Click here to go to our main page on microwave history
Click here to go to our where-are-they-now page
Update July 2013: now the entire collection (17 ads) is in one 6MB pdf file, in order by date, thanks to Tommy, who was once a Navy Radar Tech.
Download the whole enchilada!
Update April 2013: Helmut sent us one we didn't have, Galileo meets the Martians (see bottom of page)
Update December 2012: Jim sent us his scan of the ads, and it turns out we were missing two! Go to the bottom of the page to download Jim's contribution.
In 1959 and 1960, the Bomac Tube Company of Beverly Massachusetts published a series of ads that traced the history of microwaves back to the Stone Ages.
Who said microwave advertisements can't have a sense of humor?
Varian bought Bomac, and changed the name on later copies of the ads. Then Varian sold the business to CPI in Palo Alto, CA and Canada. Check out our "where-are-they-now?" page for more information on dead microwave nameplates!
Click on the title to reveal a high-resolution scan that you can download, print out, and hang by the coffee pot.
About Waterloo
The Day Somebody Goofed
Sir Francis Drake Cracks a Case
Radar and the Crusades
The Great Dragon Raid of 1405
A Viking Fable
The Real Story of the Trojan Horse
Tall Tale from Texas
The Birth of Radar
How Radar Got its Name
Attila Attacks!
The Perfidious Electron Tube
Radar & the Bastille
While Nero Fiddled
That's fourteen ads, but it's not complete collection... wait, there's more!
Jim sent us a scan of the ads he had, his collection has two we were not aware of: George at the Forge, and Shaggy Fish Story. For now, if you want to view these two, they are in the file below. We'll try to bust them out separately for you later.
Download Varian ads scanned by Jim
And here is another ad we didn't have, sent in by Helmut:
Galileo meets the Martians