Broadcasting (July - Dec 1937)

Mr. Myers Employes ofKOIN May Acquire Stock EMPLOYES of station K O I N, Portland, 0 r e., will be given an opportunity to acquire stock in the corporation and thus share in its ownership, according to a new policy announced by the management. Approximately 50% of the station's stock will be distributed to employes who have been with KOIN one year or more. Each employe may acquire a number of shares based on the length of service and the relative responsibility of his or her position, according to C. W. Myers, president of KOIN and KALE and former president of the NAB. It will not be necessary for those who participate in the plan to make payments out of their wages unless they wish to do so. About 40 persons will qualify for stock ownership at once. "For more than 10 years, KOIN was operated on a basis of plowing profits back into the business," President Myers stated. "During that period our employes stuck by the ship in a grand manner, exerting their efforts to perfection of the institution. "The management of the station rests with a managing board, consisting of department heads which meets every week. In order to bring these department heads and their assistants more closely in touch with the conduct of our business, the present stockholders of KOIN have diverted about one half the stock in a pool of shares," he added. KOIN at present is 521/2% owned by Mr. Myers, 221/2% by C. R. Hunt, manager, and 25% by the Portland Oregon Journal. KALE, its sister station, recently merged with KFJR to make a full-time outlet, is one-third each owned by the same interests. Wireless Veterans Plan Marconi Memorial Fund A MARCONI Memorial Fund for the purpose of erecting a monument to the late inventor somewhere in New York City has been undertaken, it was announced July 28 by the Veteran Wireless Operators Association, of which Marconi was "Wireless Veteran No. 1." A board composed of prominent members of the communications industry will be appointed to approve designs to be solicited from prominent sculptors. A committee also will be appointed to make arrangements for a suitable location. The fund was launched with a contribution of $100 by William J. McGonigle, president of the VWOA, and second and third contributions were pledged by David Sarnoff, president of RCA, and Alfred J. McCosker, chairman of MBS and president of WOR. Other contributions may be addressed to the association at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, New York. ITALIAN residents of New York on .July 26 heard a special memorial tribute to the late Guglielmo Marconi over WOV, with Mayor LaGuardia, Generoso Pope, Italian newspaper publisher, and Edward Corsi, deputy commissioner of public welfare, delivering eulogies. GUGLliiLiViO iVlARCONI ALL OVER the civilized world, and especially among radiomen young and old in his native Italy and in the lands of his greatest achievements, England and America, heads were bowed with gnef as the magic medium of his own creation — Radio — on July 20 flashed the news of the passing of Guglielmo Marconi. He died of a heart attack that morning in Rome at the age of 63 after an illness of only a few hours, and just after he had sent a telegram to his youngest daughter Ellerta who was celebrating her seventh birthday. ■ Few great inventors have lived to see such great results of their first modest efforts and fewer yet have been honored in life and death as Marconi was honored. American radio spontaneously expressed its mourning in silent periods and in programs narrating his achievements. Premier Mussolini knelt 15 minutes before his bier as the body lay in state before being borne away for burial in his home city of Bologna, Italy. Kings and queens, presidents and dictators, industrialists and artists, expressed their great grief at the passing of one of the truly great men of our time. . • j Guglielmo Marconi always bore himself with the simplicity of greatness. Even in 1895, when he first felt he had conquered space his unaffected announcement simply read: "I have discovered how to telegraph without wires." Four years later he was demonstrating his wireless in this country for the first time from a vessel chartered by a New York newspaper to follow the America's Cup Races. The demonstration was so convincing that within a year two vessels of the American Navy were equipped with wireless, the beginning of American radio. Perhaps it is significant that, where he sent his stories by code from a vessel to a land station, the America's Cup Races of 1937, scheduled to start off Newport July 