I first became interested in Hi Fi about 1953. It was a totally different hobby then. We built our own amps and speakers, and not from kits. Schematics were published in the mags, and in the RCA Tube Manual, and we would go to the electronics parts store (like Harvey radio in NYC) and buy a bunch of resistors, capacitors, transformers, tubes...etc and go to work with the soldering iron. We were creative: for example I built more than one amp using a bread baking tin for a chassis!
Of course we constructed all kinds of enclosures for loudspeakers, and we even modified drivers by doing things like glueing stips of balsa wood onto the cone to control breakup.
Of course there was always Heathkit, RIP. When other kits were introduced, like Dyna Kit, and Eico, you didn't need to know anything about how the electronics worked, and the nature of the hobby changed.
Today audiophile skills relate to knowing how to best allocate financial resources in the purchase of ready-made equipment. That's OK, but it really is not as interesting as the old days. It is a bit like flying an airplane today (I am a private pilot too). In the old days it took some physical coordination and skill to fly a plane like a J3 cub. Today, it's about as challenging as driving a car. In the case of jetliners, the pilot's job is to program the computers that fly the plane.
