NBC transmitter (Jan-Dec 1940)

8 NBC TRANSMITTER NBC TRANSMITTER Published for and by the employes of the National Broadcasting Company from coast to coast. KOA DENVER by Charles Anderson VOL. 6 FEBRUARY, 1940 No. 2 EDITORIAL BOARD John Kelly Editor Howard Flynn Assistant Editor Charles Van Bergen Photographs ASSOCIATES James Beardsley Guest Relations Thomas Canning Guest Relations Charles Turner Guest Relations James Tyson Guest Relations William Crawford Gartoons Address all correspondence to: NBC Transmitter, National Broadcasting Company, Room 465, RCA Building, New York, N. Y. Telephone: Circle 7-8300. Extension 220. RAY KELLY {Continued from page 3) except, well — the ladies can’t hear the colors clash. You’ve probably heard the distant roll of thunder. Technician Kelly took six months trying to find a steer hide large enough to give the proper sound for a thunder drum. One was finally located in Chicago, cured and stretched onto a six-foot square frame. It is used now for many varieties of percussion sounds, long sustained rolls and distant explosions. In the natural world sounds very seldom are the same. That, too, is considered up in the sound effects shop. The single sound of thunder may come from an electronic machine, from a recording, from an inflated basketball bladder filled with bird-seed, or from the inexplicable thunder sheet with a magnetic pickup, as well as from the drum. This winter a specially designed RCA sound effects kit for youngsters appeared. It had a little rain resonator, a mild steam engine puffer, a couple of balloons, one for surf, one for thunder, and other charms. The story finally comes out that the designer was Ray Kelly. Now every kid that got one for Christmas has w'ritten to Uncle Ray who has been elected Chief Engineer of the Short Pants Sound Effects Club. This makes the young Kellys, both of them, the talk of the town among the younger set of Great Neck, Long Island. In fact, Ray Kelly seems to be able to create any sound with precision and proper variations. So if you’re writing a radio play that needs unheard of noises, don’t worry about them, go on worrying about the play, because Kelly could, if necessary, produce the sounds of life on Mars, and these would he authentic. KOA goes to the Theatre! December 14th, Denver’s 12 leading theatres began a promotional co-operation campaign as result of an agreement signed by General Manager Lloyd Yoder and Harry Huffman of Fox Intermountain Theatres, Inc. To celebrate the signing of the pact a mammoth program was presented from the stage of the Denver Theatre. Clarence Moore, Program Director of KOA, M.C.’d the show introducing Manager Yoder, Mr. Huffman, singer Donald Novis and Dr. I. Q. KOA will carry Theatre reporter program daily and theatres in Denver and Rocky Mountain Region will carry trailers publicizing KOA-NBC outstanding radio attractions. Conservative estimate states that theatre audiences will get 8,000,000 reminders yearly of NBC’s programs. As Promotion Manager James MacPherson of KOA says, “8,000,000 KOA flashes can’t be wrong.” Denver University has again commandeered the services of KOA’s Assistant Manager and Chief Engineer Robert H. Owen. He will lecture the Electrical Engineering Seniors in the College of Engineering. Mr. Owen garnered his B.A. in Science and Electrical Engineering at the University of Colorado and spent several years with the General Electric Company in Schenectady, New York, before coming to Denver again to put KOA on the air for the first time, in 1924. Saturday, December 9th, President Neville Miller of the National Association of Broadcasters, paid a visit to Denver for the regional NAB Conference. The meetings were attended by Manager Lloyd Yoder, and Assistant Manager Robert H. Owens. The welcome mat was spread in typical KOA class for the arrival after Christmas of Mrs. Yoder, wife of Manager Lloyd Yoder. Mr. Yoder went ■ 1 u W ^ 'f r 1 .7 > ^ 1 I '■ t • * Welcome to Denver, Mrs. Yoderl Seated: Harry Huffman (left) of Fox-1. M. Theatres: Lloyd Yoder. Standing: Manager Rice, Paramount Theatre; Bernie Hynes, Manager, Denver Theatre; James MacPherson. to San Francisco to officiate at the Annual East-West game and to bring his wife back to Colorado with him. The Staff of KOA turned out en masse at the station to greet Mrs. Yoder and give her a bouquet of roses as an expression of our hospitality. KOA is joining with the Sloan Foundation in a very worthwhile effort to make educational broadcasts equally interesting to every listener. With Dr. A. D. H. Kaplan, Professor of Government Management at the University of Denver, acting as authority, and Forbes Parkhill, nationally known writer, preparing the scripts, Roscoe Stockton, KOA Producer, is directing the series to be started soon under the title You Make America. The shows will have dramatic appeal and production techniques applied to make them interest-getters as well as educational aids to better understanding of the problems of Government Management. Program is result of months of consultation between Manager Lloyd Yoder, Dr. A. D. H. Kaplan, Clarence Moore, Program Director, and members of the Sloan Foundation. J. A. Slusser, engineer in charge of the KOA Transmitter, received from the Chamber of Commerce of Aurora special commendation for the beautiful Christmas lighting effects which had passersby oh-ing as they drove by the building and tower. Two evergreens in front had strings of lights; a big wreath and rope of green over the door; inside another wreath and lighted Christmas tree; and on the roof the two small towers for the Hi-frequency antenna were floodlighted. All this combined with the neon on the tower and the fountain out front made something to look at.