[GreenKeys] Esse Radio Co., Indianapolis

[John Vendely]

On 3/22/2013 8:44 PM, Richard Knoppow wrote:
>
> -
>     A place I've always been curious about was Esse in Indianapolis, 
> they bought four or more pages of advertising in CQ magazine every 
> month in the early to mid 1950s. For a while he featured pin-up girs 
> around the borders.  I wonder if anyone knows anything about this fellow.
>
>
> -- 
>
Esse Radio Company was THE military surplus store in Indianapolis from 
around 1947 to the early 1970s, finally closing around 1980 to 
subsequently become a parking lot for the grandiose new 
shopping/entertainment mall built in the restored Union Station nearby.  
Esse was owned by a guy named Ben Selig, and was located at the 
intersection of Meridian St. and South St., downtown. The somewhat 
decrepit 4 story building was one of those 1890s jobs with an ornate 
cast-iron facade, and was a bit of a local landmark with its two large 
aircraft wing tanks mounted out front.

Esse was a "classic" surplus store of the era, with a large quantity of 
military surplus electronics, mechanical parts and gizmos, and a 
smattering of military surplus clothing.  In its heyday (late 40s 
through earlly 60s), one could buy complete, unused SCR-508s, SCR-300s, 
SCR-610s ,SCR-534s, WS no. 19s, command sets, etc., etc., often in 
original crates.  Esse also had a a lot of 40s and 50s vintage avionics 
(e.g. APX-6, BC-645), a good stock of meters and loose parts, and some 
surplus photographic gear, mainly large numbers of surplus 16mm gun 
cameras.

My friends and I frequented Esse Radio most Saturday mornings starting 
in the late 1960s, and most of our early surplus acquisitions came from 
there.  Many of the above items could still be found then, though less 
of it in new condition.  I recall large numbers of SCR-511s laying 
about.  In those days, Esse also had large quantities of aircraft-style 
wet-cell NiCd batteries and cells.  The upper floors of the building 
were unfortunately off-limits, and contained much interesting stuff 
which occasionally migrated downstairs for sale.

By the early 1970s, Selig had little personal involvement in the 
business, and store personnel more or less took care of things. He did 
let me into the upstairs sanctum, however, which by then contained 
little in the way of interesting radio gear (though I bought a large 
quantity of R-508 receivers for 2 bucks apiece, which then I sold to 
Fair Radio).   Most of the "upstairs inventory" was bought in the late 
70s in one large transaction by a couple of scruffy scrap dealers who 
made a ton of money reclaiming precious metals from many hundreds of 
land-odograph machines, electgronic parts, etc.  I remember seeing them 
breaking up beautiful high-current rotary switches, which Selig had sold 
for just 50 cents each, for their far more valuable coin silver contacts.

The building was finally razed for the Union Station renovation, the end 
of an era.

R&R surplus was also a major military surplus outfit, started in the 
late 60s by Ron Ross, and located just a few blocks from Esse Radio.

All that cheaply available surplus started many of us on our engineering 
careers.  Too bad there's nothing like it today...

73,

John K9WT