home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Tech Arsenal 1
/
Tech Arsenal (Arsenal Computer).ISO
/
tek-20
/
pioneers.zip
/
PIONEERS.TXT
< prev
Wrap
Text File
|
1993-03-15
|
39KB
|
673 lines
PIONEER BROADCAST STATIONS IN THE UNITED STATES
Thomas H. White - June 1, 1992
Any review of the first U.S. broadcast stations is complicated by
conflicting interpretations and claims, plus a scarcity of
information. This is an overview of the pioneer stations granted
broadcasting authorizations, plus a review of the government
policies in force at the time.
Establishment of the Broadcast Service
--------------------------------------
As with most innovations, there was a lag between the development of
broadcasting, and formal recognition of its existence by government
regulators. In the United States, beginning in 1912, radio was
regulated by the Department of Commerce's Bureau of Navigation. One
of the first steps taken by the Bureau, as recorded in the September
28, 1912 edition of "Regulations Governing Radio Communication", was
to divide land station licences into eight classes: 1-Public
Service, 2-Limited Commercial, 3-Experimental, 4-Technical and
Training School, 5-General Amateur, 6-Special Amateur, 7-Restricted
Amateur, and 8-High Power. (The High Power class was soon dropped,
and its stations absorbed into the other categories).
None of the licence classes included any reference to broadcasting.
Thus, in the period of broadcast development and experimentation
leading to the formal adoption of regulations in 1921, stations
licensed under a number of classifications made experimental
broadcasts. For example, among the numerous stations that engaged in
early broadcast development, KDKA in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
held a Limited Commercial licence; many stations, including
DeForest's "High Bridge" station, 2XG in New York City, and
"California Theater" station, 6XC in San Francisco, plus the
American Radio and Research Corporation's 1XE in Medford Hillside,
Massachusetts, and Frank Conrad's 8XK in Pittsburgh operated under
Experimental authorizations; while additional stations, including
the University of Nebraska's 9YY in Lincoln, had Technical and
Training School licences. Other early dabblers in broadcasting,
including the Detroit News' 8MK, held General Amateur licences,
while KDKA's initial November 2, 1920 election broadcast actually
went out under a temporary Special Amateur authorization, 8ZZ. In
addition there were government stations, exempt from Commerce
Department regulation, including AGI, operated by the Army Signal
Corps at the Presidio in San Francisco, California, and the Navy's
NOF-NSF, located in Anacostia, D.C.
Adoption of Broadcast Service Regulations
-----------------------------------------
On December 1, 1921 the Bureau of Navigation formally established
standards for the first time for a broadcasting service. The new
regulations were reported in the January 3, 1922 edition of the
Radio Service Bulletin. However, instead of creating a new licence
class, broadcasting was set up as a service category within the
existing Limited Commercial classification. (Broadcasting would not
become a separate licence until radio regulation was transferred to
the Federal Radio Commission in 1927.) The new broadcast service was
assigned two wavelengths: 360 meters (833 kHz) for "broadcasting
news, concerts and such matter", and 485 meters (619 khz) for
"broadcasting crop reports and weather forecasts". Thus, depending
on the service offered, a broadcast station could be licensed for
360 meters, 485 meters, or for both wavelengths. Stations using the
same wavelength in the same area had to share time in order to avoid
interference. Also, a station licensed for both wavelengths had to
switch from one wavelength to the other whenever its program fell
into another service category. (This dual-wavelength setup was
dropped in May, 1923 when the number of broadcast wavelengths was
greatly expanded).
Under the new standards, in order to be permitted to make broadcasts
intended for the general public, a station had to hold a Limited
Commercial licence, and its licence also had to authorize use of the
broadcast wavelengths. Therefore, Limited Commercial stations that
didn't have an authorization to use the broadcast wavelengths, and
stations operating under other licence classifications, no longer
were permitted to broadcast to the public. (Government stations
remained exempt from Commerce Department control, so some continued
to make broadcasts).
