Uploaded December 2024 | Updated September 2026, 7 hours ago
Magnavox called this radio "The Companion." I THINK it was their first shirt-pocket radio and their first to be made in Japan. But mysteries surround it.
Everything about this radio indicates that it is early--earlier than Magnavox's other early shirt-pocket radio, the AM-22. And though the AM-22 model number preceeds that of this AM-23 Companion, I still can't help but believe that this one was first. Supporting that idea is that service literature was issued for this AM-23 BEFORE the AM-22.
Though made in Japan, this radio sure looks like it was at least DESIGNED by Magnavox. It has the same simple and straight lines of their first transistor radio, the American-made AM-2. It's a little hard to explain this--it's a kind of style thing you either see or you don't. And sometimes--I will confess--in the arts and even elsewhere, one sees such things when they may not even be there.
But there's one thing I know for sure: this one's a cutie. I remember finding this radio rather early in my collecting days and how it went right to the top of my favorites list. I knew about, but had not yet found a Sony TR-63, the radio on which this Magnavox's design was obviously based, and so to me, this Magnavox--which I did not know about in advance--was a treat to get and stood in nicely for that Sony I hoped to find. And then when I found that Sony, I didn't appreciate this Magnavox any less, and it remains one of my favorites to this day.
It says "Japan" on the back, but we don't get a lot of clues as to who in Japan made it. NEC, the Nippon Electric Company, made many of the later Magnavox transistor radios in Japan. There's a logo on the back of the speaker in this one that LOOKS like it might say NEC--with a diamond shape around it, but the letters aren't exactly legible. And whatever it says, it could be referring only to who made the speaker. There isn't a lot about the rest of it inside that looks like the exacting, precision work of NEC. And most of the NEC radios I've seen have had the chassis mounted the other way around so all you see is the circuit board. So that also casts more doubt on idea of NEC being the maker.
Sometime after finding this Magnavox, I found this Uni-Six. Ah! I thought. I'm going to be able to compare and learn and understand more about this Magnavox. That, to me, is really at the heart of collecting. I'm talking about not just the discovery of things, but the learning and comparing that come after. These things, to me, are actually more important and more satisfying than the mere possessing.
As you can see, the Uni-Six looks like a variant of the Magnavox--different name and different tuning knob, but other than that the same radio. Same straight, simple styling, same dial pointer arrow. But, as we used to say. Nuh-uh. When I opened up the Uni-Six, all was completely different from the Magnavox. Now, manufacturers sometimes did this--completely changing the chassis in a radio --the Zephyr ZR-620 comes to mind--there were three entirely different versions of the chassis in the model run of that particular Zephyr. So here in this Uni-Six, the different chassis does not by itself mean that it's a different manufacturer than the Magnavox or that it isn't "esssentially the same radio." Here's a look at them both, side by side. Entirely different, obviously. No, the different chassis' don't necessarily prove that these radios are not siblings. Or at the very least, cousins. But THIS does. They are not even the same cabinets. If they were siblings, made from the same mold, the back of one would fit on the other, wouldn't you think? It doesn't. So, they are not siblings. One of them is a copy. Maybe both of them are a copy of something else!? I have to assume that no one copies themselves, so I'm concluding that these aren't step-siblings either--made by the same company--but are rather strangers who never met until coming together in my collection, the home for wayward transistor radios.
Inside the back of the Uni-Six radio is molded the words "Iwata Electric Co, Toyko, Japan." As promising as I thought this might be as a clue for learning more about these radios, it proved to be a dead end. I could find scattered references to a couple of Iwata Electric companies that started up in the years after this Uni-Six was made, but there seems to be no trace of the apparently long-gone Iwata Electric who made this Uni-Six.
It's a nice leather case on this Magnavox--with a side pouch for the detachable antenna rod which came with this radio originally. It is most unusual for a six-transistor to come with an antenna rod. Both the Magnavox and the Uni-Six have jacks on top for these antennas.
That hints at another possibility. What AM-only radios typically DID come with an antenna rod? The Boy's Radios, of course, those two-transistor toy radios. Could it be that this Magnavox and Uni-Six were made by outfits that produced boy's radios? Well, here's one of those.
