The N.Z. Vintage Radio Project

5-valve plus vibrator supply (6-valve equivalent) Army Canteen Radio Receiver.

One of two different sets released by the Army Education Welfare Service for 'education and entertainment' (as noted in the AEW1 manual).

This set is understood to have been designed by the Radio Corporation of New Zealand, and manufactured by at least Radio Corp NZ in Wellington and Radio (1936) Ltd in Auckland.  There is evidence in a section of a letter from Alex Marks in the Radio Corp factory (Alex was the son of William Marks, the RCNZ founder) to Fred Green (who was their factory rep / buyer in England at the time) in 1946 that they were producing spares packages for the AEW1 and had formerly produced the AEW1's themselves:

The AEWS (Army Education Welfare Service) offered training for post-war life to NZ soldiers, and this included radio technician training - it is believed that the AEW1 & 2 radios were both to be listened to, and to be experimented with as part of the training in radio.

It is interesting to note that the front panel dimensions follow the golden ratio - the author calculated the actual ratio at 1.616 from measurements - almost exactly the actual Golden Ratio figure of 1.618.