The Bureau's introduction of broadcast service standards actually
formalized developments of the previous two-and-a-half months. At
the time of the introduction of the new regulations, nine stations
already held Limited Commercial licences authorizing the use of 360
meters for broadcasting purposes. The existence of this group of
stations was a side effect of a wavelength assignment request made
by the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company.
Westinghouse's famous KDKA in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania was
first licensed, as a Limited Commercial station, on October 27,
1920. According to early publicity, KDKA's initial broadcasts,
through the fall of 1921, went out on the wavelength of 330 meters
(909 khz). With the success of KDKA, in the fall of 1921
Westinghouse began to set up three additional broadcasting stations
-- WJZ, WBZ, and KYW -- which initially were assigned to a variety
of wavelengths. According to an article in the September, 1922 issue
of Radio News, at this point Westinghouse's L. R. Krumm asked the
Bureau of Navigation to assign all the Westinghouse stations to a
single wavelength, 360 meters. The first Westinghouse station to be
issued a licence explicitly for 360 meters was WBZ on September 15,
1921. During the next two months the other three Westinghouse
stations were also issued licences specifying use of 360 meters.
Moreover, in the period before the December 1st adoption of the new
regulations, five other new stations being set up for public
broadcasting by other companies -- WDY, WCJ, WBL, WJX, and KQL --
were also licensed by the Bureau of Navigation as Limited Commercial
stations operating on 360 meters. Thus, at the time of the adoption
of the December 1st regulations, Limited Commercial licences for 360
meters had already been informally established as a standard
operating setup for broadcasting stations.
The new broadcast service regulations didn't require the nine
stations already on 360 meters to make any changes, because they
already met the new standards. In view of this, lists of the first
broadcasting stations, issued over the years by the Federal Radio
Commission and the Federal Communications Commission, generally
begin with these nine 360 meter assignments, starting with WBZ on
September 15, 1921.
Exceptions and Additions
------------------------
A problem with using the 360 meter grants to identify WBZ as the
first broadcasting station is that this is seemingly an overly
restrictive standard. The question is whether there are radio
stations which can claim existence, as broadcasting stations, prior
to WBZ.
In my view, two of the Westinghouse stations -- KDKA in East
Pittsburgh, and WJZ in Newark, NJ (now WABC New York), qualify as
being senior to WBZ. Both KDKA and WJZ were specifically set up to
be fulltime broadcast stations, and received Limited Commercial
licences, although neither initially specified 360 meters. (KDKA was
first licensed on October 27, 1920 but didn't receive a licence
specifying 360 meters until November 7, 1921. However, it's very
possible that KDKA switched to 360 meters before the new licence was
issued, since it's first licence also didn't specify the 330 meter
wavelength it initially used. WJZ was first licensed in May of 1921,
and was issued a new licence specifying 360 meters on September 30,
1921). Thus, given Westinghouse's pioneering work, in the following
list of broadcast stations KDKA and WJZ are listed according to
their initial licence dates of October 27, 1920 and May, 1921,
respectively.
Of course, once you start developing your own standards, others tend
to come up with suggestions. Most of the broadcasting stations set
up under the December 1st regulations were licensed to individuals
or companies that had operated earlier radio stations. (This
includes KDKA, which was an outgrowth of Frank Conrad's 8XK. The
earliest claim is by KQW in San Jose -- now KCBS in San Francisco --
which identifies predecessors dating back to 1909).
Although some of these earlier stations utilized spark transmitters,
others used continuous wave transmitters and in some cases had
conducted experimental broadcasts. Thus, in many cases broadcast
stations are claimed to actually date back to licences issued to
predecessor stations. However, to the best of my knowledge none of
these predecessor stations can really be considered to be
"broadcasting stations" -- at best they were "radio stations that
also made broadcasts", with their broadcasts secondary or in
addition to the station's normal functions. So, at the risk of great
bodily harm, I personally see no compelling reason to date the
"broadcasting station" ranks any earlier than KDKA's initial
authorization.
