Western Manufacturing Company (1932-1989) [2, 4, 6]
1404 5th Avenue
(Beshore family home)
Kearney, Nebraska (1932-1936) [1, 2, 3]

Third Floor, Fort Kearney Bank Bldg.
Kearney, Nebraska (1936-1942) [2]

22nd Street and 14th Avenue
(or 1400 West 22nd Street)
Kearney, Nebraska (1942-1989) [2, 4]

Western Manufacturing & Supply Co. (1947-1989) [4, 5]
22nd Street and 14th Avenue
(or 1400 West 22nd Street)
Kearney, Nebraska (1947-1989) [4, 5]

The Western Manufacturing Company was the umbrella company for several companies manufacturing "Pocket" crystal radios, intercommunication systems, radio transmitters, radio microphones, walkie-talkies, citizen band and police frequency band converters, battery chargers, arc welders, antennas, and related items [1, 6].

The Western Manufacturing & Supply Co. was founded in 1947 [5], although they continued to sometimes use the Western Manufacturing Co. name in their ads and notifications.

The companies were the Tinytone Radio Co., Midget Radio Co., Pa-Kette Electric Co., Western Radio Co., and the Midway Sales Company.

In addition, they also founded Arrow Engraving Co. and Arrow Advertising, Inc., which produced the company catalogs, product literature, and ads [7, 8].

The company was dissolved, and all assets were sold by the Paul Beshore (1914-1988) estate sale in June 1989 [4].

From: Volume 13, No. 10   Buffalo County Historical Society [1]

THE BESHORE FAMILY

Electronics Pioneers

by Margaret Stines Nielsen

    In the early part of the century Andrew Beshore, of Pennsylvania, went south to attend Washington and Lee University, and on to a Divinity School in Dayton, Virginia. There he met Nannie Burrus, of an early day North Carolina family, who was studying music at Shenandoah Collegiate Institute. The couple were married and set out for Aurora, Nebraska where Andrew began his ministry in the Methodist Church. Their sons Paul and Charles were born there. Later Andrew was transferred to Pleasanton, where Woodrow Wilson and David Lloyd George were born. The couple also lived in Gibbon for a time.

    During World War I Andrew, a powerful speaker, traveled to Liberty Bond rallies around the state. In Scribner he met William Jennings Bryan. Through that connection he was asked to be a summer replacement in a Chautauqua circuit.

    In 1921 the family moved to Kearney where Andrew, Jr. and Robert E. Lee were born. Andrew had joined the Redpath-Horner Chautauqua Circuit, traveling from early summer to November, which meant he was gone for most of the year. In 1931, with the depression and changing times striking his two main sources of income, he gave up and moved to Pennsylvania, where he took a job with the State Rehabilitation Department. Although he returned for an occasional visit, Nannie was left with a baby and five other boys to support, a devastating blow to the family.

    Nannie had supplemented their meager income by giving piano and voice lessons and her sons worked at any jobs available. The family had a large garden; Nannie canned quantities of fruit and vegetables, made sauerkraut, and dried corn. The neighbors helped as they could. In spite of this it came to the point that the stores wouldn't allow Nannie credit. "Chas" dropped out of high school for a year to work at the Kearney Tea and Coffee House.

    All the boys had natural mechanical aptitudes. As a child Paul began experimenting with light bulbs run on dry cells and storage batteries. Although the house had no electricity he soon had lights in every room. He built his first radio at the age of ten; "in 1926 (he) completed his first loud-speaker radio, a single tube re-generative type circuit which would receive signals from KDKA, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and other distant places."

    Paul and his brothers had tinkered with a number of vehicles and gadgets. He took drafting in high school and began making blueprints of some of his inventions. They were finished by holding them up to the sun and developing them in the bath tub. The next step was to advertise these blueprints and plans for sale to other amateur mechanics. In time this developed into a catalog advertising a whole array of radios, vehicles, and other electronic products, under the name of Motor Industries Co.

