McWatts Comic Strip
December 1956 Popular Electronics

December 1956 Popular Electronics Table of Contents Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles from Popular Electronics, published October 1954 - April 1985. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged. s from Popular Electronics.

McWatts was an electronics-themed comic that appeared in Popular Electronics magazine back in the 1950s. Artist Carl Kohler's main character is a stereotypical "Joe Sixpack" type of electronics hobbyist who dreams up unique ways to deal with situations. This edition shows McWatts in a scenario where, presciently enough, he experiences having his radio controlled airplane treated to what modern day "drone" pilots are experiencing on a more and more frequent basis - being shot down. In this case the hostile fire came from some kids with slingshots. Fast-forward to 2015 and we are now seeing reports of people using shotguns and rifles to down the privacy-invading craft being piloted by unqualified pranksters. Back in the McWatts era, getting "shot down" was much more likely to occur when non-protected frequency usage (27 MHz band intermixed with the CB radio band) caused death-inducing interference that resulted in loss of control. Nearly all modern systems use bullet-proof spread spectrum modulation in the 2.4 GHz ISM band.

Other Carl Kohler masterpieces: "The Great Electron-Pedantic Project," "Dig That Reel Flat Response," "I Married a Superheterodyne," "Unpopular Electronics," "Operation Chaos," "Thin Air, My Foot," "High Tide in the Tweeter," "The R/C Cloud," "Hi-Fi Guest List," "Kool-Keeping Kwiz ," "Boner Box," and "McWatts."

McWatts Comic Strip

By Carl Kohler

Posted February 10, 2022
(updated from original post on 3/30/2015)