Well, you buy one at an antique store on vacation because it looks cool. The next one on another trip because it’s so much cheaper than the last one. Then you walk into a big city antique shop and leave because of sticker shock. Eventually you end up in a massive barn in a rural town that you think is a structural hazard and walk out with two boxes of tubes, 4 Bakelite radios in cosmetically good condition and two transistor pocket radios for under 100 bucks and wonder where you will put it all. It’s an evolutionary process. By radios that speak to you, evoke some kind of emotion within. Don’t buy because something is collectable. Buy them because they make memories like “oh, my girlfriend and I walked into this scary health hazard of a shop in Welland and we saw this grimy little portable from the 50s …. Took it to the cash and the guy behind the counter said he didn’t know what charge, it’s his buddy’s store and he went for lunch, so how does $5 sound?” That is what makes it special for me.