The Humble Mailer

I keep a box of used mailers around to re-use. A lot of music critics and radio-type do. It's a cheap way to get a package out the door. I was noticing recently that with digital delivery that my stash is running low. Fewer and fewer labels are servicing press and radio with physical media. Some albums are digital only even at retail. It was predicted in January that this would be the year that digital sales are projected to outstrip physical sales. [source here] Sales figures are apparently still on track for that to happen as of  May. [source here]



So music critics and programmers of the future won't be receiving quite so many mailers. So this bin beside my desk is quickly becoming a historical footnote. I have scanned several of them below as most readers have never been serviced by a label or promoter and 20 years from now this may be the only record of this simple tradition.

I've scanned a dozen or so mailers and made the slide show above so you can get a whiff of what Monday morning is like for the biz. The rest of you may never know the Christmas-Morning like fun of opening four dozen mailers full of new music. But like Christmas morning it's not all Squirt guns and Legos. There are some socks and underwear and very lame other sundries. Maybe it's more like a free scratch-off ticket. The odds are about 10-to-1 that you'll like what's inside.

The First Black Radio Announcer (Part 5)

That radio tower to the left is on the roof of the Fox Theatre in Atlanta. [source]  Like many posts this one starts with an intriguing side note from an article about something else. In this case it's a piece [link] by Dale Patterson about early black disc jockeys.

"Other black radio pioneers included Atlanta's WJTL, which in 1935 offered a daily 15-minute newscast about the black community and delivered by black announcers."

1370 WJTL-AM was not a long-lived station. In fact it only existed from 1931 to 1935 under those calls. The station signed on as 1310 WRBI-AM in Tifton, Georgia in 1928 owned by the Kents Furniture & Music Store. In 1930 they changed the frequency to 1350.  It became Oglethorpe University's first radio station in 1931. Initially they shifted the frequency to 810 and operated as a daytimer at 100 watts. In June they shifted to 1370 where they were granted unlimited hours at 250 watts. A 1973 history text on Atlanta claims that in the early years of the station it aired only educational programming and extramural instruction. Students could enroll at Oglethorpe via radio and were charged and each course was broadcast 1 hour three days a week for a semester. Texts and general requirements were handled by mail. Students had to mail their notes to their professors to validate their listening. Professors could also answer the questions of radio students by mail or by phone.

In 1935 the school sold the station to the Atlanta Broadcasting Co. who changed the calls to WATL-AM. The station appears in Erik Barnouw's canonical radio book A History of Broadcasting in the United States: A Tower in Babel because, anachronistically, it sold advertising. The laws that forbid advertising on non-commercial stations today didn't exist in 1933. They were one of 12 educational stations that were known to be selling ads in that year. This was ostensibly to "defray the cost of scholarly journals."  The others were: WGST, KOOW, KOB, KFJM, WESG, WHAZ, WJBU, WEHC, WWL and WHAD. It might have led to the City of Atlanta v. Oglethorpe University case wherein Atlanta was trying to levy taxes on WJTL.

So why was this school, in the segregated South airing a black community newscast? The programming was mixed and the aired a lot of what was then called "hillbilly music."  They hosted performers such as Fiddlin' John Carson, The Bill Childers Strong Band, Riley Puckett, The Dixie String Band, Ted Hawin's Mountaineers, the North Georgia Buggy Riders, The Skillet Lickers, but Of the names I've seen only Carl Talton aka Cowboy Jack, was a regular and began his career there with a daily 15-minute spot. They were even home to the Fulton Country Jamboree program.

Despite all the country music they were a fairly forward-thinking station. A local Mormon church had a program. They even rebroadcast programs from WOSU.  The Oglethorpe University website merely states that the station was " dedicated to the broadcast of educational programming designed for the public to take additional instruction on various University subjects."  If true that must have been changing by 1933 as they were taking in musicians off the street by that time. In his book Fireside Politics, author Douglas B. Craig posits that this was the first systematic attempt to use radio as a medium of civic information and education for black listeners. That might even be true, even if it's impossible to prove. As a source he cites the book Don't Touch That Dial by J. Fred MacDonald who makes no such claim.

Unfortunately I've never been able to find a name of a single announcer from that news program. Whoever they were, they were some of the very first black voices in broadcasting. I've found some staff names: Station Manager David Brinkmoeller, Staff Director Lynne Brannen, Engineer Frank Parkins, Program Director Robert McConnell, and Rex Dantzler selling those dubious ads. But I have never connected the dots as to who begat the program. Despite the time elapsed since then the station still serves the black community of Atlanta.  It's calls today are 1380 WAOK-AM and it's airs a black gospel format.  

*****If any reader has a copy of Step down, Dr. Jacobs: the Autobiography of an Autocrat by Thornwell Jacobs I'd like to hear from them. It is rare and is supposed to have detailed information on WJTL.

Reddit Is Mighty

Arcane Radio Trivia had the benefit of a link from Reddit today. Subsequently  its web traffic today has exceeded the combined traffic from of last three months. (Maybe more, the days' not over.) That link is here along with hundreds of comments.  The Reddit page links to a 2009 post I wrote about Peter Tripp's 1959 two hundred hour wake-a-thon in Times Square. At the bottom of the post I had linked to a page I maintain listing off all print-cited DJ wake-a-thon records. That second page is a work in progress. I add records as I find them in my research. It too benefited from that single link.

