The Pure Oil Band

Edwin F. Goldman 1929

The Pure Oil Program is a bit obscure but it actually hosted Al Jolson's first radio appearance in 1929. So who was this band which launched such a legendary radio career? In the 1920s it seemed like every sponsor needed to have their own radio band. The book And now, a word from our sponsor, by Dorothy Hoober remarks on the 1920s convention: 

"Each program had its own musical group, and they were some times named after the sponsor of the program. Fran’s favorite was a banjo band called the Cliquot Club Eskimos. Cliquot Club was a brand of ginger ale. The Parkers also listened to the A & P Gypsies, the Pure Oil Band, and the Firestone Orchestra."

In the University of Iowa "Goldman Band Library" is a radio script from the Pure Oil Program as it aired on WJZ on November 11th 1925... almost 100 years ago. I'd love a scan but I don't have plans to go to Iowa this year. Short of getting that transcript, let's piece together the story.  

The first clue there is that the document is in the Goldman Band library. That would be Edwin Franko Goldman. (Sometimes spelled Franco) He was born in 1878. According to Boyd B. Perkins, "He first formed the New York Military Band in 1911 with the goal of employing the finest musicians and repertory possible."  That sentiment is echoed in a 1929 Union Banner article on the band:

"Every member of Mr. Goldman’s celebrated Pure Oil Band is a finish¬ ed solo artist on his particular instru¬ ment, and the ensemble has played together for a good many years. Many of the radio audience who have heard Mr. Goldman’s Band on con¬ cert tour, we believe will find in this weekly Saturday evening program the fulfillment of their desire for fine band music and will dial in any of the following stations Saturday evening: WJZ, WJAX, WBT, KDKA, WLW, WRVA, WSM, WMC, WBAL, WHAS, WJR, KYW, KWK, WREN, WEBC, KSTP, WTMJ, WHAM, WSB."

Previously Goldman had played trumpet in New York municipal bands which performed at the New York City parks and piers. Goldman felt that the musicianship was lacking in some of these groups. He gathered musicians he felt were the leading wind instrument players in New York City to discuss  forming a New York Military Band. After a number of private engagements, the new 40-member band began playing public shows on the Columbia University green in 1918. 

In 1923 construction forced their move from Columbia to the Mall in Central park. Starting in 1924 the Guggenheim family donated 76k to make the programs free to the public. The first show of that season attracted an estimated 30,000 people. That year they began broadcasts on WJZ and WGY. By 1925 WEAF was broadcasting them remotely and NBC began broadcasting them on their then fledgling network. They probably had 150 million listeners by 1928.

In 1929 the New York Times published an article quoted an unnamed NBC representative that the Goldman Band was "the victim of commercialism this season" Fewer program sponsors had signed off for the Summer season." there would not be three weekly concerts by the band, as it had been in 1928. Goldman still had a contract with WJZ with Pure Oil for a half hour on Tuesday nights, but he was retreating from radio. But WNYC did still broadcast their show from the park on Wednesday nights. It's clear that this incarnation of the band still broadcast as the Pure Oil band into November of 1929. 

Edwin's son, Richard became conductor in 1956 following his fathers death. The band also changed their name to the Guggenheim Band after their long time sponsor.  The live programs in the park continued until 1969 when they were moved to the Lincoln center for safety reasons. When the Guggenheim withdrew their funding the band name changed again to the Goldman Memorial Band.  The band finally broke up in 2005, now having no original members over private fund raising and a negotiating stalemate between the band's negotiating committee and the board of directors.  

Curt Peterson 1928

The NBC announcer for the program was Curt Peterson. He also did CBS Radio Mystery Theatre, Jones & Hare: the Interwoven pair, Collier's radio Hour, The Gillette Program, The Atwater-Kent Show, The Dutch Masters Minstrels. He was born in 1898 and other than a story about his bad handwriting, little is recorded about him.[SOURCE]  Peterson announced for Radio Mystery Theatre in 1975 when he would have been 77 years old. There are several other Curt Petersons, including the founder of Sabina records, and an engineer at KOVR to name a few. the disambiguation makes it difficult to track his career. But he does appear in the book Golden Throats and Silver Tongues. I did find a head shot from a 1928 radio mag. (above) 

