CB RADIO: Vintage low-power base stations for children

Holiday memories of hitting the neighborhood airwaves with 100-milliwatt radios

If you were into radios as a kid growing up in the late 1960s or 1970s, you might have had the pleasure of opening a holiday gift that transmitted and received citizens band signals to and from almost all corners of your neighborhood.

This 1972 RadioShack Archer Space Patrol CB transceiver transmitted at 100 milliwatts, or a tenth of a watt, which allowed its operation without a license. Many children received these low-power citizens band base stations as holiday gifts.

Imagine the pure fun of casting out your voice and having a neighbor kid call back to you from their base station or handheld radio. When the conversation ran dry, you would start using the “Morse code key” on the front of the base station and start sending random beeps that never came close to actual characters!

We’re in the midst of the holiday season so let’s take a look back at these fun self-contained rigs that might have been the gateway drug for going full power on CB, or even getting a ham radio license.