Tech Blog

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Dust off the Wayback Machine Sherman, we're going back a few years with this one. Following on Buzz's earlier post, I thought I'd introduce you to one of my most memorable gifts.

In the last half of the previous century, technology was simpler. Computer circuits were just coming into their own on a piece of silicone called an IC, or Integrated Circuit - a chip.

 Budding young hobbyists wanting to learn this arcane art of electronics had one great omnibus took to help them out - the Radio Shack / Tandy 100-in-1 Electronic Project Kit.

For me, this was one of the coolest things to get for Christmas, even better than a chemistry set!

Basically it was a big wooden frame box, with a lot of 1970's era state-of-the-art electronics mounted in cardboard.

A large manual with the fabled 100 projects came with it. Each project was a recipe for electronics exploration and understanding.

That book really taught me some of the basics I'd use later when I explored computer programming, but that's a tale for another post.

To build a project was simple. Each component is soldered to a short wire spring. By running wire between the springs, you completed circuits between components.

An ingenious, inexpensive and safe way to let kids play with stuff that normally required a hot soldering iron.

My brother and I spent many hours over a few years building and rebuilding projects in that kit. Of course, we'd eventually try hooking it up to parts of radios we'd also disassembled, but somehow that never worked out as expected.

I'm sure we wore that kit out, then moved on to other things that young mad scientists boys enjoy, like Model Rocketry, astronomy, and maybe even girls.

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Images for this post graciously provided byJonathan Warfield at RC/GrabBag. He's in the process of scanning and sharing the original kit manual - check his blog post for the PDF and updates.

Message Edited by bgrier on 12-23-2009 12:50 AM