C. Crane Company

C. Crane was founded in 1976 in San Francisco, California, by Bob Crane, a former cabinetmaker, and his wife Susan Crane. The "C" is Crane's middle initial, as well as his wife's and children's. The company was initially a furniture design and manufacturing company and only switched to being an electronics distributor in 1983, upon the Cranes' relocation to Fortuna. C. Crane's first electronics product was the "Select-A-Tenna", an antenna manufactured by Intensitronics Corp. of Hales Corners, Wisconsin, for long-distance reception of AM radio broadcasts. The company advertised on late-night radio shows, which served to increase business from AM listeners looking for a better antenna.

Later in the 1980s, C. Crane began to distribute radios, such as the GE Superadio, to go along with their antennas.

In the 1990s, Bob Crane decided to move the company toward designing its own products, rather than just retailing what was already out there. Following the 1992 Cape Mendocino earthquakes, the company expanded their catalog to include emergency radios and other disaster equipment, such as flashlights. Eventually, C. Crane began to produce its own radios in collaboration with Sangean. At the present radio division of C. Crane specializes in weak signal reception and developed many products to improve the reception of weak radio and internet signals. C. Crane also focuses on high quality audio.