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Ever Ready Radios (and Lissen)

I would like to thank Bev Parker and Frank Sharman for allowing us to reproduce some of the material from the Wolverhampton History and Heritage Society website (see links)

The Early Years and Lissen

Britain was slow to electrify and many of the rural areas remained without electricity for a long time. Due to this there was a large battery market and for many years large numbers of radio batteries were sold. In 1934 the sales of high tension radio batteries exceeded 15 million. The Ever Ready Company (Great Britain) Limited was the market leader and was part of an international group that originated in America at the turn of the century. It was incorporated in Canada in 1932 and the British company held quite a number of the shares.

In 1928 Ever Ready purchased Lissen Limited from its owner and Managing Director, T. N. Cole, for over 1 million pounds. Thomas Noah Cole was born in 1891 at Llanllwni, near Lampeter and brought up in Cardiff. He was interested in football and a keen supporter of the Cardiff team. His father was a marine engineer and Thomas's first job was selling bananas from a hand cart. In the early 1920's there was a lot of interest in radio and he realised that there would soon be a large market for radio components. With this in mind he moved to London and set up the Lissen Company. In 1923 he formed Lissen Limited, with works at Shepherd's Bush, to sell a large range of components, most of which were made at the factory. Thomas's wife Rebecca was the main shareholder and the company was very successful, employing around 3,000 people by the mid 1920's.

The company had three factories, one produced batteries and the other two produced components. The company sold everything that was required to build a radio. There were Lissen valves, resistors, capacitors, coils, transformers, loudspeakers and cabinets. Lissen also produced a range of complete radio kits under the name of Skyscraper, and published plans which encouraged builders to solely use Lissen components, suggesting that to do so would produce a receiver of superior quality. Ever Ready continued producing Lissen components and radios until the beginning of the second world war, after which the Lissen name ceased to be used.

The Lissen Skyscraper 4

A Lissen moving coil loudspeaker from the early 1930's.

When Ever Ready purchased the company, part of the deal was that Thomas Cole would remain as Managing Director, but for 10 years he would not get involved in any business venture that would be in direct competition with Lissen Limited. Eventually he would come to regret not being his own master, and in 1934 purchased the ailing Burndept radio company and founded a new battery company called Vidor.

Vidor was named after the initials of Thomas's two daughters, Valerie and Denise, and his Wife Rebecca. As a concession to Ever Ready and his agreement with the company, he did not run Burndept and Vidor himself, but employed Mr. R.P. Richardson as Managing Director. In 1935 Thomas brought an action appealing against the agreement and engaged Sir Stafford Cripps, and two other eminent lawyers. On the eve of the action, an out of court settlement was made and from that time on, relations between Ever Ready and Vidor were strained. This wasn't helped by the fact that Vidor batteries were popular with radio dealers, because the company offered a 25 percent discount and the batteries sold at a very competitive price.

The Radio Era

Ever Ready's commercial policy was to encourage the use and production of battery powered equipment, and with this in mind the company entered the radio manufacturing business. The first two Ever Ready receivers appeared at the beginning of 1935 and strangely one of them was mains powered. Initially Ever Ready collaborated with Pye and Mr. Charles Orr Stanley who owned Pye, was invited onto Ever Ready's Board as a non-executive director. The chassis and cabinets were made by Pye and put-together at Ever Ready's Finsbury Park factory, which was supervised by Pye management. The collaboration only lasted for a few years. Just before the war Charles Stanley fell out with Magnus Goodfellow, who was Ever Ready's Chairman, and the venture came to an end.

The Lissen factory at Islington was still in production and at the beginning of the second world war it obtained a ministry contract to assemble and repair "Comfort Sets" for the armed forces. All went well until 1941, when the factory was destroyed in an air raid. The company was tied to the ministry contract and so it was essential to quickly find new premises, and continue production. Initially manufacturing began again at Amersham, Buckinghamshire, but the buildings were too small and unsuitable for this kind of use. Space was found at Canal Works and in 1942 Ever Ready began to build radios in Wolverhampton. More space was still required and so the radio department soon made its final move to Block 'A' of the Park Lane works.

The Sky Baronet valve portable (left)

Although the radio department was situated in a part of the battery works, it operated as a separate unit and reported directly to the company's Board of Directors. After the war, the department began to produce radios for the civilian market, and all future Ever Ready radios were designed and built here, except for the Type 'B' of 1947, which was built by Plessey. The first receiver to be produced after the war was the Model 'A', which was a development of the wartime "Comfort Set". It was a heavy 4 valve superhet in a wooden case with a crackle paint finish. The controls and carrying handle were on the top, and it was powered by a B103 battery.