Licensing Policies and Procedures
---------------------------------
As noted earlier, licensing at the time of the creation of the
broadcasting service was conducted under the provisions of an act
passed in 1912. Although the standard since the 1927 formation of
the Federal Radio Commission has been that stations serve the
"public convenience, interest, or necessity", no comparable
guideline was mandated by the 1912 act, and licensing of the pioneer
broadcast service stations amounted to little more than
registration. Licensing authority was vested in the Secretary of
Commerce, and exercised through the Bureau of Navigation. This body
operated on a much more informal basis than successor regulators.
Moreover, control was more decentralized, with oversight, performed
primarily by nine regional Radio Inspectors, generally limited to
insuring that stations maintained technical standards.
The procedure normally used to procure a broadcast licence in the
early twenties was as follows: the prospective station operator
filled out an "Applicant's Description of Apparatus" (Form 761),
obtained from the region's Radio Inspector. The completed form,
which provided mostly technical information, was submitted to the
inspector, who, if deemed necessary, inspected the proposed
apparatus. Next the form, including the inspection report plus a
recommendation on the type of authorization that should be issued,
was forwarded to the Commissioner of Navigation in Washington, DC.
In the case of new stations two distinct steps took place. First,
when the Form 761 was received in Washington the station was
immediately assigned a call sign, which was written at the top of
the form. Later, if everything was in order, a licence was issued.
(If the station equipment had not been inspected, the licence was
issued with the notation "provisional".) The time period between
assigning call letters and issuing a licence ranged from immediate
action to as much as forty days, and according to Commerce records
was usually in the range of one to three days. The assignment of the
call sign was not considered as establishing a new station.
Stations were not reported in the Radio Service Bulletin until the
first operating authorization -- usually a licence but in a few
cases a preliminary telephoned or telegraphed authorization -- was
issued. Licence periods for broadcasting stations through the early
twenties ranged from as few as ten days to one year, with one year
licences the norm for grants made until early January, 1922, six
months the standard during mid-January, 1922, and three months the
norm thereafter. Licence renewal was obtained via the submission of
an updated Form 761 at the required intervals.
A serial licence number was assigned to the first licence issued to
a given station, which normally was carried over to later licences
issued to the station. Occasionally the same licence number was
accidentally given to two different stations. In that case, a "1/2"
was added to one of the licence numbers. Some mistakes were never
caught -- according to a penciled note WBU's initial February 21,
1922 licence was supposed to be numbered "299". Instead, it was
stamped "219", and this number was kept for its later licences.
Although the above procedures were the ones normally used, Commerce
files report that in a few cases the process was accelerated by
direct letters, telegrams, and telephone conversations between
applicants and Washington officials.
Station Deletions
-----------------
Station deletions in the early twenties were performed with even
less formality and consistency than licensing. When a station
discontinued broadcasting before the end of a licence period, the
station operator could return the licence for cancellation. However,
it appears that in most cases the station owners didn't bother --
instead they just let the licences expire in due course. Moreover,
the lapse of a station licence was seen as no more than the close of
an operating authorization, and rarely resulted in immediate
deletion from the official station lists. Generally a grace period
was allowed, on the assumption that many stations would eventually
be relicensed.
The timespan between the expiration of a licence and formal deletion
varied greatly, and according to Commerce files most stations were
not removed from the published lists until one to six months after
their operating licences had lapsed. The whole process has a
distinct "we'll delete them when we get around to it" feel, and
appears to have been to some degree dependent on the diligence of
the district Radio Inspectors. Because of the flexible deletion
practices, the number of stations deleted in a given month is not a
precise measure of the decline in activity for that month, as the
licences for many of these stations had in fact expired a number of
weeks or months previously. Likewise, official lists of this period
invariably include stations no longer holding active licences, and
merely awaiting formal removal.
Temporary Stations
------------------
One category of broadcasting stations has been almost completely
undocumented -- that of temporary grants. These were issued for
special occasions, usually lasting a month or less, and were not
reported in the Radio Service Bulletin. There is little information
about these grants recorded in the Commerce files, although at least
seventy were issued in the period from January, 1922 to October,
1928. For temporary grants made through May, 1922, where wavelength
information is recorded, the wavelength assigned was always 360
meters. [Histories for five temporary stations operated by
educational organizations can be found in S. E. Frost's
"Educations's Own Stations": Bancroft School, Haddonfield, NJ
(WRAQ); Gardenville High School, Gardenville, NY (WGHS); Gettysburg
College, Gettysburg, PA (WDBG); Milton College, Milton, WI (WSAM);
and Northern State Normal School, Marquette, MI, (WBI).]
