Rogers-Majestic Corp.
by Victoria JL Fisher
The Rogers companies were founded as Standard Radio Manufacturing Corporation in Toronto 1925 by Edward S. Rogers, a radio aficionado who had already won acclaim for his knowledge and work with radio. The company began by selling radios but quickly added the sales and development of radio tubes--a crucial component in radios of the era--to their products. In 1928, Rogers merged with the Majestic Corporation of Chicago, forming Rogers-Majestic Corporation Ltd.. A division for the manufacture of radio tubes was established around that time, and operated under the separate company Rogers Radio Tubes Ltd.
Electronic interference with tubes causing 'noise' in reception was a central problem in radio vacuum tubes. One solution, developed in Germany, was to shield the tube with a coating of metal. However, this was expensive and slow. Two Rogers engineers, H.W. Parker and F.J. Fox, developed a more efficient system to apply a thin metal coat to the glass envelope of the tube: this involved an automatic machine that, with one operator, could manufacture 200 to 400 tubes an hour and changes to the shape of the glass tube itself. Tubes were first sandblasted to roughen their surface and then sprayed with a metal alloy.
A description of the technology pointed to its design and value: “…the revolving table brings the tube into position for the successive operations of blasting and coating with metal from an oxyacetalyne blowtorch… A simplicity of design in this machine enables it to produce the spray shield rapidly with a minimum of initial cost."
The tubes manufactured could then be sold as part of Rogers-Majestic’s line of radios and were advertised to customers as offering “noise-free operation and uniform reception.” They were later reported as the world's first successful AC radio tube. The commercialisation of this process therefore represented an important step forward.
Edward S. Rogers died in 1939. In 1941, the radio and tube manufacturing elements of the company were sold off to Small Electric Motors (Canada) Ltd., itself a subsidary of a UK family of companies owned by Radio & Electrical Developments. The company, including the tube division, was reincorporated under the name Rogers-Majestic (1941) Ltd.
The company went on producing radios and tubes under the name Rogers-Majestic or Rogers Electronic Tubes into the early 1960s.
Timeline
1924 – Edward S. Rogers visits the Westinghouse laboratories in Pittsburgh, and purchases the patent rights to the Alternating Current tubes developed by Frederick S. McCullough.
1925 – Company founded by Edward S. Rogers under the name of the Standard Radio Manufacturing Corporation. While initially manufacturing “batteryless” radios (radios run from household electricity), the company quickly added vacuum tube development and sales.
1928 – Company name changes from Standard Radio Manufacturing to the Rogers Radio Tube Company Ltd.
1928 – Rogers Radio Tube Company Limited merges with Majestic Corporation of Chicago, becoming Rogers Majestic Corporation Limited and also forming Rogers Radio Tube Ltd.
1933 – A new technique of inexpensively “spray shielding” tubes with a metal layer is described by Rogers-Majestic engineers H.W. Parker and F.J. Fox.
1934 – Consolidated Industries (De Forest Crosley) acquired by Rogers Majestic, which went on making radios under the brand name De Forest Crosley.
1939 - Edward S. Rogers dies.
1941 - The company is sold to Small Electric Motors (Canada) Ltd., and reincorporated under the name Rogers-Majestic (1941).
Selected Sources
Canadian National Exhibition Official Catalogue and Programme. pg 26.
“De Forest (DeForest) Crosley Radio, Consolidated Industries”. (https://www.radiomuseum.org/dsp_hersteller_detail.cfm?company_id=8247)
Parker, H.W., Fox, F.J., “The Spray Shield Tube” Proceedings of the Institute of Radio Engineers Vol. 21, No. 5 (May 1933)