Broadcasting (Oct - Dec 1950)

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RADIO broadcasting was already established as an integral part of the American way of life in 1931, when, on Oct. 15, the first issue of Broadcasting, "The News Magazine of the Fifth Estate," was distributed. Magazines went to executives of the 612 stations then serving listeners in more than 15 million of the nation's homes and of the business concerns and their advertising agencies. Those advertisers and agencies during 1931 spent some $56 million for the use of broadcasting facilities to deliver sales IS'Sl messages about their products to this vast listening audience. In the 11 years since KDKA Pittsburgh and WWJ Detroit had first begun providing regular program service for a few thousand listeners, broadcasting had come a long way. If it had not as yet achieved full maturity it was certainly a healthy, husky youngster, filled with youth's vitality, idealism and eagerness to serve, and beset by more than a normal number of growing pains. A rapid recapitulation of radio history during the 1920's, touching only a few of the ultra-high spots in a list of notable events long enough to more than fill a full issue, shows: 1921 : First broadcasts of a championship fight (Dempsey-Carpentier) and a big league ball game; 30 stations on the air at the end of the year. 1922: Secretary of Commerce Dr. Armstrong Herbert Hoover called the first radio conference relating to broadcasting (the Department of Commerce a decade earlier had been directed to enforce a radio act requiring certain passenger ships to carry radio equipment and operators, and had expanded its super vision to all domestic radio operations, including broadcasting) ; the superheterodyne radio receiver was introduced by its inventor, E. H. Armstrong; first sponsored p r o gram was broadcast (by WEAF New York, then owned by AT&T which was testing the theory that if a telephone service could be maintained on fees collected from individuals using telephone facilities to talk to other individuals, it might be possible to support a broadcasting service on fees collected from individuals or organizations utilizing radio facilities to address at one time a large number of other individuals); program was a 10-minute talk on real estate, sponsored by the Queensborough Corp., New York real estate organization; more than 500 stations on the air by Dec. 31. Network Broadcasting Debuts in January 1923: First network broadcast in January when WEAF New York and WNAC Boston were linked by telephone wire and in June the first multiple station hook-up comprising WEAF, WGY Schenectady; KDKA Pittsburgh, and KYW Chicago; first rebroadcast, when KDPM Cleveland picked up short waves from KDKA and transmitted them; opening of Congress broadcast for first time. 1924: First transatlantic rebroadcast, KDKA program shortwaved to London, broadcast there for local audience; conventions of the major political parties broadcast for the first time over nationwide networks (What listener from those days will ever forget "Alabama casts 24 votes for Underwood" ? ) ; first transatlantic picture transmission by facsimile radio. Nation Hears Coolidge Inaugural 1925: Coolidge inaugural broadcast across the country by 24 stations; John Baird, television inventor, showed "radio shadowgraphs" in London; introduction of alternating current tubes made possible the all-electric home receiver; United States Radio Research Labs confirmed Heaviside-Kennelly theory of so-called "radio mirror." 1926: President Coolidge signed the Dill-White Radio Bill, creating the Federal Radio Commission and ending chaos caused by an undisciplined growth of broadcasting after Department of Commerce control had proved ineffective; World Series broadcast for first time by nationwide hookup; NBC organized Nov. 1, with WEAF and WJZ as New York key stations, Merlin Hall Aylesworth as president; more than 700 stations on air. 1927: First regularly established transcontinental hookup opens New Year broadcasting Rose Bowl football game from Pasadena; President Coolidge appoints first Radio Commission: Rear Admiral W. H. G. Bullard, John F. Dillon, Judge E. 0. Sykes, O. H. Caldwell, Henry A. Bellows; CBS went on the air Sept. 18, with basic network of 16 stations, Maj. J. Andrew White as president; Young & Rubicam buys block of time across the board on NBC for Radio Household Institute, mixing commercials for various clients among household hints and recipes. London Beams First Transatlantic Telecast 1928: Baird telecast from London viewed at Hartsdale, N. Y., first transatlantic video transmission; Bell Telephone Labs demonstrates outdoor video pickup without lights; 107-station hookup carries Herbert Hoover's speech accepting Republican nomination for President from Palo Alto; the two major parties spent about $500,000 (Continued on page 68) Maj. White THESE are the founding fathers of NAB as they met in the Dralie Hotel, Chicago, on April 23, 1923, to establish the organization. They are (I to r): Raymond Walker; C. H. Anderson; Frank W. Elliott, WHO Des Moines, later an NAB president; Comdr. Eugene F. McDonald Jr., then owner of WJAZ Chicago; Paul Klugh, manager of WJAZ; William S. Hedges, radio editor of the Chicago Daily News, operating WMAQ; Elliott Jenkins, WDAP Chicago (now WGN); A. B. Cooper; John Shepard 3rd; Rowel Crosley Jr., WLW Cincinnati. They were to guide a rapidly-growing young industry in its early years. BROADCASTING • Telecasting October 16, 1950 • Page 67