Listed below are the fifteen stations listed in Commerce files as
receiving temporary grants for the period through the end of May,
1922:
TEMPORARY BROADCAST STATION GRANTS THROUGH MAY, 1922
----------------------------------------------------
1st Air Call
date Assign Call Location Grantee/notes
======= ====== ==== ======== ============================
1/-- 1/20 WPU Buffalo, NY Buffalo Courier and Enquirer
2/-- 2/2 KDP Seattle, WA Saint James Cathedral
2/23 2/22 WHO Kansas City, MO Kansas City Post (2 days)
3/-- 3/1 WWS Pella, IA Fowler Telephone Company
3/10 3/-- WBI Marquette, MI Northern State Normal School
(2 days)
3/16 3/6 WTB Evansville, IN Sieffert Electric Company
3/-- 3/10 WSH New York, NY Experimenter Information
Service (2 days)
3/23 3/20 WMX Port Huron, MI Port Huron Times Herald
(also for 3/27/22)
3/27 3/9 WTA Uhrichsville, OH Board of Trade
3/-- 3/27 WDS Richmond, VA Mann S. Valentine
4/16 4/15 WAAT Jersey City, NJ Jersey Review (also 4/19/22)
4/16 4/15 WAAU Philadelphia, PA H. C. Kuser
4/28 4/18 WBAC Des Moines, IA Kiwanis Club (2 days, also
for 2 days starting 4/28/23)
5/13 5/5 WCAI Topeka, KS American Legion
5/-- 5/31 WEAL Des Moines, IA Mystic Shrine, special train
"to coast and back"
Call Letter Policies
--------------------
One area which has been particularly murky is that of call letter
policies. Following the adoption of the 1912 act, call signs for
most non-amateur services were composed of three letters. Because
most early commercial land stations were clustered along the coast,
the original policy for land stations was that those on the Pacific
coast were normally assigned calls starting with K, while calls
starting with W were normally assigned to outlets along the Great
Lakes and the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico coasts.
With the development of inland services, further refinements were
required. As land stations, broadcasters have generally followed
the "K's in the West, W's in the East" standard. However, two
different East-West dividing lines have been used. Originally the
boundary ran along the eastern borders of Montana, Wyoming,
Colorado, and New Mexico. In late January, 1923 the line was
shifted eastward, to the current standard of the Mississippi River.
The rapid expansion of the ship service during World War One
required utilization of four-letter calls for ship stations,
including, in alphabetical order, calls from the KE--, KI--, KO--,
KU--, and, starting June, 1920, KD-- blocks. (Land stations
generally continued to receive three-letter calls.) The assignment
of the conspicuous call KDKA to the pioneer East Pittsburgh
broadcaster has been viewed as evidence of some sort of special
status. However, review of the Radio Service Bulletin shows what
actually occurred was more mundane. For some reason, during the
period of June, 1920 through April, 1921 most commercial land
stations received calls from the four letter ship blocks, and by
nothing more significant than coincidence KDKA was the only
broadcaster to be born in this period.
The policy of three-letter calls for land stations was restored
after this lapse, until the flood of broadcasting grants required
that the broadcasting service switch to four-letter calls, with
Western broadcasting stations sharing the KD--, and later KF-- and
KG-- blocks with ship stations, while Eastern broadcasters were
assigned calls from the W-A-, and later W-B-, blocks. Some received
calls outside these blocks due to special requests, and eventually
individual call requests became the norm.
Critique of Period Sources
--------------------------
While preparing the chronological list of station activity some
idiosyncrasies of three traditional sources of licensing information
became apparent.