All this exciting web traffic has completely rearranged the stats on this blog. There's certainly some random cross traffic from new readers giving things the look around. since it occupied my attention, I decided to share a bit. Below are my top posts of all time as of this evening. This is defined as web traffic from May 2008 through June 2012. All page view numbers are rounded off since they're always changing anyway.


200 hours of Peter Tripp -  63,100
Barn Storming and Barn Dancing - 2,350
DJ Marathon Stay-Awake Records - 1,800
Pig Virus Kevin Metheny - 1,500
Career Academy School of Famous Broadcasters - 1,450
Vacuum Tubes and Thallium - 703
Fractal Antenna - 650
The Cancer Inside Wikipedia - 500
Early Police Band Radio - 450
The Record Player - 350
WHTG is dead, long live Indie 103 - 400

Transcription Mystery Disc #130

I picked this 12-inch metal-core acetate disc up at a thrift store in Englewood, Florida; but as we all know that doesn't mean it originated there. The recording is in French, which presents a problem. I don't understand French at all. The disc is in decent shape, a little dirty, some scratches a little warped... all par for the course. It spins at 78 rpm and has an outer edge start. But the speed sounds a little off, a little too far into the chipmunk range. I suspect the recording speed was off a tad. The blank is a red Duodisc Type 2 if you follow the Phonozoic nomenclature. Prior to this I've seen dates on this type anywhere from 1951 to 1954. This one is the oldest I've found, clearly dated to April 20th 1949.

Notre Dame


The writing on the label is pretty clear.. for French cursive. It looks like it reads "Le mot de l'accueil Jubile[somthing] de notre dame mere seu Jeanne de Valois."  It seems to be a speech from an event at Notre Dame. Since it's in french I assume that it was recorded at Notre Dame de Paris, not the Catholic university in Indiana.Unless one of my readers is fluent in French I don't expect to get any further with this one.

Freeform FM VS The FCC

I usually blame the death of free-form FM stations on consultants. It is in the nature of the consultant to see things in the narrowest of terms, as a set of constants instead of variables. They are despicable and we should shun them, but they do not bear all of the guilt in this case. There was another more organic, reactive cause that doesn't get enough credit in the usual narratives.

In August of 1971 the FCC ruled on a free-form FM station in Des Moines, 94.9 KFMG. This tiny decision may have had broader consequences. The story was so big it graced the cover of Bilboard. In early 1971 The Iowa Fine Music Broadcasting Corp., who had held the license since 1964 decided to sell the station. When KFMG  was bought by Stoner broadcasting they flipped format from a free form rock format to Top-40. The FCC normally does not consider programming, but this format change was contrary what what Stoner Broadcasting had stated only months earlier during the FCC approval process. Five staffers and the PD resigned immediately and filed a petition to reconsider. The "Committee to Free KFMG", had a victory in successfully pressuring the station to return to a rock format... but they did not return to the staff. [That same PD, Ron Sorenson recovered the call sign when it went up for grabs in 2007. More here]

The Committee  withdrew the petition after the rock format returned. But let me be clear here. They would have lost the case. Stoner gave in to public pressure, not legal pressure. But even while the FCC was fomenting another ruling on their refusal to hold judgement over programming... they issued a comment on programming. The Commission took the opportunity to warn station owners about the potential liability they carried as owners, and the dangers of a free form station. This was a message to station owners to voluntarily impose  stricter control over content. It was terse. The relevant passage is below:

"A free form rock format, like a free form classical format, or a free form anything format gives the announcer such control over the records to be played that it is inconsistent with the strict controls that licensee must exercise to avoid questionable practices."

It would be hard to misunderstand the message: Get the hippies off the air. The Committee to Free KFMG decided to push their luck. In February of 1972 they went back to the FCC with their lawyer, Tracey Western, asked that the FCC clarify their comments. They asked for a declaratory ruling and didn't get one. Instead the FCC's thinly veiled threat became fodder for debate in the trade magazines and sure enough free form stations were soon on the wane. More here.

EAS mailer

If you live in the blast radius of the Limerick nuclear power plant you get a mailer every year reminding you to hoard food and medical supplies and to always make sure your Iodine tablets haven't expired. It also lists off not just emergency information, not just to have an emergency radio but what radio stations EAS alerts are carried on locally. This is very important and almost nobody pays attention to it. Evacuation is a poor situation to attempt a bandscan.

Pappy Dave Stone

Waylon Jennings called him "the man with the smile in his voice."  Waylon Jennings used to be a DJ himself so he'd be a man to know what that sounds like. On the other hand he was also a diabetic cocaine addict so maybe not. All minor claims aside, David "Pappy Dave Stone" Pinkston had the biggest brag in country music. He is said to have founded country music radio. Sometimes that gets the caveat "full-time country music radio" the claim goes back at least into the early 1970s. It's not true, but what a story it is. I do note that he may have originated the term "country gold" which is used in station branding today.

The claim is dubious since his first radio job at 950 KSEL-AM in Lubbock, TX wasn't until 1946. He was born in 1913 so that makes him about 33 years old— another late starter. That first job by the way was in accounting, he didn't become a DJ until 1947. He hosted the Western Roundup Show, and under his reign it became the station's most popular show, expanding from from 30 minutes to a full hour and Pappy became station manager in 1948. In 1949 he expanded the hours of country music programming and added a live country music show on Saturdays called the Western Jamboree. It grew fast, it started in studio but soon had to move to larger venues eventually ended up in a wrestling arena. Then an airport hanger!