That New York Times article seems to put an end date to this radio tale. But then I found some loose ends... It appears that in 1930 Pure Oil chose to sponsor a new band.  In the 1931 Chicago News daily Radio Station Directory [LINK] it lists Wayne King's Pure Oil Band on KYW. Those references start in 1930. [SOURCE]  The Encyclopedia of American Radio doesn't record an end to the program either. Strangely they call it a The Pure Oil Brass Band, no other attribution.  The Encyclopedia of Old Time Radio makes a passing reference under Richard Himber on the Pure Oil Hour with Eddie Peabody but that was just in 1933. Himber went on to provide music for The Spartan Hour, The Studebaker Champions, Thirty Minutes In Hollywood, and Melody Puzzles into 1937.  In 1935 Pure Oil sponsored the Vincent Lopez orchestra, but I think the band name was effectively dead by 1933.

Outstanding Radio Features of 1935

I found this image online with no attribution but dated to January 12th, 1935. But I do recognize it as a column from the New York Daily News. I'm going to assume that date is real and extrapolate from there. This Radio Program section was published in this format from at least 1934 into 1937, that's almost 90 years ago. So lets dig into the arcane details.

TUESDAY (1/15/35)

CALL SIGN	Time	Owner
WOR	8:00 PM	Eddy Brown, Violinist
WHN	8:00 PM.	Amateur Hour
WJZ	8:30 PM	Lawrence Tibbett
WMCA	9:00 PM.	US Navy Symphonic Orchestra
WEAF	9:30 PM	Ed Wynn; Duchin Orchestra
WABC	9:30 PM	Jones Orchestra; Evan Evans Baritone
WEAF	10:00 PM.	Musical Comedy, "The Mikado" with John Barclay
WEAF	11:00 PM.	Christmas Carols
WJZ	12:00 MID	Rudy Vallee Orchestra

Eddy Brown only died in 1974 after a very long career. He was a child prodigy musician, who performed on many New York City area radio stations after immigrating to America from Italy at the age of 4 in 1899. He performed with many different symphonies, and lead the Eddy Brown String Quartet in the 1920s. He was music director of the Mutual Broadcasting System from 1930–37, then the music director of radio station WQXR from 1936 to 1942. This performance would have been while he was still at WQXR, and simultaneously president of the Chamber Music Soc. of America.

Lawrence Tibbett was an opera singer and recording artist. Originally from Bakersfield, California he studied music in New York starting in 1923 under Frank La Forge. The earliest radio appearance I found of his was in 1922 over KHJ. He sang leading roles with the Metropolitan Opera in New York City from 1923 to 1950 with over 600 performances in that time. Tibbett  made his first recording for Victor in 1926 and his first Hollywood film in 1930, Rogue Song, for MGM. He appeared on many different radio programs: The Packard Show, Hit Parade, Chesterfield Presents, Ford Sunday Evening Hour, Atwater Kent Radio Hour, The Circle, The Voice of Firestone, and the live broadcasts at the Metropolitan Opera. In 1937 he co-founded AFRA and serving as it's president until 1953. I suspect this specific program is Lawrence Tibbett with Wilfred Pelletier's Orchestra and John B. Kennedy as commentator. 

 The Duchin Orchestra recorded literally hundreds of sides for Victor recordings, often with Lew Sherwood, vocalist. Their sides for the Texaco program were broadcast live on October 2nd 1934. Ed Wynne (also spelled Wynn) was also on the Texaco program back in 1932 in the Fire Chief series. [LINK]The American Bosch popularity poll vote him most popular comedian that year. 

Evan Evans should have a disambiguation asterisk. In addition to the judges, actors, writers, Welsh poets and footballers there was also an Evans Evans actress born in 1936. Evans Evans appears with the Barlwo Orchestra in multiple issues of Tempo dating back to 1933. A concert Program listing, Serious Music on the Columbia Broadcasting System notes 17 performances under the title "Melody Masterpeices." A 1939 advertisement for Julliard School of music lists Evan Evans in the voice staff. Each reference is short and nominally informative always writing out the name and the one word "baritone" except for the oldest one, The Musical Times published in 1899 which inexplicably says "tenor."