The best generally available source of information for the early
twenties is the Radio Service Bulletin issued by the Bureau of
Navigation, which reported monthly the changes, deletions, and new
station grants made during the preceding month. Three important
characteristics of the Bulletin have sometimes been overlooked. The
first is that its station lists do not report chronologically the
grants within a given month, as the Bulletin lists always used
non-chronological formats, such as alphabetically by city of licence
or call sign. Second, a few stations entered the broadcasting
service classification by metamorphosis from another service
category, so their debuts are recorded in the "alterations and
corrections" lists, rather than the new station lists which report
the appearance of more conventional entrants to the service. This
alternate route was used by three stations in the period through
May, 1922: KQV, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; KDPT, San Diego,
California; and WRR, Dallas, Texas. Third, broadcasting station
additions, changes, and deletions were not reported in a separate
category until the July 1, 1922 issue. Prior to this date they were
intermixed with the other classes of "commercial land stations", so
care must be taken in extracting broadcast service information.
The Bulletin was not completely free from occasional typographical
errors -- for example, in the January 2, 1922 issue both KJB,
Everett, Washington and KFL, Seattle, Washington are incorrectly
listed as being broadcast grants, and one station, WGI (later WARC),
Medford Hillside, Massachusetts, seems to have disappeared without
benefit of official notification. However, overall there were only
a few minor discrepancies between information contained in the
Bulletin, and that found in government records.
Another source of licensing information proved somewhat more
suspect. W. E. Downey, Supervisor of Radio at the Department of
Commerce, appears to have regularly provided monthly totals of
broadcasting station additions, deletions, and outstanding
authorizations. As seen in the listing below there are a number of
discrepancies, for the period through May, 1922, between the monthly
figures reported by Downey, and the information contained in
Commerce records and the Radio Service Bulletin.
W. E. Downey Figures Research Figures
--------------------------------- --------------------------
Month New Deleted Increase Total New Deleted Increase Total
===== === ======= ======== ===== === ======= ======== =====
1921
Sept 3 0 3 3 4* 0 4 4
Oct 1 1 4 3 0 3 7 10
Nov 1 1 5 2** 0 2 9 11
Dec 23 0 23 28 20 0 20 29
1922
Jan 8 0 8 36 9 0 9 38
Feb 24 0 24 60 23 0 23 61
Mar 77 0 77 137 79 2 77 138
Apr 77 0 76 213 83 0 83 221
May 97 0 97 310 96 5 91 312
* includes WJZ ** includes KDKA
The most troubling feature about the Downey figures is the complete
absence of deletions. In fact, Downey reports no deletions until
September of 1922. However, review of the Commerce records and the
Radio Service Bulletin clearly shows that fifteen stations were
deleted prior to September, beginning with two in March. Since the
Downey figures do not list specific stations, the cause of the
omissions not clear.
Finally, the new station totals appearing in Gleason Archer's
"History of Radio to 1926" have a readily identifiable flaw. These
figures are inflated, because they actually are the number of new
"commercial land stations" reported by the Radio Service Bulletin.
As noted earlier, this means the figures erroneously include many
non-broadcast service grants, and also omit a few transfers to the
broadcast service that were reported in the change lists.
Broadcast Service List
----------------------
Included at the end of this article is a chronological list of all
broadcasting service additions, deletions, and changes that took
place during the period from October, 1920 through May, 1922.
The vast majority of these actions are new station grants. Station
additions are listed chronologically by their initial broadcasting
authorization date -- normally the date of their first broadcast
service licence. "LIC" refers to the standard case where the
station's first broadcast authorization was a licence. "TRN" denotes
stations whose first broadcast licence was issued in conjunction
with a transfer from a previous non-broadcast service
classification, using the same call sign. "REL" refers to the
relicensing of a previously deleted broadcast station.
In a few cases an authorization to broadcast was made before the
station's first licence was issued. Initial authorizations by
telephone and telegraph are denoted "TP" and "TG" respectively.
"STA" stands for "Special Temporary Authorization", while "AUT"
appears in a case where the station is only listed as "authorized".
Included with the initial authorization date is the station's call
sign, city of licence, owner, and frequency assigned. "E" denotes
the entertainment wavelength of 360 meters (833 kilohertz), while
"M" refers to the market and weather wavelength of 485 meters (618
kilohertz). "EM" means the station was authorized for both
wavelengths.
