You're so right.  It was quite a radio for its day.  I loved mine.
Actually in their later stuff such as the 450 and so forth, you couldn't
directly access a memory from the keypad as you could on the 440.
Fortunately, you can now with the 2000 and 480.

I have both, bought a 480 used, and think the 480 for the dough is a hard
radio to beat.  I wish they had made some provison to attach the remote
head directly to the radio.  I think having the remote head separate and
then having the mike jack on the radio is a little strange.
73s
Butch Bussen
wa0vjr