31, are being covered by announcers and engineers in similar vessels and in airplanes — but their voices go directly into the homes of the nation and the world. Marconi was the true pioneer of the radio as we know it today, and even to his dying day was pioneering the new vistas of television and the ultrashort waves. His "firsts" would fill a bookshelf. It was given to others to refine his methods — and American inventors like DeForest developed code wireless into voice broadcasting — but it was Guglielmo Marconi who really was responsible for the beginnings of the world's great communications and broadcasting services of today. The American broadcasting industry mourns his passing and repeats, with heartfelt conviction, the eulogy expressed for one of America's own great men: "Now he belongs to the ages." Young Marconi Sails COUNT GIULIO MARCONL who recently came to ?Iew York to work with RCA and NBC to learn American radio methods, sailed for Italy July 21 following receipt of the news of the death of his distinguished father. He arrived too late for the funeral services which took place that day in Rome with Premier Mussolini and other notables attending. A second funeral service was held July 23 in Bologna, his birthplace, following which the body was buried temporarily in the Certosa of Bologna until a fitting monument can be built. Static marred efforts to rebroadcast the Rome services to this country, alBishop in St. Louis Star Times though they Were Carried for a "Broadcasting on an International short time when conditions cleared Band" somewhat. \ AT&T and Farnsworth Sign License Agreement For Television Patents WHAT MAY be a step towards the broader use of television and the standardization of definition and other elements in visual broadcasting is expected to result from the consummation of a licensing agreement between Farnsworth . Television Inc., and the American T. Telephone & Telegraph Co. whereII/ by each grants extensive rights in"l' television patents to the other. I Announcement of the licensing agreement was made July 26 in Philadelphia by Farnsworth Television Inc. officials. The terms of the agreement, which was signed in New York last week by Charles P. Cooper, A. T. & T. vice-president, and Philo T. Farnsworth, provide a non-exclusive arrangement whereby both the A. T. & T. and the Farnsworth company can license others to manufacture television apparatus under their patents. It is understood that the Philco Radio & Television Co. is the principal licensee of Farnsworth, both in the United States and in foreign countries. "This clears the path," Donald K. Lippincott of San Francisco, counsel of the Farnsworth interests, stated in announcing the agreement, "for cooperation between the Bell System, Farnsworth. and certain Farnsworth licensees, helps to clarify a difficult patent situation and brings one step nearer the broad use of television and other advances in communications." The licensing agi-eement only takes in television patents of both companies and does not embrace exchange of patents on m-if ventions dealing with public communications in telephony and te-s legraphy. At the same time it was disclosedfic that the A. T. & T. had satisfactorily completed the first phase of its testing of the coaxial cable between New York and Philadelphia with 1,000,000 cycle repeaters. Re-1 peaters of 2,000,000 cycles widthj;; are now being installed in the place of the 1,000,000 cycle repeaters and tests on that band will be heldj; as soon as the installation is completed. It is planned to install repeaters of greater capacity later, probably up to a band of 4,000,000; cycles. The greater band capacities' are deemed essential before thej cable can be used for television, transmission by wire. Dorothy Thompson Series: AMERICAN TOBACCO Co., New, York, will start a series of news, broadcasts featuring Dorothy Thompson, the wife of the novelist,j-;. Sinclair Lewis and a noted column ist and former European news paper correspondent, on a 30-, station NBC-Red network on Aug 6. Program will be broadcast Fri-.J; days, 10:45 to 11 p. m., under the. title People in the News, and will,.,, be used to advertise Pall MallJ,; cigarettes. Campaign is placed,, through Compton Inc., New York, Diamond Salt's Show GENERAL FOODS Corp., New York, will start a new script show_ for Diamond Crystal salt on NBCBlue on Oct. 3. Program will be broadcast from 3 to 3:30 on Sun ijj day afternoons over 12 to 15 sta f^, tions. Benton & Bowles Inc., Newr York is the agency. ■4 Page 14 • August 1, 1937 BROADCASTING • Broadcast Advertising] i