of:  Motorola.  Needless to say, he did pretty well with that name.

He just parked his car outside of the front entrance, opened the car doors, and turned up the volume.

However, even with this great achievement, the first car radios were pretty basic – the Motorola 5T71 was the first successful commercial model and it had to be installed after the car was purchased – it cost about 110 dollars, which today is about 1700 dollars – and it only received an AM signal. It had one speaker, no seek function and definitely no way to remember your favorite stations.  But radio was extremely popular in the 1930′s and 40′s (think ‘Fireside chats’ and Edward R. Murrow) and people loved having the ability to listen to music and news events in their car.

Finally by the 1950′s car radios had the ability to “seek” and stop on a station that had a good signal. Believe it or not ,the control for this was on the floor of the car where the ‘dead pedal’ is in today’s vehicles.  Cars also gained the ability to play other forms of media during the 60′s and 70′s with reel-to-reel tapes, eight-tracks and the ubiquitous cassette tape.  By the 1970′s, solid state electronics took the place of vacuum tubes, making installation easier.  Meanwhile, FM stations gained popularity due to their clearer signal,  and by the 1980′s the FM stations played almost all music, relegating AM stations to mostly broadcasts of talk radio.

During the late 80′s and throughout the 90′s aftermarket installations of head-units and speakers became very popular and companies like Alpine and Pioneer were constantly trying to one-up the competition with better sound and better technology (and bigger subwoofers).  Today, almost all upscale in-car audio equipment, even with third party branding, is installed by the auto makers themselves – although the popularity of shows like SEMA does indicate a strong interest in aftermarket modification beyond what the automakers bring to the table.

Car audio is like any other technology – very humble with very primitive roots that have grown and expanded into something the inventors could never have imagined.  The only questions that remain are: what do I listen to?  What are the best songs for driving?