NBC Transmitter (Jan-Nov 1942)

4 NBC TRANSMITTER NBC TELEVISION On Monday evening, January 5, 1 942, NBC Television officially became part of New York City’s civilian defense organization. By order of Police Commissioner Lewis j. Valentine, hundreds of selected zone, sector and post wardens were notified by their local precinct station houses to report for the special NBC defense telecast. Viewing locations were in individual homes and radio dealers' shops, enlisted by the NBC Television Department to aid in the experiment. Television’s debut in instructing New York City’s thousands of air raid wardens was made possible by the National Broadcasting Company’s offer to telecast training films and supplementary instruction by Police Department experts over NBC’s Television Station, WNBT. In the first use of television to instruct the City’s volunteer wardens, Lieutenant William F. Maley, of the staff of the Coordinator for the Police Department Civilian Defense, gave instruction supplementary to that contained in the featured Office of Civilian Defense training film, “Fighting the Fire Bomb.’’ Assistants in the NBC Television Studio at Radio City demonstrated the use of various types of fire extinguishers and pumps nec essary in fighting the light magnesium incendiary bomb. The experiment was conducted to test fhe efficiency of television in transmitting defense instruction, by Police Department experts, to many scattered groups, simultaneously. Standardization of training and the economies in the time of the Department’s crack instructors were the all-important ends sought in the test. The television experiment was also witnessed by New York State and New jersey civilian defense officials in towns and cities up to sixty miles from the NBC Television Transmitter location in midManhattan. Situated atop the Empire State Building, the WNBT Transmitter can enable one instructor to speak from five thousand television screens to an audience several times that number. The regular evening audience of NBC’s previous civilian defense television classes has been estimated at from forty to fifty thousand people. On January 5th, a re-telecast over Station WPTZ, Philadelphia, with which WNBT is linked by a radio relay, made the instruction available to defense workers in the Philadelphia-Camden area. Telegrams and notes of enthusiastic commendation have been received, placing the approval of New York City’s air raid wardens on television as a means of instruction. Reports came in from the hundreds of wardens gathered at 123 viewing locations in the 50 precincts witnessing the telecast, A sheaf of telegrams brought praise from defense officials and individual citizens in such out-oftown points as Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Poughkeepsie, and Bridgeport, Connecticut, for the television experiment conducted by the New York City Police Department in cooperation with NBC’s Television Department. A Philadelphia home viewer wired: “Three in our family saw telecast on incendiary bomb lecture. Picture very clear. We are better informed on this phase of defense.’’ A Connecticut televiewer telegraphed: “Ten people witnessed special civilian defense program, including three air raid wardens. Reception perfect. Wardens greatly impressed with television instruction as being far better than oral lecture.’’ New York City wardens reported: “The presentation was excellent,’’ “Could not be better’’ and, “I think this demonstration was very interesting and highly educational. I am sure that I could successfully destroy a fire bomb.” NBC Television has actively worked with the armed forces and defense officials of the nation for years. On May 26, 1938, almo't all the roles proposed for television in defense today, were actuallv demonstrated to Army and Navy personnel. With the resumption of regular television program service July 1. 1941. defense programs were woven into the weekly schedules. The initial program featured the USO. Regular programs thereafter have been giving visual instruction in all types of civilian protective mf^a<^ures and device'". The now famous RCA Alert Receiver is demonstrated by Arthur Van Dvck to Lenore Kingston and the NBC Television Audience in one of WNBT’s numerous defense telecasts.