In 1953 he left KSEL and with an  investor named Leroy Elmore, started another station, KDAV. This station was 100% country, though it was just a daytimer. This station was the key to his claim. In that era it was common to run block programming, with programs as short as 15 minutes. But country music had been popular radio fare for decades by then, especially in rural areas. The Grand Ol' Opry has been on air since 1925!  The idea that the format was invented in 1953 is patently ridiculous. Despite that no one has ever been able to confirm the existence of an earlier one. The spoiler is that KDAV even had a rock radio program called the "Rock n' Roll Hit Parade" ...maybe it was 99% country. Waylon Jennings and Roger Miller were both disc jockeys on KDAV, that alone should be close enough.

But Stone did build the first country music radio network. After KDAV he added three more stations: 1310 KZIP-AM in Amarillo, TX; 1420 KPEP-AM in San Angelo, TX; and both  1580 KPIK-AM, and 94.3 KPIK-FM in Colorado Springs, CO. It was the first country music FM in the market. He moved to Colorado Springs and did a 2-hour show on KPIK which he hosted personally until he sold the station in 1978. [At least one book gives these calls wrong with KZIP as KGIT and KPEP as KCBT] Stone used that radio network to propel the popularity of country music. He booked a lot of country music concerts and with his all country network he was able to bring big Nashville acts out to west Texas. He even got Buddy Holly his first recording contract with Decca. 

It's hard to give all the credit directly to Stone. But in 1961 there were 81 full time country music stations in America. Then by 1974 there were 1,020. The format had grown from a regional form to a national one. The formats popularity is said to have peaked in 1995, but there are over 2,000 today. That says something. (The book Cashville by Stephanie Schäfer covers these stats in great detail.) In 1999 Pappy was inducted into the Country Music DJ Hall of Fame, located in Nashville. He died on on February 18, 2004.

The Clarke Orbit

Geosynchronous Orbit n. 
An orbital position with an orbital period that matches the rotation rate of the Earth measured relatively to  fixed stars. 

That orbital period isn't a 24 hour day actually. it's what they call a mean sidereal day, which is 23 hours 56 minutes and 4.091 seconds in length. It's not an exactly fixed interval because the Earth wobbles on it's axis, which is measured as two variables called Precession and nutation.  Btu that's getting picky. This is just the time it takes for the Earth to rotate once around its polar axis relative to a distant fixed point. Our sun is not a distant fixed point, so they use the vernal equinox. So far.. not about radio. Don't worry I'm getting there.

The first man-made anything in space was a V4 rocket in 1942. the first satellite was Sputnik in 1957. But the first geosynchronous orbit wasn't achieved until 1964 with the launch of Syncom 3. It was an American communications satellite.

The very idea of a geosynchronous communications satellite is quite old, almost as old as broadcasting. It was first considered and published by Herman Potocnikin 1928. Being an ethnic Slovak in an area now called Croatia... his national identity is up for some debate. But he sometimes used the name Hermann Noordung. He was a real-deal rocket scientist. He attended the University of Technology in Vienna and became a mechanical engineer. He was inspired by the research of Hermann Oberth and went into rocketry.  But Arthur C. Clarke stole his thunder. In a 1945 paper published in Wireless World magazine, titled "Extra-Terrestrial Relays — Can Rocket Stations Give Worldwide Radio Coverage?" More here. He even predicted the frequency band we'd be using. He was only off a few hundred GHz on the future location of the C and Ku bands. Not bad for a guy who writes fiction. the first US TV network to move all it's affiliate feeds to the Ku band was NBC in 1983. Read on:

"It may be argued that we have as yet no direct evidence of radio waves passing between the surface of the earth and outer space; all we can say with certainty is that the shorter wavelengths are not reflected back to the earth... Medium high frequencies go through the E layer twice to be reflected from the F layer and echoes have been received from meteors in or above the F layer. It seems fairly certain that frequencies from, say, 50 MHz to 100,000 MHz could be used without undue absorption in the atmosphere or the ionosphere."

In the piece Clarke first described a geosynchronous orbit as useful for broadcast and relay communications. Because of this much more widely read publication a geosynchronous orbit  is sometimes called a Clarke Orbit. Likewise the region of Earth orbit where near-geostationary orbits are possible is called the Clarke Belt. it is about 22,000 miles above sea level along the equator. To his credit, there are presently over 700 radio communications satellites in a Clarke Orbit. More here.

Transcription Mystery Disc #129

This is a Wilcox-Gay Recordio. It spins at 78 rpm and has an outer-edge start. It is the type that Phonozoic refers to as the Type 4B. It's recording date of Christmas 1949 is contiguous with his other dates. Since there is no surname and no address there's little more to be said about the disc. It's a home recording of someones kids singing Christmas carols. The first is "Silent Night", the second is "Jingle Bells" and the third is "All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth," which back in 1949 was still a fairly new Spike Jones single. I include only "Silent Night" here since the levels were poor on Jingle Bells and the Spike Jones cover is still under copyright. (Damn you DMCA!)

Silent Night

Charm Kitchen Radio

This is the "Charm Kitchen Cook Book" compiled by Edythe Fern Melrose, better known in Detroit as WXYZ-TV's Lady of Charm. One source claims that in the 1920s as the first woman to manage a radio station. There are several claimants to that title and her claim is totally uncorroborated. She did manage WJLB-AM in the 1930s, but that seems to be after Vaughn DeLeath managed WDT-AM so she may legitimately be the second.

