[Arran]

I have an article in a 1934 issue of Radio Craft (or was it Radio News) that documents all of the various volume control circuits and resistances used, they also tried compiling statistics on what percentage of sets used each. Shunting the input of the antenna to ground was a common approach, but there were also various other schemes like controlling the plate voltage on the RF tubes, or in the case of the Canadian Westinghouse Columaire 8 I worked on, controlling the cathode current of the RF and IF tubes. Once automatic volume controls (gain control) became popular most of these circuits disappeared and the circuits became more and more standardized.
I was lucky with the Westinghouse the volume control was fine, and so was the tone control, which was what I was worried about. Sometimes you simply cannot find a correct replacement control and have to modify the circuit to take another, or wait until you find one from a parts chassis.
Regards
Arran