Heck yeah folded piece of cardboard wedged into the dial to get those "in-between" signals back when I was a stupid kid who knew nothing about calibrating the VFO...

I am still quite fond of the early "clicker" style remotes that used no batteries and worked by audio impulse and later used inaudible ultrasonics. I think it would be fun to revive the control scheme for a modern hobby project.

Edit: someone did it! https://www.hackster.io/news/control-alexa-with-an-old-schoo...