Packard Bell (1926)
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Packard Bell Corporation (also known as Packard Bell Electronics or simply Packard Bell) was an American electronics manufacturer founded in 1933 by
Herb Bell In general use, herbs are a widely distributed and widespread group of plants, excluding vegetables and other plants consumed for macronutrients, with savory or aromatic properties that are used for flavoring and garnishing food, for medicinal ...
and Leon Packard. Initially they produced radios, but expanded into defense electronics during World War II. After the war, they began manufacturing other consumer electronics, including television sets. In 1957, the company became involved in the manufacture of scientific and military
computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...
s. Industrial conglomerate Teledyne Technologies acquired the business in 1968. In 1986, Israeli investors bought the name for a newly formed personal computer manufacturer, Packard Bell.


History

Founder Herb Bell Herb Bell had been in radio electronics since 1926, when he had formed a partnership with an engineer named Neff. Bell wanted to expand from manufacturing in a one-car garage to a larger facility to increase production, but Neff disagreed and the partnership ended. In 1928, Bell formed a new venture with Edward Jackson called Jackson Bell Radio Company. Jackson left when Bell suggested producing higher priced radios that came with greater financial risk. Jackson Bell experienced financial difficulty during the
Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
. The business had greater difficulty in 1931 when RCA released the superheterodyne radio. Jackson Bell was licensed by RCA but struggled due to a large inventory of obsolete radios, and was
liquidated Liquidation is the process in accounting by which a company is brought to an end in Canada, United Kingdom, United States, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, and many other countries. The assets and property of the company are redistrib ...
. Bell then formed Packard Bell with Leon Packard, whose uncle provided the capital. In 1934, Packard Bell marketed their first radio, the Model 35A, originally developed by Jackson Bell. Herb Bell managed to obtain the RCA license for manufacturing superheterodyne radios. Based in Los Angeles, Packard Bell, along with Hoffman Radio, became well-known regional makers of consumer electronics. Leon Packard was unhappy with the course of Packard Bell Company, and asked Herb Bell to buy his share in 1935. Packard Bell was a family business. Bell and his four brothers Arthur, Albert, Elmer, and Willard participated in design, manufacture and marketing. The company incorporated as Packard Bell Corporation in 1946. Packard Bell was a profitable company during World War II, producing defense electronics, and this continued into the 1960s. One of Packard Bell's products during WWII was an identification, friend or foe transponder unit (
designated Designation (from Latin ''designatio'') is the process of determining an incumbent's successor. A candidate that won an election for example, is the ''designated'' holder of the office the candidate has been elected to, up until the candidate's i ...
AN/APX-92) used by aircraft. In 1955 the company went public. Packard-Bell Electronics Corp. was adopted in 1956 as the new name for the public company. The company formed a subsidiary to produce computers in 1957, which was later acquired by the Raytheon Company in 1964. In 1968, Packard Bell was sold to Teledyne. Teledyne was interested in expanding into consumer electronics. Teledyne converted Packard Bell common stock into Teledyne common stock at a ratio of one share of Teledyne common stock for each seven and one-half shares of Packard Bell common stock. The Packard Bell name remained but with Teledyne as a prefix (as with other Teledyne operating divisions), and was renamed "Teledyne Packard Bell". Packard Bell ceased marketing television sets in 1974, joining a number of manufacturers exiting the business, merging with stronger competitors or outsourcing manufacturing to foreign entities. There is minimal information regarding Leon Packard. The growth of Packard Bell was primarily from Herb and his brothers. Born Herbert Anthony Zwiebel in 1890, his parents were Anthony (Anton) Zwiebel Jr and Anna Mary Brehm. Like many descendants of immigrants, there was the desire to acquire 'American-sounding' names, so Herb changed his last name to Bell. In his leisure time, Herb Bell was an avid boater and owned several pleasure craft and yachts. He had a 98-foot yacht that he later donated to the
Scripps Institution of Oceanography The Scripps Institution of Oceanography (sometimes referred to as SIO, Scripps Oceanography, or Scripps) in San Diego, California, US founded in 1903, is one of the oldest and largest centers for oceanography, ocean and Earth science research ...
. They were docked at Newport Harbor (
Newport Beach, California Newport Beach is a coastal city in South Orange County, California. Newport Beach is known for swimming and sandy beaches. Newport Harbor once supported maritime industries however today, it is used mostly for recreation. Balboa Island, Newport ...
) and often sailed from Newport Harbor to Catalina Island. He named his boats the Five Bells referring to him and his brothers.


Radios

Packard Bell radios had a unique styling that makes them easy to identify. Being a US West Coast radio maker, they maintained that image by "stationizing" their radio dials. Major US West Coast and Canadian (west of the Rocky Mountain range) radio station call letters were printed on the tuning dial. From 1926 through 1950, the marketing area for Packard Bell radios consisted of Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon and Washington. Many Packard Bell models made during this period have stationized dials with the call letters of the major stations from these states marked on the dial. These stationized dials also include KSL 1160 in Salt Lake City and KOA 850 in Denver. This was an idea inspired by Herb's mother who had difficulty reading tuning dials. After 1950, Packard Bell discontinued its stationized dials when it began selling radios and televisions throughout
North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...
. A Packard Bell radio was used as a prop in the 1960s American television series ''
Gilligan's Island ''Gilligan's Island'' is an American sitcom created and produced by Sherwood Schwartz. The show's ensemble cast features Bob Denver, Alan Hale Jr., Jim Backus, Natalie Schafer, Tina Louise, Russell Johnson and Dawn Wells. It aired for thr ...
''. The
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ese made, eight- transistor AR-851 was an important plot device over the course of the three-year run of the show.


Other business

In 1957, Packard Bell Electronics formed a unit called Packard Bell Computer Corporation, which was led by
Max Palevsky Max Palevsky (July 24, 1924 – May 5, 2010) was an American art collector, venture capitalist, philanthropist, and computer technology pioneer. He was known as a member of the Malibu Mafia – a group of wealthy American Jewish men who donate ...
. This subsidiary developed and produced computers for specialized uses, such as industrial process control, military, and scientific applications. An example of a niche application was a truck-mounted digital computer that analyzed seismic data for the oil industry. Starting in the late 1950s, Packard Bell was involved in the defense electronics business. They produced the PB 250, released in 1960, which was one of the last users of magnetostrictive delay lines for its main memory. It was also the last machine to be partially based on the original designs of Alan Turing’s NPL ACE computer. The company also produced a
digital differential analyzer A digital differential analyzer (DDA), also sometimes called a digital integrating computer, is a digital implementation of a differential analyzer. The integrators in a DDA are implemented as accumulators, with the numeric result converted back ...
(DDA) called Transistorized Realtime Incremental Computer Expandable (TRICE) which could optionally be combined with the PB 250. Together the two machines formed a
hybrid Hybrid may refer to: Science * Hybrid (biology), an offspring resulting from cross-breeding ** Hybrid grape, grape varieties produced by cross-breeding two ''Vitis'' species ** Hybridity, the property of a hybrid plant which is a union of two dif ...
general purpose/DDA computing system. The Hycomp 250 was a hybrid computer that combined the PB 250 with a small analog computer such as the EAI TR10 or TR48. Packard Bell's computer operations were acquired by Raytheon in 1964.


Notes and references

This article was split from the article Packard Bell. {{Authority control 1926 in radio 1933 establishments in California 1968 disestablishments in California Consumer electronics brands Electronics companies disestablished in 1968 Electronics companies established in 1933 History of radio Radio manufacturers