I’ve been listening to some old-time-radio podcasts, Dragnet, Superman & the like, I believe originally broadcast in the 1930’s & 40’s. I got to thinking back in those days a car radio would be especially valuable to the car owner b/c you could listen to your favorite radio programs while driving. When did car radios become widely available standard equipment? Optional equipment?
The Wikipedia article suggests by the late 1930’s AM radios in cars were standard equipment in the USA. Matches up to the need to listen to the latest installment of your favorite radio program.
I wonder if thieves were stealing the radios back then as much as now? Maybe more radio theft back then, b/c cars were easier to break into?
Even gets am! Just a curious thought, all of our old furniture has key locks.
My original truck radio is AM only. Teenage-me replaced it with an aftermarket AM/FM/Cassette unit so I could listen to rock n roll music. Geezer-me is planning to reinstall the original AM-only unit … lol …
1 Like
My dad bought a new Ford Fairlane in 1963. He said the cost for a radio was about the same as the upgrade from the 6 cyl to the 260 V8. He bought the car with the V8 and saved money to get the radio installed 6 months later.
1 Like
My dad used to tell stories about dickering on the radio when he purchased new cars. Dad: I’ll buy the car, but take the radio out first! Dealer: It will cost me more for my staff to take it out than just leave it, ok, same deal & you can keep the radio! … lol … All the family cars I ever rode in as a kid in seemed to have a factory radio. OEM Car radios seem to be considerably better quality than home radios, don’t know why.
My memory from helping Mom shop for a new car in 1990 is that the basic Corolla and Civic didn’t come with a radio unless dealer installed. The Mazda Protoge she bought had the optional radio but it seemed like every Mazda Protoge we looked at had it Fitted. The new for 1991 Ford Escort’s were just arriving and a Pony trim had the antenna and speaker grille’s in the door but no radio fitted.
It should have said they were available in all cars as an option.
6 Likes
The 1993 Toyota pickup that I bought new didn’t come with a radio.
+1
As late as the '50s & '60s, radios were definitely an option–unless one was buying a Caddy, or a Lincoln, or some other luxury car. If one perused the used car ads in that era, sellers bragged about their vehicle having “radio & heater”, simply because both items were optional.
Most people did opt for both items, but… not everyone. One of the first things that I did when I bought a 1960 Falcon (in 1976) was to install a Panasonic radio, rear speaker, and antenna. The Grandma who originally owned the Falcon didn’t opt for a radio, although she did pay for her car to have a heater.
I don’t know for sure when radios became standard equipment on “popularly-priced” cars, but I suspect that it was sometime in the '70s.
2 Likes
In the 1980s, consumers demanded the right to opt out of the factory radios because they were pretty poor. The opt out left the wiring in place for the installation of good audio systems.
This encouraged Bose systems, Harman Kardon and the similar partnerships to give us decent audio choices.
My first car I was pretty poor and couldn’t afford much more than gas and insurance 
I got sick of the AM radio and bought the cheapest FM converter and a set of small speakers that mounted on the rear package tray. I couldn’t believe there was anyone worse off for car sound “system” but someone stole the converter and speakers…
1 Like
I remember you could still buy the (around) 2002 Mitsubishi Evo’s radio delete… Mainly cause most people that bought them were either going to race them or mostly, they were going to replace the sound system with an all custom sound system anyway… But yes it was still an option to have, or not to have, however you look at it…
I put in one like this. I seem to remember it was $20 in 1973, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but equal to $140 today. Crutchfield has over 30 in dash units for that price, bluetooth and cd players included in most of them.
I started driving right around the time aftermarket radios and speakers really started to get going. Prior to that there really wasn’t a market. Most cars were just basic AM radios. My first car which I bought when I back from Nam was a Chevy Vega. Came with AM only. There was a time you could special order a vehicle without a radio and install your own. I did just that with my 84 GMC pickup. Bought a BETTER than OEM unit for the price difference. And you can still buy a car (like Ferrari’s new $550,000 supercar) with NO RADIO.
And now we’re getting full circle with many systems so integrated with the vehicle that it’s getting more and more difficult to upgrade to an aftermarket system. An some you don’t want to because the OEM system is real good.
When my dad bought a Toyota Corona Mk II wagon in about 1970, we traded in my old Chevy II to have an AM-FM radio installed.
Just to go off tangent when did cars come with a cordless cigarette lighter? (Old used car commercial, comes with a free cordless cigarette lighter!)
I remember being with my parents buying a new car in the mid 50’s, and radios, heaters (and defrosters) and turn signals were options, cars came with only one horn, not two. A right side rear view mirror only became standard when the US required it, in the early 60’s. There was a time when a second tail light was an option, along with bumper guards. Pre-war and just after the war cars still had separate, spring mounted bumpers and without bumper guards two cars could “lock bumpers” when they collided gently and one bumper overrode the other and they had to be pulled apart. My recollection was that the first Honda Accords came with standard radios and that was a sales point because the American competition didn’t. Honda later said it was cheaper for them to have every car get a radio - speed up the assembly, no one had to be paid to track the orders and it was smoother supplying a radio for every car.
3 Likes