Broadcasting (Oct 1931-Dec 1932)

KTM, Los Angeles, has completely renovated its studios and redecorated in the form of an exterior set of an early California mission with belfry and facade. Special lighting effects give the sunset glow at all times and the organ console has been spotted in the mission entrance. The new scenic set was installed as an incentive for Olympic Games visitors to visit the station. KMOX, St. Louis, is surveying its coverage through letters addressed to radio editors offering to send the station's radio programs if the reception is satisfactory. ON MAY 1 KDB, Don Lee station, Santa Barbara, Cal., celebrated its first birthday under the present ownership. On the same evening KVOS, Bellingham, Wash., held a special program on becoming affiliated with the Don Lee-CBS network. WIP-WFAN, Philadelphia, recently staged a television demonstration • in cooperation with the Gimbel store. Sanabria equipment was used. A group of prominent personalities, including Leopold Stokowski, were televised. TWIN TOWERS for CKWO, new CBS outlet at Windsor, Ont., to be operated by Essex Broadcasters, Ltd., on 540 kc, were completed May 7, and the station is expected to be in readiness by June 1. -The towers are said to be the highest in Canada, rising 200 feet. EQUIPMENT DE FOREST RADIO Co., Passaic, N. J., announces that for the convenience of broadcasters, amateurs and other users of transmitting tubes, its audions are being stocked at seven distributing points, in addition to Passaic, N. J., to insure maximum speed in bringing tubes to station operators. The stocks are maintained at the DeForest regional offices in Chicago, Minneapolis, Seattle, Los Angeles, Kansas City, Pittsburgh and Atlanta. DE FOREST RADIO Co., Passaic, N. J., has completed a special laboratory to test transmitters and has enlarged its transmitting tube department to meet increased orders for broadcast requirements. Reductions in the prices of transmitting audions have also been announced. WNAC AND WAAB, key stations of the Yankee Network at Boston, claim to be the first in the country to take complete advantage of the latest developments in acoustical engineering. As a result of an exhaustive study by consulting engineers of Electrical Research Products, Inc., they are now equipped with acoustic treatment and a technique of distant sound pickup designed to make the studios "live." The supervising engineer on the work was C. G. Jones, of the ERP organization. POSTAL TELEGRAPH Sales Corp., newly incorporated affiliate of Postal Telegraph, has concluded an arrangement with the Hammond Clock Company, Chicago, to act as exclusive distributors of a new bichronous electric clock, according to C. B. Allsopp, vicepresident of Postal Telegraph-Cable Co. The new clocks, to be manufactured by Hammond, are described as non-stop and "constantly correct to a second." They do not require periodical synchronizing or servicing. They will be sold outright on a cash or deferred payment basis, instead of leased to users as has been the general custom, and are made in different colors and sizes to fit in with any type of office or store equipment. JANSKY & BAILEY, engineering consultants of Washington, are supervising the installation of the new 5 kw. Western Electric transmitter of CKWO, which goes into operation June 1 at Windsor, Ont., across the river from Detroit. PROGRAM NOTES "MARCH of Events" is the title of a new program recently started by WMCA, New York, under the personal supervision of Charles Martin, who created the "March of Time" program, formerly a CBS feature. The program is carried Sunday evenings. A TELETYPE system and a novel abbreviation scheme enables Pat Flanagan, WBBM, Chicago, sports announcer, to speed up materially his reports on out-of-town baseball games. The teletype line connects the studio and the press boxes of the National League parks. WHBY, Green Bay, Wis., recently inaugurated the "Fox River Valley Newscast," broadcast edited by Ray Leason. Its slogan is: "The news you hear today you will read tomorrow." LISTENERS were invited to send in their pet superstition on May 2 when a series of discussions on superstitions were broadcast over WAAB, Boston, and the Yankee Network during Big Brother Bob Emery's "Science Laboratory of the Air." THE AMERICAN School of the Air has just concluded its third season on the air. Seventy-eight CBS stations carried the educational programs to an estimated audience of 10,000,000 children and adults during the 19311932 season. More than 3700 hours of network time were consumed in the 97 broadcast periods. WOR, Newark, began broadcasting this month a weekly series of addresses by Oswald Garrison Villard, noted liberal leader and editor of The Nation. RAY COFFIN, onetime president of the Wampas, Hollywood group of film publicity men, has been gathering material for a potential chain