When Melrose moved from WJLB to 1270 WXYZ-AM in 1941, the old slot was taken over by Miriam Lane. Sources claim that Miriam Lane had a program called "Modes and Manners." It is entirely unclear if thei was before, during or after the tenure of Ms. Melrose. A 1955 cookbook bearing her name and the title "Charm Kitchen" serves to further confuse the matter. It indicates a possible passing of the crown, or a simple branding rip-off.  Regardless, Lane remained at WJLB while Melrose was building an empire starting with her daily, hour-long afternoon show.

Even in the beginning her program was special. She did not go to the studios. She broadcast from her private offices at the New Center building.  Fred Foy recalls some playful animosity between Melrose and the announcers who had to be on stand-by through out her remotely broadcast program. [More here.] It comes as no surprise that she didn't want to go to a TV studio to do her TV show either.

On Channel 7, WXYZ-TV her show aired from her home, the "House O' Charm," the first of which was built in 1948 at Eagle Point at St. Clair Shores and the second at 906 Lakeshore, Grosse Pointe. It was the first home to be built for testing all the products before she recommended them.Her TV program ran for 12 years. In addition to product testing she also continued to discuss cooking, table settings, etiquette, and fashion. The program continued until 1960.  She died in 1976.

Thank you Raphaël Pluvinage

This is a pretty amazing use of the Arduino card. You can read more about it here.With a little agar, salt and color and a game board made of capacitive sensors you too can have hours of wholesome fun. The jelly produces different sounds based on its shape, salt concentration and finger contact. The thinner the jelly the greater the conductance.  Conceptually it's similar to the Theremin, except this is variable capacitance instead of induction.

What this reminds me of are RF testing modules. In RF testing, instead of using actual humans (who are highly variable and uncooperative) they use a plastic bag filled with a concentrated solution of salt and water as a substitute. It's conductivity is very similar hence the stand-in.



NOISY JELLY from Raphaël Pluvinage on Vimeo.

Henry Jacobs' Last Tape

For those of you that don't read Beckett, the title of today's post is probably lost on you. [more here] So let us proceed directly to the worldly and unworldly works of Mr. Henry Jacob. It's hard to explain to a contemporary radio listener how much different FM radio was just a few decades ago. Not only could DJs pick their own music (to a degree) but in some cases they took it to the utmost extreme and broadcast whole psychedelic audio experiments... making their own musical works in the process. 

According to the liner notes on Smithsonian Folkways LP [FS 03861] he got his start in radio on a Mexican border station in 1950, which turns out to be XEW-AM. But that's not the whole story. He attended the University of Chicago (the home of WHPK) and attended grad school at the University of Illinois (the home of WILL). His program began on WILL in 1952 but KPFA aired them as well. I suspect it's 580 WILL-AM, but 90.9 WILL-FM signed on as WUIC in 1941 so it's conceivable he was on the FM stick and accounts are just off on the call sign change. They became WILL-FM in 1954.

Henry Jacobs was a legitimate early experimenter in sound collage in the John Cage sense of the word. Which makes for a nice comparison as they both started tape experiences in about 1952. Both of their tape loop experiments precede the work of Pierre Schaeffer. But as early as he was, Jacob's didn't exactly invent tape manipulation. Halim Abdul Messieh El-Dabh was manipulating wire recorders in Cairo as early as 1944. You can hear it here) What makes Jacobs' unique across the spectrum was that he was a radio DJ. His weekly program was called "Music And Folklore". These included woks by all manner of ethnic artists and experimental musicians other than himself. His own experiments with tape loops were mostly broadcast on KPFA in 1953 and 1954. These led to the release of a few LPs on Smithsonian Folkways the last of which was the the Vortex LP released in 1957.

Modern electronic music is often the work of stoned college students dicking around with samples and beats in user-friendly software. Some of it's great, but most of it is decidedly low brow. Jacob's and these early experimenters were engineers, and artists as you had to build, and repair your own equipment. They were an  artsy-fartsy, intellectual bunch of geeks. Jacobs in particular spent parts of his KPFA program interviewing ethnomusicologists. Some of that work went into a LP on a Fantasy records LP [FSY 7001]  Interviews Of Our Times It was a collaboration with Lenny Bruce and Karlheinz Stockhausen.

Anyway he out grew radio quickly and was producing programs for KQED-TV by the early 1970s. The record label Locust Music has been re-releasing some of his back catalog.  Jacob is still alive and resides in California.

Bob Jones College (of radio)

At first I assumed that The above Bob Jones Collegehad nothing to do with the Bob Jones Christian College in Greenville, South Carolina. I was wrong. Their campus has moved twice, muddying the waters so to speak. Bob Jones College was founded in 1927 by evangelist Bob Jones, Sr. near Panama City, FL. The school relocated to Cleveland, Tennessee in 1933 where it remained until their move to their present 205 acre compound in 1947.The ad above dates to end of their tenure in Tennessee.

Jones founded the college in the wake of the Scopes money trial, terrified that secular thinking might break out.  So he founded the school in St. Andrews Bay, FL with a charter from a circuit court in Panama City. His first class had only 88 students. The purpose of this school was to get back to bible-basics... in other words it was anti-science and specifically anti-evolution. they were also thoroughly racist openly supporting the KKK, they still banned interracial dating on campus until 2000. Unsurprisingly the modern (yet oxymoronic) Bob Jones College science department still supports young-earth creationism... but back in the 1940s they cherry-picked enough real science to believe that radio waves were real. At least real enough to hand out diplomas. They offered graduate and undergraduate courses in technique, script writing, program building and more.