WEDNESDAY (1/16/35)

CALL SIGN	Time	Owner
WMCA & WNYC	2:00 PM	New York Civic Symphony and Orchestra.
WABC	3:00 PM	Kate Smith's Matinee, with broadcast from Berne Switzerland
WEAF	3:30 PM	Woman's Radio Review - American Indian Music
WEAF	7:00 PM	Pickens Sisters
WABC	7:30 PM	The O'Neills
WEAF	8:00 PM	Mary Pickford in "Trigger"
WJZ	8:30 PM	Lanny Ross
WABC	8:30 PM	Broadway Varieties
WJZ	9:00 PM	Warden Lewis E. Lawes; Sing Sing Band
WABC	9:00 PM	Nino Martini; Kostelanetz Orch; Chorus
WEAF	9:00 PM	Town Hall Tonight, with Fred Allen
WJZ	9:30 PM	John Charles Thomas
WABC	9:30 PM	Burns and Allen
WJZ	10:00 PM	Induction of Elsie Janis as NBC Announcer
WABC	10:00 PM	Byrd Expedition Broadcast - Christmas Program
WEAF	10:30 PM	One Man's Family
WABC	10:30 PM	Mary Eastman, Evan Evans, Howard Barlow Orch.
WJZ	11:00 PM	Coleman Orch.
WEAF	12:00 MID	George Olsen Orch. and Ethel Shutta
WABC	12:00 MID	Amateur Night in Harlem

I hardly need to discuss Kate Smith, especially since I did that previously [LINK].  But Woman's Radio Review is a much lesser known radio program. Claudine MacDonald was the program's host, a single photo caption [SOURCE] adds little detail from the Donna L. Halpern book Invisible Stars: A Social History of Women in American Broadcasting. 

“The Women’s Radio Review was almost like a magazine, featuring segments on music (sometimes written or performed by women artists), literature, art, travel, news… and no recipes. Macdonald was… opposed to the type of women’s show that talked to women as if they were stupid.”

The Picken's Sisters were really sisters. Grace, Jane, Helen and Patti were daughters of Monte and Patti Pickens. Grace was not a singer but their manager. Patti and Helen got married and dropped out of show biz early. But Jane Pickens Hoving was a popular singer on Broadway, radio and television for 20 years. She sang in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1936, then toured with Eddy Douchin's Orchestra. Her appearances on the American Melody Hour on CBS radio led to her own radio program: the Jane Pickens Show on NBC.

The O'Neills was a radio soap opera . The radio iteration of the show aired for a decade in a 15-minute format. First on Mutual, CBS and then NBC from 1934 to 1943, later a TV series from 1949 to 1950. Quick synopsis: An elderly widow "Mother O'Neil" played by Kate McComb has two married children and two adopted children. Mother O'Neil is sage and wise, as is her platonic companion Morris Levy played by Jack Rubin. The kids are all non-stop drama as the words soap opera implied.

Lanny Ross born Lancelot Patrick Ross, was another singer from the Packard show. In the 1937 season Fred Astaire left, and they wrapped up those episodes with under the title Mardi Gras, with Ross as the singer and Walter O'Keefe as comedian, but still sponsored by Packard. His first radio gig was in 1928 earning him the title "the troubadour of the moon" according to the Historical Dictionary of Old Time Radio by Robert C. Reinehr. But this is probably not quite right. (The book Paul Whiteman: Pioneer in American Music by Don Rayno reports that same title describing Jimmy Brierly for a program he did on WAAT prior to 1933. A 1930 issue of The Herald and review newspaper tells me that "The Troubador of the Moon" program may be heard over WWJ, WSAL WHO. KSTP or WTAM... that program starred Ross so I'm going to disregard Brierlyfor the moment.  Ross career did start in 1928, but singing for Yale Glee Club's Jeddo Highlanders on NBC. He performed on Show Boat until 1937, and his own show, ''Lanny Ross and His Log Cabin Orchestra.'' before going into film. 

