In rec.antiques.radio+phono Bret Ludwig wrote:
The answer to your question is obvious to most, but since you asked,
it's that we have a eBay vendor who is trying to sell something for an
inasne amount of money and we are entitled to a little sport with him.
Also this is not a common piece at all-it has to be late 1920s
construction. The later poster is confusing this with the AC powered
metal case 19C, I think, which was thick on the land until orientals
started buying them for their not very good transformers.

Anyway, you stated earlier you have conserved 2 of those, and no doubt
others have them in their collections as well. I still fail to see what is
the big problem to selling the remaining units to be used for parts, even
if the takers are 'fools'... You can't hoard and keep all nice stuff for
yourself, it would be impractical to never recycle stuff. As long as some
examples are being preserved by caring individuals all seems well to me.

--
Met vriendelijke groet,

Maarten Bakker.