program with "big-time" authors to produce short stories. Original billing was for the program to be known as the H. H. Van Loan Eminent Author Hour included Upton Sinclair, Rupert Hughes, Homer Croy, E. D. Biggers, Jim Tully, Donald Ogden Stewart and others. No deal was announced as to chain or station, according to Los Angeles press reports. EIGHTY-FIVE schools of Georgia are taking advantage of the "Georgia School of the Air," being broadcast by WMAZ, Macon, and 10 scholarships in voice, recitation, declamation and music are offered grammar and high schools. WMAZ recently transferred its equipment to new studios without losing any scheduled time on the air. ATHLETIC interviews with prominent coaches and educators from various schools and colleges are being featured on KFKU, University of Kansas station at Lawrence, Kan. THE TECHNIQUE of broadcasting was brought to University of Southern California (Los Angeles) students late in April in the commerce department as part of a general lecture series. Speakers included Carl Haverlin, sales manager; Arthur Kales, manager and Jose Rodriguez, publicity manager of KFI-KECA. A LIMERICK contest staged in connection with the "Emmy and Ezra" program over WGAL, Lancaster, Pa., has resulted in an increase in the circulation of Lancaster newspapers in which the limericks were published. A total of 20 cash prizes were awarded and a photograph of the radio stars was given each entrant. THE POPULAR WLS barn dance entertainers on May 7 were added to the NBC network. MCA Expands ON ACCOUNT of increasing activities, the Music Corporation of America's Chicago office recently moved into larger quarters, taking over the entire eighteenth floor of the Masonic Temple building. Previously, the New York offices were expanded to include the observatory tower of the Paramount building. Agency's Radio Role (Continued from page 11) department? There's plenty for it to do besides wandering among the Narcisses of Broadway. Someone has to devise palatable, unique, unhumdrum commercials. Someone has to uncover announcers who do not sound as though they were breathing their last, broken with love. Someone needs to work out ingenious lyrical novelties, rearrange words so singers may have open throats in upper registers. Someone who knows must keep conductors on the ground so they won't be tempted as they so easily are, to choose musician music instead of the surer-fire lollipops of which audiences never weary. Someone with advertising background must study script and programs and sense immediately how entertainment factors can be harnessed to the commercials. Someone with a sense of humor must be around the place to detect absurdities that do not belong and provide the same for spots in the act where they should be and aren't. Someone who wears number twelve shoes should be employed to wander about the department, kicking others who wear number eight hats. This could go on for hours, but why should I? In the first place, ideas are worth money, even if you can't sell them. In the second place, there likely are not half a dozen big agencies in the country yet ready for this horse sense. There should be an armistice, I'm convinced — an end to the hostilities between broadcast companies and agency men. Somehow, many agency executives seem to be losing sight of an important fundamental. We're the customers of the broadcast companies. Our patronage is their bread and butter. They have their own interest at heart in their program building, but that interest comes to nothing if the programs are not sold. In a liberal sense, every dollar they have invested is an investment in the advertising business. When advertising ceases either the radio broadcast companies will cease also or we shall have government subsidy with Congressman Sapp's soprano niece and Senator Supe's nephew's college glee club pinch-hitting for entertainment. If the remnants of my readers include one agency's treasurer, may I, as a parting thrust, ask him how he likes, on the month's audit such items as "audition of orchestra, (Coryphee Shoes) $450.' Petition Denied PETITION of the World Broadcasting System for an amendment of the rules and regulations governing announcements of mechanical reproductions along simpler lines was denied by the Radio Commission May 10. In a letter to the Commission from George E. Strong, counsel for World, asked for authority to announce its transcriptions as the networks announce their programs, such as "This program comes to you by electrical transcription from the World Broadcasting System studios in New York City." A Key Station of the Columbia Broadcasting System, originating regular daily programs to stations west of the basic network. LET TH E D IALS of i&ii Great Trade Territory TUNE IN YOUR SPRING MESSAGE @ttik K M B C MIDLAND BROADCASTING CO., KANSAS CITY, M0 PaSe 24 BROADCASTING • May 15, 1932