The next model produced here was the Model 'C', which was still as heavy as the Model 'A', but had a more elegant appearance. One notable early receiver was the 'J' Type or "Saucepan Special" which was launched in September 1949. Laurence Orchard was one of the company's senior executives. In 1948 he was on a visit to Ever Ready's South African subsidiary, BEREC ( the British Ever Ready Export Company).

The Saucepan Special

While there he was approached by the man in charge of broadcasting in Nyasaland and Rhodesia. He wondered if Ever Ready could produce a tropicalised dry-battery radio that could sell for £5, as this was all that many members of the rural community could afford. The company rose to the challenge and developed a small 4 valve short-wave receiver that was powered by a B136 battery. One problem was to find a cheap housing for the receiver. This was cleverly solved by using a blue-sprayed metal case that was made by the British Aluminium saucepan factory. It was basically a 10inch saucepan with the handle removed and a hole punched in the bottom for the loudspeaker. The radio sat on the B136 battery, which was too big to fit inside. The radio was sold in many parts of the world, including Malasia, and almost a quarter of a million were produced.

The 'J' Type was followed by the 'K' Type and then the 'N' Type, after which the company began to use the word 'Sky' in most of the names of new receivers. This came from the old Lissen days when Lissen produced its successful range of Skyscraper receivers. In 1957 the company produced the Sky Leader, which was Ever Ready's first transistorised receiver. The company's last valve receiver was the Sky Captain of 1961. The radios were very successful and production peaked at about 5,000 receivers per week. The factory produced over 1 million radios.

Early Receivers Produced

Model	Year	Valves
5007	1935	K80A, K50M, K23B, K77A
5008	1935	TP2620, VP1321, PENDD4020
5012, 5024, 6012	1936	K50M, K30D, K70B
5016	1936	A50P, A50B, A70D, A11D
5027	1937	A50P, A30D, A70D, A11B
5028, 8122	1937	K50M, K30D, K70B
5029, 5040	1937	A36B, A50P, A23A, A70D, A11D
5032	1937	K80B, K50N, K23B, K70B
5038	1937	A80A, A50P, A27D, A11D
5010	1938	K50M, K30K, K30K, K70D
5010, 5118	1938	K80B, K50N, K23B, K70B
5041	1938	K50N, K30K, K30K, K70B
5103, 5117	1938	A36B, A50P, A23A, A70D, A11D
5203	1939	ECH3, EF9, EBC3, EL3, AZ1
5214, 5215, 5216, 5217, 5218, 5219, 5318	1939	DK1, DF1, DAC1, DL2
Model 'A'	1945	DK32, DF33, DAC32, DL35
Model 'C'		DK32, DF33, DAC32, DL35
Model 'H'
Model 'J' - "Saucepan Special"	1949
Model 'K'		DK91, DF91, DAF91, DL92
Model 'N'		DK91, DF91, DAF91, DL92
Sky Queen T K		DK91, DF91, DAF91, DL92
Sky Queen	1953	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Sky Prince	1954	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Briefcase N3	1955	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Sky Monarch	1955	DK96, DF96, DAF96(2), DL96(2), DM70
Sky Monarch (AM / FM)	1955	DF97, DK96, DF96(3), DAF96(2), DL96, DM70
Sky Monarch (AM / FM)	1956	DF97, DF96(4), DAF96(2), DL96(2), DM70
Sky Baby	1956	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Sky King	1956	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Sky Princess	1956	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Sky Lord	1957	DK96, DF95, DAF96, DL96
Sky Casket	1958	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Sky Emperor	1958	DF97(4), DK92, DAF96, DL96(2), DM70
Sky Queen 2	1959	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Sky Baronet /Countess	1959	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96
Skyscraper L26		DK92, DF96(2), DAF91, DL94
Sky Captain	1961	DK96, DF96, DAF96, DL96

By 1968 it was all over. Ever Ready decided to close the radio department and concentrate solely on battery manufacture at Park Lane. Just before closure the team designed and produced a prototype portable television receiver that ran on dry batteries. It used electrostatic deflection to reduce power consumption and was far ahead of its time.

Battery production continued at Park Lane until the spring of 1980, when the works finally closed. Demand for the company's products had slowly been falling and the works were no longer profitable.