Greenfield, IN & Milwaukee, WI Radio Shows

I am now back in Milwaukee after my extended travels (see previous blog posts for details). The Greenfield, IN radio swap meet was well worth going to, the weather was fantastic (lower 80's) and there were about a dozen or so dealers set up. I ended up purchasing a number of vintage hi-fi related items, including a very nice pair of Craftsmen tube amplifiers, in addition to a National HAM radio and an RCA Radiola III radio. I spent approximately 3-hours at that show and then made my way back to Milwaukee. Upon arriving in Milwaukee, I had to unload all of my purchases and then reload the van with the items I was going to be selling at the Milwaukee radio show the next day. Overall, it was quite a work out. I was able to take it easy for the rest of the night so that I was well rested in order to get up at 5:30am on Sunday so that my wife and I could setup at the Milwaukee radio swap meet by about 6:30am. The good news was that this particular radio show in Milwaukee is probably the closet show to our home, which means it takes less than 30-minutes to get to it. The Milwaukee show is usually one of the smallest ones I attend however, due to the great weather (upper-70's) for this time of year, there were more dealers setup than usual (approximately 8 to 10) in addition, there was actually one dealer who was from Minnesota and a couple from Illinois. I purchased a relatively rare Fairchild hi-fi amplifier in addition to a RCA console radio and a few other nice items. Unfortunately, my wife and I did not sell anything at this particular show. We actually left the show a bit earlier than usual due to the fact that we were approached by a gentleman who was attempting to get rid of a 1950's console radio, which he had been trying to dispose of since the beggining of summer. Once I got more details on what he had, I jumped at the chance to take it off of his hands. When my wife and I arrived at this persons home, which was only about 5-minutes from our own home, we found that this large console radio was in his basement. At first we thought we would just carry it up the stairs and right into our mini-van. However, this item was so heavy that that would have been impossible. So we literally took the console apart, piece by piece, in this man's basement. In the end, I was happy that this is the way it turned out since, I was planning on taking the console apart anyway, because I was mainly intersted in the amplifiers, speakers, and tuner in the unit and, it was much easier taking it apart in this man's airconditioned basement, as it would have been in our unairconditioned garage. Once the unit was apart, it was much easier to carry the cabinet up the stairs and into our van. Overall, I was very happy with the parts I got from the unit. Anyway, my next planned trip will probably be for the November 8th Radio Swap Meet in Kalamazoo, MI. However, I do know that there is an antique radio auction comming up in Ohio on October 25th, so who knows if that will be too much of an attraction for me to pass up. In any event, stay tuned for more adventures.....