Auto Racing on Radio

In the last century almost any imaginable type of radio program has been attempted. There are book shows, cooking shows, advice programs, political talk, sex talk, interview programs, football, baseball, and basketball. But some sports don't lend themselves to radio, at least I didn't' think so. So of the major sporting seasons there are only two that didn't make the cut. Ones too fast the others too slow: auto racing and golf.ESPN synchronized swimming. For all that's going on, none of it translates to really changed that. They've covered ping pong, sumo wrestling, arm wrestling and even good play-by-play. On 1090 XESPN in San Diego the only local program is an auto racing show on Sunday mornings.

Their Golf Talk program is based at 1230 KGEO-AM. It amazes me but they actually have affiliates for it. If you listen to this I want to know why. As a network they have no programming quality standards of any kind. It's improved since their inception in 1992, but I think it has roots in their cable TV roots.

ESPN is an acronym for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network. Originally this was a cable network. It was founded by Bill Rasmussen, formerly a reporter for WWLP-TV. His single satellite channel ran sports programming 24 hours a day. In order to do that they broadcast some lesser events: Australian rules football, badminton, pro-wrestling, slow pitch softball... While this was largely cured in their TV programming, this seems to have lived on in their radio programming.

The Evils of Automation!

Ok so automation isn't all that evil. even as a DJ I found some of it to actually be convienient.

In 2002 Paul C. Schafer, president of Schafer won the NAB Engineering Achievement award for his pioneering work in Radio automation. He was a pioneer in early development of automation systems for radio stations. He founded Schaefer Electronics in 1953, Schafer International in 1969 and the Schafer Digital Project in 1986. For better or worse, he is recognized by almost everyone as the father of automation.

He personally designed and installed the first automation system at KGEE, Bakersfield, CA, in 1953. Testing continued that same year the first station to test out his invention was 960 KROW-AM (now KQKE-AM 960) in Oaklands. Following these succcesses NAB performed field tests with his equipment in 1955 to show the viability of unattended remote control for radio transmitters. As a result of the these tests the FCC amended their rules in 1957 to permit the remote control of all radio transmitters. 1230 is now KGEO a simulcast of KERN http://www.kernradio.com/

it seemed to all go down very fast. But Schafer had put his money where his mouth was. To prove it could work, Schafer bought and automated a radio station. The station, 1230 KDOT-AM in Reno, NV operated with a staff of three people. The manager did the selling, the engineer was also the announcer and one office manager ran everything else. 1230 is now KJFK a local talker. http://www.1230kjfk.com/