[Ron Ramirez]

Doug - Heck, I would be pleased to chauffeur you around in your 1938 Cadillac should I ever get up your way; I LOVE Cadillacs! Except for the newer Mercedes/BMW/Lexus wannabe models, that is.

I think a lot of us would agree that Philco's radio quality took a decided downturn after 1938, most especially coinciding with the departure of Jim Skinner in late 1939. Around this time frame (1937), Philco bought controlling interest in Simplex Radio Corporation. (Ernst could fill in some info here, being in Sandusky.) For some time now I have strongly suspected that Philco's first home radio set to carry the Transitone name, the TH-1, was a Simplex design and probably built by Simplex. It's a four-tube TRF set with a ballast; its part numbers do not jibe with Philco part numbers. The "S.R.C." on one of the back labels is another tipoff; the Philco name is nowhere to be found on the TH-1.

Could very well be that you are right about the 38-12, 39-8, et al., and perhaps they were outsourced to Simplex? I somewhat suspect that the TH-4 and its siblings may also be Simplex products, but have no definite proof (yet).

A footnote: Wolkonowicz states in his thesis that during the 1939 Philco strike, that production was farmed out to subcontractors such as Motorola(!).