The school barely survived the great depression and was on the verge of bankruptcy when it moved to Tennessee. But Jones had already been broadcasting since the early 1920s. There are documented appearances in Pittsburgh, PA as early as 1925 on KQV-AM. In 1927 he began a radio ministry that consisted of two programs, a daily and weekly which he did personally until 1962. The show was purported to be heard coast to coast but I can't find a list of affiliates. I do know that it originated at a Chattanooga station, WDOD-AM.

In 1944, Jones became a founder of National Religious Broadcasters. After World War II, the GI Bill was introduced, which led the student body of the college to nearly double, hence the impetus to relocate again.But the move to Greenville also allowed space for a university radio station. WMUU-AM signed on with 1,000 watts at 1260 Khz on September 15, 1949. They added an FM station 94.5 WMUU-FM in 1960. The station airs easy listening today and it possibly one of the blandest stations in the nation. The university continues to be a strange crank even among religious institutions, they recently made the news for expelling a student for watching the TV show Glee. More here.

Transcription Mystery Disc #128

This is a 6.5 inch Recordisc, undated. The title is given as "Whisper to me" with the recorder marked down as just "Ward" which I presume to be a surname.  It's in very nice shape and even still has a shiny surface, marked with just one chip on the outer edge. Phonozoic dates this type of Recordisc (Type 2C) to 1948. My copy is undated so I'll rely on his research.

Whisper To Me

The recording is so clear I just edited out three harsh pops and uploaded. It required no filtering. What's interesting is that the singer appears to be faking an exaggerated French accent. This intimates that it's intended to be comedy. My only other support for this the melody, which I think is lifted from another song. It may even be a parody.

The lyrics at least appear to be original though replete with trite phrases, but so is Justin Bieber's discography. That's just what pop is about. I have nothing here to work with to narrow down the date range or the origin, this one is a dead end.

Political TV Ad Disclosure

Back in April the headline usually looked like this "FCC Requires Local TV Stations to Disclose Political Ads Online. The ruling would require them all to disclose who bought what ads and how much they paid. I assumed that it was going to happen, it just made perfect sense. the information is already public, but the current requirements for access to the Public File were written in the 1950s, before the Internet existed. Presently you actually have to go down to your local TV stations studios and knock on the door and ask to see the public file. It's sort of silly. So in the spirit of making public things actually  public, the FCC asked that this all just go on the Internet. Who could possibly be against this? (Assuming it's not implemented in a really onerous format.) Well some broadcasters oppose it. They're arguing that there is a cost to disclosure, they fear compliance it self will add some kind of cost. NAB was particularly terse in their repudiation. I'll just quote them.

“By forcing broadcasters to be the only medium to disclose on the Internet our political advertising rates, the FCC jeopardizes the competitive standing of stations that provide local news, entertainment, sports and life-saving weather information free of charge to tens of millions of Americans daily."

So the NAB is just arguing they shouldn't be singled out. There's some truth to that as the ruling does not apply to radio, websites, newspapers or magazines. (not that they have jurisdiction over print publications) For me that's an argument for more disclosure not less. But that reason is both logical fallacy and also a false flag. Most stations probably don't object to outing their political ad buyers. They don't really hustle to sell those spots, they're required by law to carry them, and to sell them at their lowest rates. That means selling potentially prime-time spots at weekend overnight prices. So it's in their best interest to sell that time to virtually anyone else if they can. The NAB's function here isn't as a spoiler, it's to protect the interest of its members even if that interest is unethical or even illegal. They are a lobbyist group like any other. So here's the real deal:

1. They don't want the prices made public because then everyone knows what their rock-bottom rate is.  It undermines their ability to gouge other ad buyers. This is not illegal, it's just crappy.

2. Public disclosure of rock-bottom rates  also prevents them from gouging political ad buyers. Some stations over-charge Some political ad buyers and while it's illegal, it's profitable. It is also certainly partisan in application: conservatives outlets over-charging liberal candidates —or vice versa.

So both of those reasons basically boil down to stations not wanting to publicly disclose any portion of their rate card. To protect this dubious self-interest FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell proposed removing the rate information, essentially just disclosing the ad buyer and the buy (when and where it ran)  This is most of what the public wants, so this will probably be the compromise that happens right?  No. Someone still objects. More here.

Last week, House Republicans voted along party-line vote to approve a policy rider to block the FCC ruling. Not to change it or limit it but just to stop it entirely. Republicans echoed the "burden" argument that NAB made ignoring the fact that the FCC already limited it to the stations in the top 50 markets. I expect big campaign donations from NAB to the republicans this year. Big donations. But the burden argument is just a smoke screen there too. While NAB members may be ambivalent on the disclosure of buyers, the super  PACS have a clear motivation. The function of the Super PAC is to obscure the buyer. If you disclose it at the point of sale that power becomes moot. So while the FCC ruling may be politically motivated, so is it's obstruction by the House. But the story isn't over.  Pro Publica has  threatened to crowd-source the data manually.  Nice move. More here.

Traveling

I'll be back Monday. It's a long drive.