Warden Lewis E. Lawes publicity photo 1935

 Lewis E. Lawes (pictured above) was an actual prison warden, that's a title not a proper name. The Sing Sing Band is a reference to Sing Sing Prison, not vocalists. But Lawes did make some radio appearances. He was in The Glass Key episode of the Campbell Playhouse in 1939, and on Information Please he appeared with Boris Karloff in 1941.  He was the narrator for "Behind Prison Bars", which ran on WJZ from 1933-1939.  Later he was the subject of The Crime Cases Of Warden Lawes, a set of dramatized stories from Lawes' Sing Sing files on Mutual-Radio 1946-1947. He did record one record for Victor in 1932, it's more of the above. [SOURCE] It's hard to describe his brief but intense popularity, he wrote a few books and appeared in everything from radio to the cover of Time magazine, to comic books.

John Charles Thomas was an American opera singer from Pennsylvania. He made his first recordings for Vocalion in 1920, then RCA Victor in 1931. This led to regular appearances on radio including Five-Star Theater in 1932-33 with the Joseph Bonime Orchestra, the Vince Radio Program 1934–36, the Ford, General Motors and The Magic Key of RCA shows 1937–40, the Coca-Cola show from 1940–41 and the Westinghouse Radio Program in 1943-46. 

Elsie Janis was born Elsie Bierbower, in 1889. She was an actress, singer and eventually a radio announcer. most sources state that in 1934, Janis became the first female announcer on the NBC radio network. The December 19, 1934 issue of Radio World published the below article. Apparently NBC had an official first broadcast on January 16th.

Ethel Shutta and the Olsen orchestra air back to back which isn't' surprising. Shutta married band leader George Olsen in 1926, and the couple began touring together. They appeared on the Jack Benny Canada Dry Radio Show, which debuted in 1932 on NBC radio, and apparently together on WEAF. They divorced in 1939. Her career was mostly spent on Broadway but she did do the Nestle Chocolateers program in 1933. 

My favorite program on this list is Amateur Night in Harlem. This was broadcast live from The Apollo Theater. This is where the tough judgement of that local crowd was built. Great artists won real applause, but poor performances were met with jeers, the audience would boo and hiss. [SOURCE] I've written about this program before but there is so much to be said. [LINK]

Captiol Riot Radio

As government agencies go, the FCC is very high-functioning. I believe it comes to them naturally, as a large number of their decisions and functions come from the reality-based, engineering side of the world. Engineering is apolitical. The Nyquist frequency isn't liberal or conservative, it's a mathematical function. Be there no doubt, it gets misused when political hacks like Ajit Pai get nominated. But that's par for the course. Nonetheless the FCC does have a means for making quiet political statements: The enforcement advisory.

On January 17th, 2021 the FCC released a public notice "Warning: Amateur and Personal Radio Services Licensees and Operators May Not Use Radio Equipment to Commit or Facilitate Criminal Acts." The timing here is important as it comes in the aftermath of the insurrection at the capitol. 

Regardless of your political bent, whether you see the people who stormed the capitol building as "protestors" or "terrorists" it is clear that they were premeditated, trained and organized. We have audio recordings, and video and screen captures of what happened. Separate teams  communicated throughout the event via social media: posting, texting, streaming audio and video and frequently using a walkie-talkie app called Zello. [SOURCE]  For the record, Wired did a story in 2016 about the popularity of Zello with both ISIS jihadis and legitimate protesters. So it's continued use should come as no surprise. [SOURCE]

Back on October 16th WNYC broke a story on the use of Zello for recruitment and organizing by far-right, and white supremacist groups. Reporter Micah Loewinger documented over 200 radical right-wing channels on the app, ranging from three percenter gangs and QAnon cult groups to white nationalist militias. Note:  all of these groups appear to violate the app's terms of service. Zello for their part falls on a free-speech defense and put out a press release stating the following:

"Zello allows speech protected by the US constitution and law. Therefore, Zello does not permit distribution of content designed to incite violence.  Zello does not permit promotion of terrorist groups identified by the United Nations."

So while we wait for the United Nations to classify these racist militias as "terrorists" there comes a likelihood that Zello will be face some real consequences for their inaction on this topic as they've been getting warnings for at least 5 years. In response to the WNYC story Zello booted 2,000 radical right-wing channels, and changes their terms of service to ban militias. So what forum is left for these poor gun-toting bigots?  Not ham radio says the FCC. Two days later the FCC rebukes the would-be insurrectionists of the future not to use radio to organize.

