TV Signal Booster
Videon Jr.

The third, and apparently last, signal booster produced by Indianapolis-based Videon Electronic Corp., was a big styling step up from the wooden-cabinet B-122, but electrically they are pretty similar. However, the Junior may have been too late into the market for much sales volume; the model is very rarely seen. Indeed, my rusty knobless unit is the only one I've found up to this point! The 1952 ad was placed on the cusp of the unfreezing of new VHF stations and the advent of UHF broadcasting, both of which spelled the rapid decline of VHF boosters.

1950s Indianapolis was home to the much-more-successful I.D.E.A. and their Regency line of boosters, which also used permeability tuning and a 6J6 dual triode like the Videons. RCA had a very large television set factory in town too, so there was a lot of technical talent around to create such accessories as boosters and later UHF converters. Marketing such things was more difficult as the TV industry matured, which may have been Videon's eventual downfall.

The "Watch For It" notice presages the appearance of Videon's "Navarre" UHF converter in 1953. It was attractively styled in a pre-space-age "swept-back" way, but to date I have seen no actual examples of that converter.

Updated April 19, 2019