Airforce Country Music Time

 At the bottom of this post you'll find a work-in-progress, a discography for the Country Music Time series. I have been collaborating with Stewart G. Hoar, another radioman who happens to have a sizable collection of these hard to find transcriptions.  Most Stations discarded the discs after the programs were aired, so few discs have survived.

Country Music Time was an US Air Force sponsored recruitment radio show. The 15-minute program was syndicated via transcription starting sometime around 1960. A Billboard article in 1970 claimed they had 2,400 radio stations on their mailing list. The program ended around 1985. Some early transcriptions seem to have been sponsored by the Navy and not the Airforce, but I've seen so few examples the program name could be a coincidence.[Source here]

It was often hosted by actual enlisted servicemen. Having previewed a number of discs I heard names like Staff Sergeant Tom Shaw, Airman Jerry Keller, Airman First Class Jim Ardbeg, Lieutenant Bill Jordan, and even it's producer, Major charlie Brown. Marvin Hughs, another WWII veteran also produced a number of the programs. Hughs had previously spent time as a performer at WLAC and at the Grand Old Opry on WSM. Regardless of the producer, the program was always produced, proudly, in Nashville. Performers over the decades were both big and small including classic artists like Hank Snow and Red Sovine and many modern stars as well. (Particularly collectible are the Johnny Cash appearances.)

There is no canonical discography (that I've found) so I list below all of what I've found in my research. I have to reiterate that this is a work in progress. Thanks again to Stewart G. Hoar who's personal collection was used to fill in many gaps. I have marked conflicting or otherwise dubious entries with an *asterisk. In most of those cases I am just uncertain of which side belongs to which artist. I also mark the duplicated entries with a **double asterisk  were I have two seemingly verified but conflicting entries. It raises the possibility of the numbering being less than consistent as well. I am not presently including any track listing or other identifying numbers currently as these are not reliably marked on the labels.

