Classic Hifi Care

So you remember when you walked into a restaurant and there was a pie case sitting by the checkout stand? This fan sat on the pie case of a local restaurant in Missouri, the biggest, most popular restaurant in town. This fan ran 24-7 for probably 40 years. I don't ever remember being in that restaurant when this fan was not running. It shook so badly, the glass and pie plates in the pie case would rattle. The husband and wife owners got older, one passed away, so the family decided to close the restaurant. I bought the most famous fan in the county at auction for $3. It had the reputation of shaking so badly, folks figured it was no good. When I looked at the fan before I bought it, there was grease and dirt built up on the edges of the blade so deeply it caused the fan to shake. You can see where I chipped the dirt off the edges of the blades. The fan now runs perfectly quiet and runs strong. It is still covered with a layer of cooking grease, in spite of my efforts to clean it. IT needs a bath in acetone and then a good repaint. I thought you guys might enjoy seeing it.

Did it get some service from time to time like a bit of oil for the bearings, or did it get along with original lube? There is much to be said for durable goods, no? I am astonished by how much trash piles have grown during my lifetime. People buy stuff with the expectation that it will be just tossed out in a couple years. And they are right--much of it is not repairable nor long-lived.

Your pix also revealed your line of little radios above your bench instruments. Show us some more photos of the inhabitants of that shop. In my old age I've developed a respect for the little radios. Once my Dad came upon a "radio collection" for sale--a couple boxes of AA5 radios, some AA5 + 1, and a few Zenith AM/FMs. He bought 'em all for me for a few bucks. I did an internal eye roll but now look at them as fun little projects and often as surprising performers, given the slender parts counts in the newer ones.

Was there some unwritten law that all restaurants with counter service had to have a fan up behind?

Chris Campbell

When I had the auction, I sold 228 radios and almost 50 fans. I kept "about a dozen" of the best performing little radios, and about six of the big metal fans. My "about a dozen" small radios actually is 50 on the nose. They all work well, with a couple of exceptions. But they all basically sorta work. I kept eight console radios plus my Magnavox stuff. The only small radio I own anybody would be interested in is the Coke radio. The rest are AA5's and AA6's, many plastic, all orphans, none "desirable". I have the little Emerson 522 my grandpa bought me in 1955 so I'd keep my hands off grandma's radios. And I have grandma's radios.....

Knowing the family that owned the restaurant, the Hunter fan never got cleaned, let alone receive any maintenance. I'd say whatever lube it had when it went up on the pie safe is still probably what it came with from the factory. All the equipment from that restaurant that sold in the auction was well-used and in serious need of cleaning and maintenance. The oscillating feature quit working, or was disabled, so the fan is "clocked" 180 opposed on its base. The nameplae is in the front, it should be in the rear.

There are probably a few people for each one of those small radios who remember particular models for the influence they had on their lives. That's what got me started restoring. Radios that I remember from my youth. One that I have wanted but haven't gotten was the first working tube radio I bought at a yard sale for something like a quarter. A Westinghouse H126 "Little Jewel" radio. It seems to have become an antique as I have become one, it becoming expensive as I have become cheap.

I have a soft spot for things most people turn their noses up at. And I like the big metal fans. They seem to run forever and are ruggedly dependable.

That is a cute radio, Rex, and I can see why you want one. After Googling it to see what it looks like I found that it is all so called the refrigerator radio. Looking at it, I can see why. I have never seen one but will keep my eyes peeled.

Bill