What was this cupboard used for?

We have this antique cupboard which has always been in the family.... the only problem is we have no idea what it was intended for!



The top surface can be lifted up to expose the top cupboard (photo below).



This cupboard can also be accessed via the fold-down door on the front. On the inside of this door is a hand written radio frequency(?) map? This is enclosed in glass. Photos of this below:





There's also a large hole on the back panel as seen in the rather unclear photo below:



Then there are two small holes on the bottom wooden panel of the top cupboard:

 

maybe it held a short wave radio.....

 

For an old radio?

 

AAAAWWWWWW.....ya SNIPED me!!!!! I was wondering if it was from wartime and held a short wave radio!!!!!

 

Thank you all for your replies. Do we know roughly when it could have been made? I know you suggested @Aquitaine that it could be from the war period? 1914-18 ish?

 

A reading of the radio stations will give you a (directional) answer. The use of "Leningrad" dates to 1924 so unlikely to date to before then.

Debora

 

Ah that's useful, thank you for mentioning that.

 

And honestly, I wasn't quite sure WHICH war, so thanks Debora!!!! DH was also thinking 2nd!!!

 

Radios were not all that commonplace during WWI, were they?

 

(More widespread) radio broadcasting dates to the 1920s. The first commercial radio station in the U.S. was licensed in 1920 and the BBC was created in 1922.

Debra

 

A wireless, please, not a radio. And it's long wave, probably for a home built crystal set. It didn't start out as that, it looks like a music cupboard.

Daventry opened in 1925. It's still a massive transmitter site, I used to go and see BT up there.

You've got transmitter locations and what look like aerial declinations as well as frequencies. Can you get me some close ups of those pages?

 

Thank you for your reply. I've never actually heard of 'crystal sets' before! Something interesting for me to Google! Also interesting to hear you think it could have started out as a music cupboard... what would you think the reason was for the top surface being able to lift up? I don't think it could have housed something like a gramophone as there is no hole on the side to wind one? What were music cupboards intended for anyway?

For some reason I am unable to attach good quality close-ups to this reply! I keep getting an error message that the images are too big! Even though they're under 1MB! I therefore attach two rather low quality versions to this message... I don't know if you're able to make some of the text out?

 

My other half built crystal sets as a young boy - and indeed, they're still sold for specialist applications.

Music cupboards were for sheet music, basically, rather than an instrument. I suspect the holes on yours got added. Let me see if I can squint at the photos.