"The Bureau has become aware of discussions on social media platforms suggesting that certain radio services regulated by the Commission may be an alternative to social media platforms for groups to communicate and coordinate future activities. The Bureau recognizes that these services can be used for a wide range of permitted purposes, including speech that is protected under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Amateur and Personal Radio Services, however, may not be used to commit or facilitate crimes. Specifically, the Bureau reminds amateur licensees that they are prohibited from transmitting “communications intended to facilitate a criminal act” or “messages encoded for the purpose of obscuring their meaning.” 47 CFR § 97.113(a)(4). 

This section applies to both amateur radio and PRS (Personal Radio Services) a category that includes Citizens Band radios, Family Radio Service walkie-talkies, and General Mobile Radio Service.  It states "Under prohibited transmissions the FCC includes "communications intended to facilitate a criminal act; messages in codes or ciphers intended to obscure the meaning thereof..."  Penalties for violating  47 CFR § 95.333(a) are subject to severe penalties, including significant fines, equipment seizure and criminal prosecution.

Ralph Gleason opens for Art Hodes

I wish I could remember which Art Hodes LP I found that quote on.  But it was how I first found that Art Hodes was a DJ in addition to being a jazz writer, and frequently recorded jazz pianist. He played with Sidney Bechet, Pee Wee Russell, Joe Marsala, Louis Armstrong, Wingy Manone, Gene Krupa, Muggsy Spanier and Mezz Mezzrow. More here.

Hodes was born in Ukraine and moved to the U.S. with his family as an infant. He got his start as a musician in Chicago, his big break came when he moved to New York in 1938. But it wasn't until April 6th, 1942 that he stepped into radio.

From 1940 to 1942 Ralph Berton hosted WNYC's daily foray into jazz called Metropolitan Revue, dedicated to "the finest in recorded hot jazz." It was the first jazz program on 830 WNYC-AM and possibly the first serious jazz music show in New York. [LINK] Berton played hot jazz, black and white, both A sides and B sides, big hits and out of print obscurities. His show was free-wheeling in a way that somewhat presaged Free Form FM, he was funny, and really knew his jazz and he sprinkled in a little folk music too.  He analyzed jazz records in depth, and even gave lectures on jazz that his listeners and the general public attended. But he had blind spots, he didn't understand the gravitas of Nina Simone, and despised electric instruments. (He also hated modern art and avant garde jazz.)

It was Gene Williams and Ralph Gleason who published the magazine Jazz Information. It was a 4-page newsletter that was printed irregularly out of the back room of the Commodore Music Shop but it was big with jazz heads.  (The magazine ran from 1939 - 1941) When Ralph was leaving the show, they suggested Art Hodes as a replacement.

"...they wrote some scripts for me. When I strayed from what they had written, they left me on my own. I didn't have many records, so I had to borrow things to play, which led me to get interested in collecting. I got really involved, and haunted the record shops, and junk shops, and rummage sales. the program was on six days a week in the early afternoon, and generally it lasted half an hour on weekdays and an hour on Saturday, when I'd ask guests in to play. I was playing the records I grew up with. It was beautiful jazz music going out into the air, and all I had to do, except for saying a few words, was sit there and listen."

He played Louis Armstrong's intro to West End Blues as his theme and once or twice every show Hodes played piano himself, often playing his own exit theme. It aired from 1:30 to 2:00 Monday, Wednesday and Friday, then 1:45 to 2:00 Tuesday and Thursday. But it all came to an abrupt end one week when the Mayor made an appearance on the show following Metropolitan Revue.

"Everything was fine until the day Mayor LaGuardia broadcast right after me. While he was waiting to go on the air, he heard me announce what label each tune was on, and the label number. I guess it was the first time he'd ever heard the show, and he told the station manager to get rid of me—that I was giving commercials on a noncommercial station. Of course what I was doing was giving my listeners the information they needed to get the records I had played. Otherwise they would write me by the dozen..."

He had the option to be fired or quit, so he resigned. But the show had made Art Hodes a made-man in the New York jazz community so the Art Hodes Band didn't exactly struggle for gigs after that. Before he got the boot Hodes had started a magazine, The Jazz record. He moved on from radio and didn't go back. Hodes went on to edit The Jazz Record for five years, and he continued to play with his own band for another 40 years.

