oldest tube(s) in your system

I have a pair of RCA (Radio Corp. Of America) JAN CRC 12sn7GT..one is 1943 the other is 1945. The coolest part about these 2 is I have the original boxes..& all sides & flaps are pretty much intact. Order & contract # printed on the box. Long list of patent #'s provided on the inside folded sleeve that holds the tubes.  U.S. ARMY U.S. NAVY wartime tubes man. I use these in my DIY 12/6sn7 preamp. 

I also have a pair of 1944 RCA JAN CRC 5R4GY rectifiers with the Double slanted getters. I switch one of them in & out in my Icon Audio preamp that is pretty sensitive to rectifier changes. 

I grew up working with my Grandmother that owned 3 Antique stores. I've always found old stuff to be pretty cool. When I was a young teen in the early 80's I would come across lots of vacuum tubes & electronics when we would do estate sales. Old people would pass away & my granny would get hired to go through these houses to price out & then sell the contents over a few days to the public..also having 1st pick of what she wanted. I had no idea what I had access to then. But to be fair tubes were still very cheap back then. Had I known I would have been hoarding tubes & radios from an early age. 

My oldest tube is a Cunningham globe 46.  It has two test stickers indicating that it was tested and found ok in 1936 and 1938.  Clearly it was made no later than 1936.  The tube works just fine.  Back when I used my 46 amps as daily drivers, I tried a number of 46 tubes including these Cunningham; my favorite set however were RCA.

I gave a photo of the Cunningham but I am not sure how to post it.

Wow; 1936.  Pre-WWII.  Others have too.  Amazing.

Did vacuum tubes precipitate WWII?

I do have a WWII era military rectifier, but prefer a somewhat later GEC cup base U 52; I run a set of GEC KT 66s that I bought NIB NOS some years ago for my "vintage" system. Most of the tubes in my two systems are somewhat more modern- 6h30s from the late ’70s. I don’t know how old the Russian 6C33C I use in the Lamm amps are; I suspect they are also late ’70s. Those mercury vapor tubes are very cool, but have not used them. 

I recently retubed the main system but have been having some noise crop up- I think it may be the line stage (Veloce Lithio upgraded by Vytas)-- last time I had this issue, I cleaned the battery contact plates and the noise disappeared.

I’ll sort this out soon, I just need time and patience since I have a full complement of fresh tubes for the Lamms, along with NIB old stock Tele 12ax7 ribbed plates, which I prefer for these amps- they give it a little "grit" which makes them less sweet and lends a gravitas to the amps. I run them with extremely efficient horns. 

Trying to locate a matched quad of early production 6h30 reflectors is not easy or cheap; to my guesstimate on hours, they should still be in good fettle, but we’ll see.