1080 - Judy Roman  /1079 - Highway 101
1064 - The Forester Sisters/ 1063 - Keith Stegall
1062 - Patty Loveless / 1061 - The Almost Brothers
1042 - Rex Allen Jr. / 1041 - Ray Griff
1040 - John Russel / 1039 - Sylvia
1038 - Dobie Gray / 1037 - David Frizzell
1035 - Tari Hensley
*1030 - Barbara Fairchild
*1030 - Karen Taylor Good / 1029 - Sawyer Brown
1027 Oak Ridge Boys / 1028 - Eddie Raven
1015 - Randy Travis / 1016 - Chance
*900 - James Monroe / *899 - Linda Nail
*896 - Terri Gibbs / *895 - Karen Taylor Good
*886 - Burrito Brothers / *885 - Cristy Lane
*878 - Hank Cochran / *877 - Big Al Downing
*876 - Cole Young / *875 - Susie Nelson
*762 - Gene Laverne / *761 - Vern Gosdin
*760 - Karen Wheeler / *759 - Joe Stampley
*758 - Ricky Skaggs / *757 -  Terri Gibbs
*754 - Cristy Lane / *753 - Andy King
*748 - R.C. Bannon / *747 - Ralph Emery
*746 - Melba Montgomery / *745 - The Four Guys
*740 - Razzy Bailey / 739 - *Gary Morris
734 - Billie Joe Spears / 733 - Ferlin Husky
732 - Sonny Throckmorton / 731 - O.B. Mclinton
730 - Sue Powell / 729 - Buck trent
726 - Dean Dillon  / 725 - Ed Bruce
662 - Steve Gibb / 661 - The Cates
660 - Susie Allanson / 659 - Jim Owen
*606 - Nat Stuckey / *605 - Ferlin Husky
*598 - Tommy Overstreet / *597  - Thundercloud
*594 - Del Reeves / 593 - Wilma Lee Cooper
*592 - Marion Worth / 591 - LeGarde Twins
*590 - Dewayne Orender / 589 - Don Gibson
*588 - Danny Davis / 587 - Randy Barlow
*586 - Jim & Jesse / 585 - Roy Drusky
*583 - Floyd Cramer / 584 - Billy Walker
*582 - T.G. Sheppard / 581 - Carl Smith
514 - Stan Hitchcock / 513 - Bobby Lord
510 - Hugh X. Lewis / 509 - George Hamilton IV
490 - Merle Travis / 489 - Chuck Holt
480 – Tommy Cash / 479 - Charlie Walker
478 - Bob Luman / 477 - Charlie Louvin
476 - The Jordonaires / 475 - Harold Morrison
474 – The Harden Trio / 473 – Grandpa Jones
472 – Charlie Louvin / 471 – Wilma Burgess
470 - Jimmy C. Newman / 469 – Bobby Bare
467 – George Hamilton IV / 468 – Smiley & Kitty Wilson
466 – Mac Wiseman / 465 – Archie Campbell
464 – The Carter Family / 463 – Ray Pillow
462 – Ferlin Husky / 461 – Charlie Louvin
460 – Warner Mack / 459 – Jean Shepard
452 - Johnny Seay / 451 - Roy Drusky
448 – Bobby Lord / 447 – Jim & Jesse
446 - Margie Bowes / 445 - Claude Gray
444 – Warner Mack / 443 – Bob Drusky
442 – Mac Wiseman / 441 – Bob Luman
435 - Jimmy Newman / 436 - Bobby Bare
430 – Warner Mack / 429 – Jean Shepard
428 – Dave Dudley / 427 – George Morgan
**426 - Web Peirce & Max Powell / 425 - Johnny Carver & Pat McKinney
**426 – Billy Grammer / 425 – Billy Walker
**424 – Roy Drusky / 423 - Willie Nelson
**424 - Jim Ed Brown / Cates Sisters / 423 - Stonewall Jackson
422 – Sonny James / 421 – Skeeter Davis
416 - Jordanaires / 415 – Sonny James
**414 – Bobby Lord / 413 – Billy Walker
**414 - Rex Allen / 413 - Dickie Lee & Jane Austin
406 - Wilburn Brothers / 405 -  Martha Carson
399 - Margie Bowes/400 - Grandpa Jones
392 - Bobby Lord / 391- Glaser Brothers
388 - Bobby Lewis / 387 - Jan Howard
*386 - George Morgan / *385 - Melba Montgomery
382 - Bill Anderson / 381 - Sonny James
376 - Gene Willis / 375 - The Willis Brothers
372 - Margie Bowes / 371 - The Browns
365 - Ferlin Husky
*364 - Sonny James
356 - Sonny James - / 355 - Osborne Brothers
354 – Red Sovine / 353 – The Jordanaires
348 – Porter Wagoner / 347 – The Irvin Twins
346 – Bill Anderson / 345 – Grandpa Jones
**344 – Martha Carson /343 – Sonny James
**344 - Red Steagall / 343 - Pat McKinny
342 – Jean Shepard / 341 – The Wilburn Brothers
340 – The Carter Family 339 – Margaret Lewis
338 – T. Tommy / 337 - Bill Carlisle
336 - The Jordanaires / 335 - Bobby Helms
334 – Helen LaCroix / 333 – Hank Snow
332 – Hank Locklin / 331 - Margie Bowes
330 - Sonny James / 329 - Benny Martin
328 – The Irvin Twins / 327 – Sonny James
326 – The Willis Brothers / 325 – Jimmy Newman
324 – Tom Paul & The Glasser Bros. / 323 – Claude Grey
322 – Dick Flood / 321 – Archie Campbell
320 – Roy Drusky / 319 – Carl Butler
318 - Faron Young / 317 - The Willis Brothers
316 - Bill Carlisle / 315 – George Hamilton IV
314 - Bobby Sykes & Marion Worth / 313 – Billy Walker
310 - Mac Wiseman / 309 - The Jordannaires
308 - Jim Reeves / 307 - Jim Reeves
306 - Hawkshaw Hawkins / 305 – Patsy Cline
300 -  Charlie Louvin / 299 - Webb Peirce
298 - Charlie McCoy / 297 - The Four Guys
294 - The Louvin Brothers / 293 - Ernest Tubb
290 - George Morgan / 289 – Tommy Jackson
288 - Tex Ritter / 287 - The Jordanaires
282 - Porter Wagoner / 281 – T. Tommy
*280 - Dickie Lee / *279 - Jimmy C. Newman
278 - Tex Ritter / 277 - Webb Peirce
266 – Billy Grammer / 265 – Cowboy Copas
264 – Jean Shepard / 263 – Wilburn Brothers
262 – Faron Young / 261 – Roy Druskey
260 – Grandpa Jones / 259 – Jimmy Dickens
258 – Patsy Cline / 257 – The Jordanaires
254 – Margie Bowes / 253 – Tommy Cutrer
252 – Marty Robbins / 251 – Billy Grammer
250 – The Wilburn Brothers / 249 – The Jordanaires
262 - Faron Young / 261 - Roy Drusky
254 - Coyboy Copas / 253 - T. Tommy Cutrer
248 - Marty Robbins/ 247 - The Glaser Brothers
243 - Johnny Cash / 244 - Glen Douglas
242 – Carl Smith / 241 – Wilma Lee & Stony Cooper
238 - Hackshaw Hawkins / 237 - Jimmy C. Newman
235 - Joan Hager / 234 - The Louvin Brothers
230 - Bob Williams / 229 - The Jordanaires
228 - Benny Martin & Del Wood / 227 - Patsy Cline & Jan Crutchfield
226 – Carter Family / 225 – Roy Drusky
220 - T. Tommy / 219 - The Willis Brothers
216 - Diana Trask / 215 - Dave Dudley
214 - Billy Grammer / 213 - Jimmy Newman
212 – Tommy Jackson / 211 – The Glasser Brothers
210 - Bob Druskey / 209 – The Jordanaires
210 - Bobby Bare / 209 - Peggy Little
208 - The Jordanaires / 207 - Jim Reeves
206 – Carl Butler / 205 – Wilma Lee & Stony Cooper
**204 – Porter Wagoner / 203 – Roy Drusky
**204 - The Florida Boys / 203 - Cal Smith
202 – Bobby Lord / 201 – Cowboy Copas
200 - Martha Carson / 199 - Tom T. Hall
190 - Roy Drusky  / 189 - Faron Young
186 - Benny Martin / 185 - Faron Young
184 - George Morgan / 183 - The Jordanaires
141 - Johnny Cash / 142 - Joe Maphis
135 - Jim Reeves / 136 Marty Robbins
131 - The Collins Kids
122 – Archie Campbell / 121 – Mac Wiseman
119 – Connie Smith / 118 – Warner Mack
102 - Van Trevor / 103 - Bob Luman
19 - Sons of the Pioneers

The Record: Contemporary Art And Vinyl

Off topic but well worth seeing if you're in Miami this week. The Record: Contemporary Art and Vinyl, is an art exhibit organized by the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University.  It explores the culture of vinyl in art history through sculpture, drawing, painting, photography, audio, and video.  Next week it'll be on the way to Seattle so do not delay.  More here and here.