But there were details missing from Hodes' version of the story. Hodes already knew Ralph Gleason. Mr. Gleason had recorded jazz sessions at WNYC which included some live sets at the Village Vanguard. One of these was released as "Matinee Jam Session" recorded December 29th, 1940. Alongside Lester Young and Coleman Hawkins was a young Art Hodes. The Art Hodes discography Hot Man, specifically notes that Ralph Gleason transcribed it, and "possibly" broadcast it on WNYC.

The NBC School for Radio Announcers

You probably have no idea who Frank H. Vizetelly is. But 80 years ago he made some predictions and set into motion some changes to broadcast media that have had some truly substantial effects on our culture. Linguists have been mourning for decades our fading regional American accents. This was a personal goal for Frank Vizetelly, and he was in a position to actually drive some of that change.

In 1930 NBC started a school for radio announcers. The school was headed by the British-born Dr. Frank Vizetelly. In 1919 he published Soldier's Service Dictionary of English & French Terms. He also published his own pronunciation dictionaries including a 10 cent pamphlet called A Desk Book of Twenty-Five Thousand Words Frequently Mispronounced. There was another in 1921 The Words We Mispell and one called Mend Your Speech and yet another named A Desk Book of Errors in English. I think you get the idea.

Vizetelly became an announcer on the program Air College on WNYC-AM in 1929.  In another book he later wrote specifically for NBC staff he wrote in the introduction the need for steps to establish the purity of American English. He saw it as under threat from immigrants and foreign accents and presumably regional accents. His hope was that radio would have a homogenizing effect on our speech. He wanted radio to "...iron out any jarring irregularities common to various sections..." but he wasn't alone in this thinking. The book Radio's Civic Ambition by David Goodman covers this in some detail. More here.

In 1931 NBC Vice president Henry Bellows praised the BBC on their diction "British Program announcing is a good deal better than ours, because announcers over there are all honor-graduates of Oxford and Cambridge." Bellows had a Phd in English Literature so his bias comes as no surprise. In 1935 he wrote an article for Harpers magazine that further establishes his hopes that radio would be the domain of talented educated men.There were always money men, the management staff that had their eye solely on profitability. But in that era there was also a strain of liberal-thinker that wanted radio to be an educational media with certain civic ambitions.

Those mixed goals left a mixed impression on the listening public. A year later another NBC VP, John Royal stated "If our announcers are guilty of mispronunciation, it is not because they are lacking in education, because more than eighty percent of them are college men..."  NBC had a hiring policy that sought out recent college graduates. In short, this was a long standing policy for NBC and other networks. They wanted their airstaff to sound erudite and part of that meant accent-neutral.

For the staff it meant practicing perfect diction. Announcer André Baruch recalled his own time at NBC.  He stated that  they used to test potential announcers using copy filled with tongue-twisters and foreign names, such as “The seething sea ceased to see, then thus sufficeth thus.”  Later it led to tests filled with expert-level tongue twisters including the legendary and somewhat comedic, Announcers Test passed down by Del Moore. It runs as follows:

• One hen
• Two ducks
• Three squawking geese
• Four limerick oysters
• Five corpulent porpoise
• Six pair of Don Alversos tweezers
• Seven thousand Macedonians in full battle array
• Eight brass monkeys from the ancient sacred crypts of Egypt
• Nine apathetic, sympathetic, diabetic, old men on roller skates with a marked propensity towards procrastination and sloth
• Ten lyrical, spherical diabolical denizens of the deep who hall stall around the corner of the quo of the quay of the quivery, all at the same time.

Ultimately Vizetelly was probably less militant about his ideas than the radio moguls that applied them. Vida Sutton also trained NBC announcers in that era and she considered regional variations acceptable but she saw the standardization of language happening of it's own accord. Whichever the case, it has come to pass.

Art Nudnick's Musical Menagerie

The image on it's own is almost inexplicable. First I found the image on a Tumblr page. It actually originates with Andy Lanset who helps look after the WNYC archives in New York. It's online origin at Flickr makes the following claim:

"Rolf, the mandolin-playing terrier, was regularly featured on Art Nudnick's Musical Menagerie. The Sunday afternoon variety programme was a hit on WYNC in 1925"

This is the kind of story that you hope to be true. But so far I've found nothing. No Art Nudnick, and no Musical Menagerie... at least not on WNYC-AM.  But the date is plausible. It is one of the oldest licensed radio stations in the U.S.  It made its first official broadcast on July 8th 1924. they were operating on 570 AM at the time. They had the frequency all to themselves until 1928 when they were forced into a time share with WMCA-AM which lasted until 1931 when they became a daytimer on 810.

