Radio Digest (Jan-Oct 1926)

RADIO DIGES T— Illustrated EARL MAY WINS GOLD CUP AWARD FARMER TO BENEFIT BY U.S. AIR PROGRAM AGR. DEPT. SIGNS 100 KEY STATIONS FOR FEATURES Farm School, Homemakers' Chats and Noonday Flashes Only Three of Twenty Helpful Broadcasts WASHINGTON. — Approximately one hundred major broadcasting stations, representingevery section of the country, will lend their facilities regularly to the United States Department of Agriculture, starting October 4. The new government farm programs, which cover a wide scope of interest, are to be brief digests of the most timely, pertinent facts woven into story form and carefully adapted to Radio presentation. The fall and winter broadcasting schedule of the Agricultural Radio service includes twenty special program features each week, covering the full range of interests reached by all bureaus of the department. Farm School at 25 Stations The United States Radio Farm school, which has already brought requests for a half million enrollment cards, will be conducted from twenty-five stations. Lessons take the form of experience talks and imaginary inspection tours. Radio "schoolmasters" at the respective stations will conduct classes. Material furnished by the Department of Agriculture will be dramatized in such form as to attract and maintain interest through the courses. Printed lessons are to be mailed to all enrolled students. Another outstanding service to be released from forty stations is the noonday flashes. This program will enable a million farmers to listen in daily to both sides of an intelligent, interesting, telephone conversation between a county agent and farmer who will discuss timely problems. "Aunt Sammy" Aids Homemakers 'Aunt Sammy," a new Radio friend and neighbor, will be heard from thirty stations starting October 4. Uncle Sam's sister, who is the official Radio representative of the bureau of home economics of the department of agriculture, has a sense of humor and is the friendly sort. She knows all the new wrinkles and fine points in housekeeping and will tell about them in a style all her own. Special farm features to be scheduled this fall and winter from fifty stations include "A Weekly Letter to Dad," which the son at college writes home telling the folks the high spots in his studies of agriculture which he believes might well be put into practice on the home place; "Autobiographies of Infamous Bugs and Rodents," a ten-minutes specialty about "Pests That Are Bothering Now," as told by the insects and rodents themselves; "Chats by the Weather Man"; "Primer for Town Farmers"; "An Interview With the Agricultural Economist," and a weekly "Farm News Digest." Broadcaster Lifesaver When Storm Hits South WSMB Warns Fishermen and Trappers of Hurricane NEW ORLEANS. — The first demonstration here of the practicability of broadcasting for other than entertainment took place during the recent tropical hurricane which struck the south central coast of Louisiana and later hitting Florida, when Station WSMB remained on the air over forty hours straight broadcasting advisory bulletins on the progress of the storm. Because of this service, the tropical hurricane did not come sweeping down unheralded as heretofore on unprotected, lonely fishing craft anchored in secluded covers off the Gulf coast; on trappers miles deep in the almost impenetrable fastness of marshlands and isolated communities and villages. Hundreds of lives were saved. National Broadcasting Co. Takes Over WEAF Goodwill NEW YORK. — The formation of the National Broadcasting Company, Inc., was announced by Owen D. Young and James G. Harbord, chairman of the board and president, respectively, of the Radio Corporation of America, in a formal statement here recently. M. H. Aylesworth, formerly chairman of the Colorado public utilities commission, and more recently managing director of the National Electric Light association, has been named as the president of the new company which will make the station WEAF, formerlv owned by the American Telephone and Telegraph company, as the nucleus of a national broadcasting service. INJURY CANT STOP RADIO LOVE MAKER SCHENECTADY, N. Y. — The actor in the Radio drama may have broken bones or even be minus a leg or two, but, providing he has retained his voice, the audience will enjoy his work quite as much. Ten Eyck Clay, director of the WGY Players, recently tried to start his car by cranking after the battery had become exhausted. The car started at the price of a broken wrist. In the Radio play that night he made passionate love to the heroine despite his injury. "PAT" BARNES,WTTHIN 12,000 OF BIG PRIZE, PUCES SECOND KMA Owner Is First with Record Breaking Vote in His Favor — WHT Announcer Wins Silver Cup as Runner-Up — Lillian Shaw of CKY Wins Canadian Trophy Earl E. May, top left; "Pat" Barnes, right; Lillian Shaw, lower left. LOYAL tall corn farmers of the Middle West are responsible for the victory of Earl E. May, owner and operator of KMA. When once asked how his station had built up such a following, Mr. May answered: "First of importance, I believe, has been our definite, aggressive and broadminded policy. Second, comes the personality of the announcers and our staff. Third, I would list clear and successful transmission. We have striven to give our audience just a little better than they wanted." Mr. May is president of the May Seed and Nursery company and also of the American Association of Nurserymen. He is a vigorous personality who personally directs programs and the imparting of information to listeners. The latter he always strives to keep accurate, reliable and trustworthy. The farmers believe in KMA and its owner. They