   In 1933 Paul "developed and patented a miniature radio about the size of a small matchbox [9]. It was the first radio utilizing a crystal .... and a tuner which enabled the user to select more than one station. This radio consisted of a block of wood, with the crystal embedded in the block and sealed with pitch, and magnet wire wound around the block, a tuner dial and an earphone. Originally it was packaged in a cardboard pillbox obtained from the local drug store."  In the early days the Beshores mined their own crystals in the Colorado mountains.

    Named the TinyTone, the radio was advertised in Popular Mechanics and Mechanics Illustrated for $2.99. With borrowed money, and what Paul made writing articles for Popular Mechanics, the TinyTone Radio Corporation was established in the Beshore home at 1404 5th Avenue. The four oldest boys worked together on the project, assisted by neighborhood boys. Lester Billings stayed with the company for the fifty-plus years it was in operation. When a lot of orders piled up they might work the night through, arousing the suspicions of some of the neighbors.

    The home was a gathering place for boys of all ages, with the energetic Beshores in the middle of the action. As one family member said, "There are some skeletons." But Nannie with her strict Baptist moral code saw that they didn't get too far out of line.    

    In 1936, as the business grew, the company moved to the third floor of the Fort Kearney (later First National) Bank at 2031 Central Avenue. The sound of the various machines caused some stress to those who had offices on the second floor. The manufacturing end of the business was then moved to 2218 Avenue A (later Fairmont Creamery). Here they made their own plastic molding machine which was used to make cases for the TinyTones. The advertising and business offices were left in the bank building. The company took and developed its own pictures, with Andy as the photographer later on. Lyman Rice did the art work. The company was the first to have an offset press.

    By 1942 the company, now the Western Manufacturing Corporation, had moved to a 2500 square foot building on 22nd Street and 14th Avenue. With the outbreak of World War II the Beshores began bidding on government contracts and they were soon working full time on aircraft parts and components for the Norden Bomb Sight. 150 people were employed during peak periods.

  All the boys worked for the company at various times, each contributing in his own way. The day after graduating from high school Woody had gone to Pennsylvania to work as a machinist with various companies and was well established there. However, after five years the TinyTone business had grown so rapidly that Paul offered him a share in the business if he would supervise the manufacturing end of the company. Chas., who served in World War II, returned to Kearney for a time to be general manager. Later he went to Chicago and points east where he was an executive in several large companies. His last position before he retired was as general manager for the Otis Elevator Company. He now lives in Pinehurst, North Carolina. Andy has worked as an electronics engineer for the TRW Systems in California for the past thirty-five years. David and Robert are physicians in Denver. Nannie died at the age of fifty-five.

[1] Buffalo Tales, Buffalo County Historical Society newsletter, Vol. 13, No. 10, Nov.-Dec. 1990, The Beshore Family–Electronics Pioneers by Margaret Stines Nielsen, pages 1, 3-6.
[2] The Kearney Hub, March 28, 1950, page 3, Addition to Permit Expansion Western Mfg. Co. Operations.
[3] The Kearney, Nebraska, Daily News, Nov. 4, 1938, page 25, Kearney Business Houses–Tinytone Radio Corporation, and Midget Motors Corporation.
[4] The Kearney Hub, May 29, 1989, page 17, AUCTION Collectible Radios, Toys, Equipment, Gadgets—Estate of Paul Beshore, Pres. Western Manufacturing.
[5] The Lincoln [Nebraska] Journal Star, April 17, 1947, page 15, New Corporations–Western Manufacturing & Supply Company. To deal in radios, electrical equipment, and aircraft parts.
[6] The Kearney Hub, March 30, 1956, page 1, Western Manufacturing is ‘Home Built’ Industry.
[7] The Kearney Hub, May 3, 1939, page 4, Kearney Boasts a Fine New Engraving Plant, The Arrow Engraving Co., founded and operated by Paul Beshore.
[8] The Kearney Hub, Aug. 9, 1947, page 3, Paul S. Beshore and Lyman A. Rice were listed as incorporators of Arrow Advertising, Inc.
[9] US Patent 2,074,887, Midget Radio Receiver, Paul S. Beshore, Kearney, Nebr., Application Date March 5, 1936, S/N 67,391; Patent Granted March 23, 1937.