The exhibit is focused on modern history so those excruciating audio collage projects by John cage in the late 1930s are not included —whew. Instead the show starts with a classic 1970s Volkswagen Minibus traveling around Miami with live DJ sets and exhibit information. The full exhibition features 99 works by 41 artists including a a hybrid violin and record player by Laurie Anderson, David Byrne's original life-sized Polaroid photomontage used for the cover of the 1978 Talking Heads album More Songs About Buildings and Food, and works by William Cordova, Robin Rhode, and Dario Robleto.

Travel

Got a flight to catch. Be right back.

CRIS Radio

The IAAIS (International Association of Audio Information Services) estimates that over one million Americans over the age of 40 are blind and another 2.4 million are visually impaired. For them, radio reading services are crucial. But for the rest of us these networks are invisible. So when I heard about CRIS Radio, I reached out to their Operations Director, Scott Baecker who was very helpful with some technical questions.

The first CRIS program was broadcast in 1979. That day volunteers Alan Sagal, Jim MacPherson and Ron Milligan read a series of articles from periodicals including the Hartford Courant. The program was just two-hour broadcast that was aired only on a sub-carrier frequency of WJMJ. But by 1981 CRIS was on air 8 hours a day Monday through Friday, and by 1982 it was 7-days a week.

In 1983 they began broadcasting on a subcarrier of WPKN down in Bridgeport, and beefed up their hours of operation to 14 hours a day, Three years later it was officially a 24/7 operation. In 1989 and 1990 they were added to the COX and Charter Cable systems. That substantially improved their coverage of the Hartford suburbs, and eastern Connecticut. The addition of WHUS in 1988 redoubled that. Today their programming is carried on WJMJ, WPKN, WHUS, WNHU, WDAQ and WCNI. That's coverage comparable to the NPR network.  It's worth noting that they archive their programs on their website and operate a toll-free TeleReader service so listeners can call up and and listen to the program of their choice. More here.

As an avid reader I can't imagine losing the ability to read which is why reading services always catch my attention. Too many of these kinds of radio services operate under the radar so to speak. Despite their specialization, some of these stations produce quality programming that would work outside their intended market.I can't help but to compare them to HD sub-channels, who also need "special" radios to listen. I suspect that presently, reading services have more listeners than HD stations.

Harold Kayes Mailorder Network

It's almost unthinkable now. In 1950 WGN-AM just handed over night programming to Harold Kaye Mailorder service. The company was very real,  Kay was a former exec from the Olian Ad Agency. the company even appears in the 1950 and 1951 Broadcasting yearbooks simply as "Mail Order Network." According to a 1949 Billboard article they had 50 stations on board. They provided up to 35 hours of programming per week, and were on stations as big as WOR-AM in New York. The "network" was linked by transcription, but provided programming, advertising copy and sponsors. They were headquartered at 1440 Broadway, in New York. The book The Deejays by Arnold Passman described it somewhat grandly:

"So in the fall of 1949, WGN, Chicago, shocked the industry by turning over its midnight-5 A.M. hours to Harold Kaye's Mail Order Network. With Erv Victor spinning pop and hillbilly records between the "per inquiry" spots, plastic Jesus radio, with six pitches per hour, was spewed from WGN's superengineered, wide-ranging, 50-kilowatt mountaintop, where big bands had been beamed to the nation just a few years earlier."

 Their first produced program was "Big Joe," hosted by Joe Rosenfield which was carried by 710 WOR-AM. His program ran from 2:00 AM to 5:00 AM from 1949 to 1954. Joe went on to host Big Joe's Happiness Exchange on 770 WABC-AM in 1959. How long his WOR program was involved with Kaye is unclear. More here. The aforementioned Uncle Erv Victor was a country music DJ formerly of KMOX, where he had been since at least 1946. He left for WGN in September that year. The program ran overnights, 1:00 AM to 6:00 AM, syndicated on 56 stations.  One of them was KHJ-AM. The mail order network had previously claimed to have 50 affiliates with stations in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Baltimore, Washington, Miami, Jacksonville, Tampa, Atlanta, Birmingham, New Orleans, Buffalo, Rochster and New Orleans. I count 15 cities in that list. With 50 affiliates that is either a lot of double coverage or a lot of omitted stations, or a gross over-estimation. The article went to some pains not to name the stations, describing wattage and market but not the call sign... almost as if there were some shame attached...

It was said that NAB didn't like the precedent, but WGN wasn't a member so there wasn't much they could do. For Harold Kaye results were great. the huge coverage area of WGN parlayed into more orders from more customers in more markets. It was the QVC of it's day and as programming it bordered on repugnant, but the sales numbers didn't lie. But in 1951 Kaye told Billboard that his similar programming on TV was "headed for the junk pile."  Kaye credited the two-month drop to "the current economic squeeze, public resentment of phony claims and inferior merchandise, and the fact that mail-order pitches are no longer a novelty to TV audiences." Unsurprisingly Kaye shows up as the new TV department head at the Dorland Ad Agency in June of 1951. I can't be certain that it's the same Harold Kaye... but it fits the story.