The next column covers the call sign assignment, which as noted
earlier was included as part of the application process, and took
place prior to the issuance of a licence or other operating
authorization. The three entries here are the date of the call
assignment, the form of the station application, and its origin. In
most cases the standard procedure was followed, with a call assigned
upon the receipt in Washington of a Form 761 from a regional Radio
Inspector. The nine radio inspection districts were headquartered
in the following locations:
1. BOS-Boston, Massachusetts 6. SF-San Francisco, California
2. NYC-New York, New York 7. SEA-Seattle, Washington
3. BAL-Baltimore, Maryland 8. DET-Detroit, Michigan
4. SAV-Savannah, Georgia 9. CHI-Chicago, Illinois
5. NO-New Orleans, Louisiana
In addition, a few of the Form 761s came via Norfolk, Virginia (NOR)
and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (PHI).
Most exceptions to the standard procedure occurred when the station
owners (OWN) dealt directly with Washington, via telephone (TP),
telegraph (TG), letter (LET), or call letter reservation (RES). In
one case W. E. Downey (WED) was listed as the person involved in
making the call assignment.
The next column notes the date of the first broadcast service
licence, the duration of that initial licence (with "D" signifying
days, "M" months, and "YR" years), and the licence number assigned.
(These licence numbers were used on subsequent station licences
until 1927, when the newly formed Federal Radio Commission assigned
new licence numbers to all existing stations). The final "status"
column lists the eventual fate of the station--either its deletion
date (with call sign if different from the original) or status as of
June 1, 1992.
When only the month of an action is known, usually reflecting data
derived from the Radio Service Bulletin, two dashes appear for the
day the action took place. A "(?)" marks a "best guess" required
because of incomplete or ambiguous information, which in most cases
should not be more than a few days off. As might be expected, some
errors, both in the original records and during the research
process, must be assumed to have crept in. However, extensive
cross-referencing of original records and other source material
should insure that errors have been minimized. Moreover, it is
certain that these 319 grants comprise the complete roster of
non-temporary broadcasting authorizations issued during this period.
The one entry which must be viewed with due caution is current
status. Unlike human beings, which have clearly defined births,
lives, and deaths, these stations sometimes had very complicated
histories, complete with resurrections, call sign and ownership
changes, consolidations of two or more stations under a single call,
and facility exchanges. Review of the station histories in
Education's Own Stations will give a good idea of the tumultuous
histories some of these stations enjoyed. With this caveat in mind,
the status information was included to provide an overview of the
fate of these stations, although a few station histories are too
tangled to allow easy refinement to a single entry.
A general standard for status entries was that, in case of doubt,
the nod was given to interpretations which provide continuity and
longevity. In particular, stations which were deleted but then
immediately relicensed were treated as having a single unbroken
lifespan, so deletion dates are those where the final unreversed
deletion took place, and stations still active might have been
deleted and then quickly relicensed somewhere along the way.
Summary
-------
The information presented will hopefully provide a more complete
understanding of the policies of the period, and permit more
detailed analysis of the development of the broadcast service. For
instance, the list of new broadcast station grants shows the abrupt
shift from the slow initial expansion of the service though November
of 1921, with the first grants dominated by northeast and midwest
radio equipment firms, to the popular expansion that began in
December of 1921, when owners of all kinds sponsored stations. This
popularization has every appearance of a rapidly spreading West
Coast fad, as fully sixteen of the twenty-two grants made from
December, 1921 to January 4, 1922 were for West Coast facilities.