rely upon his agricultural and horticultural tips. Tiny know, too, that Mr. May understands the farm. He was raised on a cattle ranch in western Nebraska, forty miles from the main line of the railroad, and besides his practical farming experience, he is an efficient judge of human nature and the public mind. He is appreciative of meritorious comments but proof against praise, and he accepts censure in the spirit in which it is given. Although Shenandoah, Iowa, is a town of but 5,000 people, the interest of the public in KMA was shown this past summer by visits to the station from over 50,000 people. PATRICK HENRY BARNES, winner of silver cup as runner-up in the 1926 Radio Digest Gold Cup Award, is a likeable figure in Radio. As director and chief announcer of WHT, he and his first lieutenants, Jean Sargent and Al Carney, have made the Wrigley building studio one of the best known in the city of Chicago, the Midwest and the entire country, for that matter. While from point of service, he is still a youth in Radio, Pat has a strong following and may be considered as 1927's most feared gold cup contender. Mr. Barnes's presentations or continuity sketches and his "Your Hour League" have hundreds of thousands of followers. He is ranked as a leading showman in the present and future art of Radio entertainment. Last June he was married to Eleanor Gilmour, a singer whose voice is still remembered by the invisible audience. Pat is still young — not over :!:', — and he is as good looking as his voice and its mannerisms arc pleasing. During the world war Pat was overseas with the A. B, F., and while there he achieved fume with his own play, "A Buck on Leave," which many world war vets will remember as a ray of sunshine upon a murky field of mud and blood. The programs emanating from WHT never seem to be commercial in any sense of the word, yet WHT is a strictly toll station. As such it is the most prominent toll broadcaster west of New York where WEAF holds forth. Because the Wrigley building has been so pleasingly entertain (Copyrigrht 1926 by Radio Digrest) With 452,901 votes to his credit to mark him indisputably as the world's most popular announcer for 1926, Earl E. May, owner of and announcer for KMA, the May Seed and Nursery company station at Shenandoah, Iowa, went over the top and won the 1926 Radio Digest Gold Cup Award, bringing honor to a little town in Iowa in the midst of the Corn Belt. But his margin was not great. Close behind him trailed Patrick H. Barnes, director and announcer of WHT, the Radiophone Broadcasting Corporation station, Chicago. Mr. Barnes, at the end of a week's tabulation of votes on the part of the judges, showed a count of 441,379 — a matter of but 11,522 less than Mr. May, the champion. To the victor will be awarded the solid gold cup, shaped like a microphone and valued at $5,000. To the runner-up will be presented the sterling silver cup, identical in design and size with the gold cup that marks second place. Complete final standings for all contestants will appear in the next issue of Radio Digest. Heavy Vote Breaks Records The presentations of both cups will be made at the Chicago Radio Show, to be held October 11 to 18 at the Coliseum, Chicago. Although the night of the ceremony has not been set, the event will be broadcast by a chain of stations. The unusually heavy voting this year was remarkable. Each of the winners polled well over twice as many votes as it took to elect-Graham McNamee in 1925 or George Hay in 1924 to the honored position. Perhaps the interest in the contest would not have been so great had not Messrs. Hay and McNamee insisted upon withdrawing this year, both claiming that one gold cup was enough for anyone, and thus establishing a "single term" precedent for world's champions. But the 1926 race was hot, and almost to the end of the counting not a judge would predict the outcome. Woman Takes Canadian Cup A young woman announcer for CKY, Miss Lillian Shaw, took the special silver loving cup offered by Radio Digest for the most popular Canadian announcer this year. This marks the second successive year that a member of the staff of CKY has taken the Canadian cup, last year's having been won by D. R. P. Coats, chief announcer for the Manitoba Telephone System station. Joining with McNamee and Hay, Mr. Coats refused to run again this year, and instead became campaign manager for Miss Shaw. Complete final standings for all entrants in the Gold Cup Award, together with pictures of the fifteen announcers next in order following May and Barnes, will appear in the next issue of Radio Digest. The fifteen whose pictures will be given will be presented with certificates of honorable mention. Final tabulations and recounts are now being made by the Gold Cup Award Editor and a corps of busy assistants. ing as a commercial station, we cannot help but admire the ability of its staff. L1LLTAN SHAW, who now rates as Canada's most popular announcer for 1926, Mr. D. R. P. Coats, 1925 Canadian champion, permitting (by his refusal to run in 1926), is a native Canadian. She was born of English parents in Winnipeg just twenty years ago, and her education consisted of attending the Winnipeg public and high schools. Tn 1922 she left school to take a business course, and in November, 1923, she joined they staff of CKY as stenographer and daytime program announcer. She may be said to have grown up with CKY as this was her first business appointment. Miss Shaw is a "preferred" blonde of slight build. She is the daughter of Mrs. A. H. Shaw, one of Winnipeg's best known soprano soloists and winner last year of the prize for operatic singing in the Manitoba Musical Festival.