Superwhamadyne

This word came into my life while I was still in grade school.

Our family were farmers on the edge of the Sand Hills of Nebraska about 9 miles South of Gordon.

Technology was slow to arrive in our isolated section of the Mid West. I remember when a kid brought a hand held battery powered transistor radio to school. It was AM Only – We didn’t know anything about FM back then. It was the first hand-held radio I had seen. Back then, battery powered radios were installed in car dashes. “Portable” radios were about the size of a Coleman cooler and were lugged around with a strong handle on top, they had a half-size car battery or a Thermos bottle shaped battery in the case to power them.

Transistor technology was booming back then. It was not long before a kid brought in a “Three Transistor” radio. OOOH WOW!

Then a kid brought in a “Six Transistor” radio. UUUH UUUH WOW!

By this time all us kids had seen the movie “Mary Poppins”. We liked making up words to compete with Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.

Then a kid brought in a “Nine Transistor” radio with “Superheterodyne” tuning. Us kids just couldn’t get our tongues around the word “Superheterodyne” so we invented a new word “Super-WHAM-ah-dyne“. From that time on, new technology, instead of being praised by differing applications of “OOOHs”, “AAAHs” and “WOWs” was now praised by stating that it was “Superwhamadyne!”

I continued to use that term throughout my adult life when confronted with new and exciting technology.

I got laid off at the Hanford Site and started my own electronic and computer repair business named: “Superwhamadyne“. The business failed, but the web site remains. I know that some day, like a phoenix, my business will rise from the ashes and the name Superwhamadyne will be known throughout the world. OK, so I still drift off into childish fantasies!

Lloyd

P.S. The business “Superwhamadyne” still exists (at least on paper) as the corporate entity “Superwhamadyne, Inc.“