[morzh]

Well, today I've heard the strongest local station, "Good times oldies" from Lakewood NJ.

After I re-fitted all the Bakelite caps and re-stuffed the electrolytic caps (bought a bunch from Mouser - my company obliged piggibacking my order on theirs; otherwise the shipping is a killer with them), and replaced all the resistors, and washed the tuning cap, and...and.....when turned on, I realized one 36 type tube was not glowing, so I had to buy two tested tubes on Ebay.

So, with me acting as antenna, grabbing the antenna wire, I was able to tune in.
The music as not very loud. It is about where I would listen to it, but at the maximum volume setting.

I suspect I will have to tune the regenerative stage; after all the radio is really old and some parameters must have drifted by now.
Will have to look for the tuning procedure.