The 319 entries actually comprise only 317 different stations,
because the Marshall-Gerken Company's WBAJ [202] in Toledo, OH was a
relicensing of its deleted WDZ [37], and the Electric Lighting
Supply Company's KNX [233] in Los Angeles, CA supplanted its earlier
KGC [14]. According to my research, 90 of the 319 entries are listed
as surviving to this day, although only as 88 different stations --
in addition to KGC and KNX being essentially the same station, WFI
[94] and WDAR [286] in Philadelphia were consolidated in 1935, and
are now WEAZ. Thus, based on the research list that follows, below
are the 88 United States broadcast stations that date back to May,
1922 and have survived to today:
OLDEST BROADCASTING STATIONS IN THE UNITED STATES
-------------------------------------------------
# Auth Date Call/Freq City of Licence Research Entry
== ========= ========= =================== ==============
01. 10/27/20 KDKA-1020 Pittsburgh, PA KDKA [1]
02. 05/--/21 WABC-770 New York, NY WJZ [2]
03. 09/15/21 WBZ-1030 Boston, MA WBZ [3]
04. 10/13/21 WWJ-950 Detroit, MI WBL [8]
05. 11/09/21 KYW-1060 Philadelphia, PA KYW [9]
06. 12/07/21 KWG-1230 Stockton, CA KWG [10]
07. 12/08/21 KNX-1070 Los Angeles, CA KGC [14]
08. 12/09/21 KCBS-740 San Francisco, CA KQW [21]
09. 01/09/22 KQV-1410 Pittsburgh, PA KQV [32]
10. 01/13/22 KUOM-770 Minneapolis, MN WLB [34]
11. 01/13/22 WHA-970 Madison, WI WHA [35]
12. 02/04/22 WGY-810 Schenectady, NY WGY [40]
13. 02/18/22 WOC-1420 Davenport, IA WOC [48]
14. 02/20/22 WOR-710 New York, NY WOR [49]
15. 02/21/22 WHK-1420 Cleveland, OH WHK [52]
16. 02/28/22 KAQQ-590 Spokane, WA KHQ [58]
17. 03/02/22 WLW-700 Cincinnati, OH WLW [62]
18. 03/09/22 KJR-950 Seattle, WA KJR [64]
19. 03/10/22 KDIA-1310 Oakland, CA KLS [65]
20. 03/10/22 KWKW-1330 Los Angeles, CA KJS [66]
21. 03/10/22 KLZ-560 Denver, CO KLZ [67]
22. 03/11/22 KBLX-1400 Berkeley, CA KRE [70]
23. 03/13/22 KAAM-1310 Dallas, TX WRR [71]
24. 03/14/22 KUSA-550 Saint Louis, MO KSD [76]
25. 03/14/22 WGR-550 Buffalo, NY WGR [77]
26. 03/14/22 KGU-760 Honolulu, HI KGU [78]
27. 03/15/22 WSB-750 Atlanta, GA WSB [82]
28. 03/16/22 WKY-930 Oklahoma City, OK WKY [87]
29. 03/18/22 WEVD-1050 New York, NY WHN [89]
30. 03/18/22 KKHJ-930 Los Angeles, CA KHJ [90]
31. 03/18/22 WBT-1110 Charlotte, NC WBT [92]
32. 03/18/22 WEAZ-560 Philadelphia, PA WFI [94]
33. 03/20/22 WIP-610 Philadelphia, PA WIP [96]
34. 03/21/22 KGW-620 Portland, OR KGW [102]
35. 03/22/22 KTRH-740 Houston, TX WCM [103]
36. 03/23/22 WEW-770 Saint Louis, MO WEW [109]
37 03/23/22 KMJ-580 Fresno, CA KMJ [111]
38. 03/28/22 WILL-580 Urbana, IL WRM [124]
39. 03/29/22 WMAQ-670 Chicago, IL WGU [129]
40. 03/30/22 KGY-1240 Olympia, WA KGY [133]
41. 03/30/22 KKMO-1360 Tacoma, WA KMO [135]
42. 03/31/22 KFI-640 Los Angeles, CA KFI [137]
43. 03/31/22 WWL-870 New Orleans, LA WWL [140]
44. 04/05/22 WBAA-920 West Lafayette, IN WBAA [144]
45. 04/05/22 KKOB-770 Albuquerque, NM KOB [146]
46. 04/05/22 WRTH-1430 Saint Louis, MO WEB [149]
47. 04/05/22 WDZ-1050 Decatur, IL WDZ [151]
