Portable Phone circa 1955

Air Trails March 1955

Portable Phone c.1955, Air Trails March 1955 - RF CafeSending texts must have been a real challenge on this early portable phone. Aside from having to type out your message on a standard telephone keypad (oh, the humanity), the baud rate must have been snail-like. The article doesn't mention whether dropped calls were a big issue and whether there was a massive marketing plan with a bespectacled "Can You Hear Me now?" guy. I'm just kidding, of course. This news item appeared in a 1955 edition of Air Trails: A woman speaks on a Bag Phone in the 1980s - RF CafeHobbies for Young Men. Before you laugh at the Portaphone's dipole antenna and carrying case, consider that it was only a little over two decades ago that Motorola debuted its famous M800 "Bag Phone" (user's manual).

From the magazine: "Portable two-way radio phone for use in homes, office buildings, construction jobs or farms, operating on "citizens band"  designed by A. Fuller Dean of Chicago. Called Portaphone, set has a range of 8 to 12 miles in open spaces, 800 yards within steel buildings. Power supplied by dry cell battery earned in plastic bag."

Below is the Portaphone as pictured in the March 1955 edition of Air Trails: Hobbies for Young Men:

Portable Phone Circa 1955, Air Trails March 1955 - RF Cafe   Air Trails Hobbies for Young Men, March 1955 Cover - RF Cafe

Posted  August 27, 2013