Don, why didn't you have a crystal radio? Then you did not need a battery, just a long antenna wire and a big punch bowl so you could drop in the earphones and everyone could hear! I used to make them with an oatmeal box to wrap the tuning coil around and sit for a long time with the "catwhisker" to find a "hotspot" on the galena crystal..but that was a long time ago, maybe 10 years! LOL Ken "Too cheap to buy batteries"