Magnavox called this radio "The Companion." I THINK it was their first shirt-pocket radio and their first to be made in Japan. But mysteries surround it.
Everything about this radio indicates that it is early--earlier than Magnavox's other early shirt-pocket radio, the AM-22. And though the AM-22 model number preceeds that of this AM-23 Companion, I still can't help but believe that this one was first. Supporting that idea is that service literature was issued for this AM-23 BEFORE the AM-22.
Though made in Japan, this radio sure looks like it was at least DESIGNED by Magnavox. It has the same simple and straight lines of their first transistor radio, the American-made AM-2. It's a little hard to explain this--it's a kind of style thing you either see or you don't. And sometimes--I will confess--in the arts and even elsewhere, one sees such things when they may not even be there.
But there's one thing I know for sure: this one's a cutie. I remember finding this radio rather early in my collecting days and how it went right to the top of my favorites list. I knew about, but had not yet found a Sony TR-63, the radio on which this Magnavox's design was obviously based, and so to me, this Magnavox--which I did not know about in advance--was a treat to get and stood in nicely for that Sony I hoped to find. And then when I found that Sony, I didn't appreciate this Magnavox any less, and it remains one of my favorites to this day.
It says "Japan" on the back, but we don't get a lot of clues as to who in Japan made it. NEC, the Nippon Electric Company, made many of the later Magnavox transistor radios in Japan. There's a logo on the back of the speaker in this one that LOOKS like it might say NEC--with a diamond shape around it, but the letters aren't exactly legible. And whatever it says, it could be referring only to who made the speaker. There isn't a lot about the rest of it inside that looks like the exacting, precision work of NEC. And most of the NEC radios I've seen have had the chassis mounted the other way around so all you see is the circuit board. So that also casts more doubt on idea of NEC being the maker.
Sometime after finding this Magnavox, I found this Uni-Six. Ah! I thought. I'm going to be able to compare and learn and understand more about this Magnavox. That, to me, is really at the heart of collecting. I'm talking about not just the discovery of things, but the learning and comparing that come after. These things, to me, are actually more important and more satisfying than the mere possessing.
As you can see, the Uni-Six looks like a variant of the Magnavox--different name and different tuning knob, but other than that the same radio. Same straight, simple styling, same dial pointer arrow. But, as we used to say. Nuh-uh. When I opened up the Uni-Six, all was completely different from the Magnavox. Now, manufacturers sometimes did this--completely changing the chassis in a radio --the Zephyr ZR-620 comes to mind--there were three entirely different versions of the chassis in the model run of that particular Zephyr. So here in this Uni-Six, the different chassis does not by itself mean that it's a different manufacturer than the Magnavox or that it isn't "esssentially the same radio." Here's a look at them both, side by side. Entirely different, obviously. No, the different chassis' don't necessarily prove that these radios are not siblings. Or at the very least, cousins. But THIS does. They are not even the same cabinets. If they were siblings, made from the same mold, the back of one would fit on the other, wouldn't you think? It doesn't. So, they are not siblings. One of them is a copy. Maybe both of them are a copy of something else!? I have to assume that no one copies themselves, so I'm concluding that these aren't step-siblings either--made by the same company--but are rather strangers who never met until coming together in my collection, the home for wayward transistor radios.
Inside the back of the Uni-Six radio is molded the words "Iwata Electric Co, Toyko, Japan." As promising as I thought this might be as a clue for learning more about these radios, it proved to be a dead end. I could find scattered references to a couple of Iwata Electric companies that started up in the years after this Uni-Six was made, but there seems to be no trace of the apparently long-gone Iwata Electric who made this Uni-Six.
It's a nice leather case on this Magnavox--with a side pouch for the detachable antenna rod which came with this radio originally. It is most unusual for a six-transistor to come with an antenna rod. Both the Magnavox and the Uni-Six have jacks on top for these antennas.
That hints at another possibility. What AM-only radios typically DID come with an antenna rod? The Boy's Radios, of course, those two-transistor toy radios. Could it be that this Magnavox and Uni-Six were made by outfits that produced boy's radios? Well, here's one of those.