48. 04/05/22 KMBZ-980 Kansas City, MO WPE [152]
49. 04/06/22 KKSU-580 Manhattan, KS WTG [159]
50. 04/07/22 WJPC-950 Chicago, IL WAAF [160]
51. 04/10/22 WNEW-1130 New York, NY WAAM [162]
52. 04/12/22 KBBT-970 Portland, OR KQP [177]
53. 04/17/22 WJBO-1150 Baton Rouge, LA WAAB [189]
54. 04/17/22 KNBR-680 San Francisco, CA KPO [190]
55. 04/19/22 KCRO-660 Omaha, NE WAAW [194]
56. 04/21/22 KSL-1160 Salt Lake City, UT KZN [197]
57. 04/22/22 KKFX-1250 Seattle, WA KTW [204]
58. 04/25/22 WSOY-1340 Decatur, IL WBAO [210]
59. 04/26/22 WBAP-820 Fort Worth, TX WBAP [215]
60. 04/28/22 WOI-640 Ames, IA WOI [216]
61. 04/29/22 WTVN-610 Columbus, OH WBAV [219]
62 04/29/22 WBAX-1240 Wilkes-Barre, PA WBAX [223]
63. 05/03/22 KNEW-910 Oakland, CA KLX [226]
64. 05/03/22 WTAE-1250 Pittsburgh, PA WCAE [229]
65. 05/04/22 WJR-760 Detroit, MI WCX [235]
66. 05/08/22 WCAO-600 Baltimore, MD WCAO [243]
67. 05/08/22 KCPX-1320 Salt Lake City, UT KDYL [244]
68 05/09/22 KTSA-550 San Antonio, TX WCAR [248]
69. 05/10/22 WOGL-1210 Philadelphia, PA WCAU [251]
70. 05/10/22 WHB-710 Kansas City, MO WHB [255]
71. 05/13/22 WVMT-620 Burlington, VT WCAX [259]
72. 05/13/22 WBNS-1460 Columbus, OH WCAH [263]
73. 05/15/22 WDAE-1250 Tampa, FL WDAE [264]
74. 05/15/22 WTMJ-620 Milwaukee, WI WCAY [266]
75 05/15/22 WCAZ-990 Carthage, IL WCAZ [270]
76. 05/16/22 WDAF-610 Kansas City, MO WDAF [273]
77. 05/16/22 KGNC-710 Amarillo, TX WDAG [274]
78. 05/19/22 WFAN-660 New York, NY WDAM [278]
79. 05/19/22 KEEL-710 Shreveport, LA WDAN [280]
80. 05/19/22 WGN-720 Chicago, IL WDAP [282]
81. 05/23/22 KULL-1300 Seattle, WA KDZE [292]
82. 05/23/22 WDAY-970 Fargo, ND WDAY [293]
83. 05/25/22 WFDF-910 Flint, MI WEAA [301]
84. 05/26/22 KFH-1330 Wichita, KS WEAH [305]
85. 05/27/22 KUSD-690 Vermillion, SD WEAJ [308]
86. 05/27/22 WHCU-870 Ithaca, NY WEAI [309]
87. 05/31/22 KTTS-1260 Springfield, MO WEAK [315]
88. 05/31/22 KHOW-630 Denver, CO KDZQ [317]
Notes On Sources
The Commerce Department's Call and Licensee card files were the main
source for station information up to March, 1927. Additional
information came from the FCC's "History Card" files, available at
the FCC's Public Reference Room on the 2nd floor of 1919 M Street,
NW, Washington, DC. This data was double-checked against a number of
sources, including the Radio Service Bulletin grant, deletion, and
cumulative station lists, original 761 Forms and station licences at
the Washington National Records Center in Suitland, MD, and an
undated "List of First Stations Licensed for Broadcasting" (through
March, 1922, although it omits a number of stations licensed in
March), which was prepared by unidentified FCC personnel, and
obtained through the Broadcast Pioneers Library in Washington, DC.
This article was from the pages of DX News, the
magazine of the National Radio Club, Inc. (The
World's Oldest & Largest Medium Wave DX Club).
Reprint permission obtained from: Ken Chatterton,
National Radio Club Publications, P.O. Box 164,
Mannsville, NY 13661-0164 USA.