I remember my dad having a german made contraption,which was basically an "improved " escapement.It was powered by an electric motor,and had a sort of wheel on the side.This had 4 slotted arms,which could be used to control whatever surface.A detent stopped the wheel as required.The thing was quite heavy,so i have a feeling it was meant for boat use,which was what my dad bought it for.
At that time,ni-cads were available,but very expensive.Hence my dad relying on dry batteries.He never had any real success with this gear,probably also because of a lack of knowledge.Here is a broadly similar device on tube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jZJAgcRCEQDad was a cabinet maker,and built beautiful boats,but the electronic side always gave him much grief.He graduated to the Futaba green single channel set with a relayless receiver.I still have the plastic case of it.Still didn't do dad much good tho.
Finally,he lashed out on the first Futaba propo 2channel set,and got a succesfully controlled boat.I seem to remember the servos were in a brick with the receiver.The wonder of it all!Batteries were still the biggest letdown,and i don't think this improved much until the button style ni-cads became more common,and thus cheaper.
We are SOOOOOOO spoiled these days.