The mic is a prop but the mandolin looks curiously playable. It was the right era for strange radio programming, in those eccentric and experimental early years when there was a lot of airtime and not enough talent and programming to go around. I can't be sure.

The End of NJN Radio

It didn't get nearly enough press. Last week an entire public radio chain was snuffed out. It was like there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.  The whole process took abotu 6 months if you start with the actual papers and not just the stumping. Their last day was last Thursday, and that day was the end of the New Jersey Network; a Public Radio and Television Broadcasting Network. Gov. Christie [R] of New Jersey chopped his state in half, more-or-less drawing the line at Interstate 195, and only letting the networks butt heads around Brick Township. The Northern territory went to New York's 93.9 WNYC, and South Jersey for the Philly gang at 90.9 WHYY. The television network was spared and reorganized as NJTV now owned by WNET.org, the parent company of WNET-TV and WLIW-TV.

I'll now callously skip over the massacre of the TV stations and focus on radio as I am known to do and go straight for the radio. WNJT 88.1 Trenton NJ, WNJY 89.3 Netcong NJ, WNJP 88.5 Sussex NJ and WNJO 90.3 Toms River NJ, and even the repeater W285EE have become "New Jersey Public Radio," owned by New York's WNYC. Only a year ago New Your Public Radio (WNYC) owned just WNYC-FM on 93.9 and WNYC-AM on 820 kHz. Then they picked up 105.9 WQXR for a classical service Even W228BI, their 93.5 repeater in Smithtown, NY. It is being replaced by another on 105.7  but I don't' think it's on air yet. This purchase effectively doubles their number of transmitters,

WHYY was the much smaller entity, consisting of just the one FM and the one TV station. (Maybe WRTI was giving them an inferiority complex.) But now they're audible clear to the shoreline. They have assimilated WNJB 89.3 Bridgeton NJ, WNJM 89.9 Manahawkin NJ, WNJN 89.7 Atlantic City NJ, WNJS 88.1 Berlin NJ and last but not least, WNJZ 90.3 Cape May Court House NJ. I broke it out on a map roughly estimating coverage area. Blue is WHYY, red is WNYC . Here's what that looks like:

(You can zoom in for a bit more detail if you want) The stations were sold at bargain basement prices to say the least. Why BIA/Kelsey would put their name to this trash I cant guess. The stations they compared them to for price reference were in podunk markets, some even in unrated market areas. It stinks of bias. The total market value was estimated to be $4.2 million for the entire network. And while none of these stations was KTRU or WRVU... I maintain they were undervalued in this estimate. The whole NJ treasury doc in pdf is here, but I'll cut to the chase.

WNJB - $469,000

WNJM - $144,000

WNJN - $563,000

WNJO - $496,000

WNJP - $403,000 (includes W285EE)

WNJS - $142,000

WNJT - $1,572,000

WNJY - $581,000

WNJZ - $219,000

But now it's gone. Ultimately that means a lot of  "NJ" call signs will be changing in the immediate future. It also means both of these networks will be working hard to round up new donor/members to pay for both the acquisition and the operating costs.

DJ Curtis Sliwa

Curtis Sliwa isn't really a DJ. He did eventually became a radio show host. He is a somewhat conservative populist and in New York City, that can be unpopular as these are totally conflicting belief systems.You probably know Silwa as the founder of the Guardian Angels. Those meat-head Brooklynites with the red berets actaully have over a hundred chapters across America. It was founded back in 1979 to protect a neighborhood. It is no longer a dozen friends of Silwa. It is an international civic organization. It was through this new position as a public figure that he became a radio talk show host in 1993.

Sliwa was co-host with his then-wife Lisa Evers on WABC-AM in New York City. In 1992, none other than John Gotti tried to have him wacked. Why Sliwa was worth wacking I don't know. I can only guess he said something in the course of his program the don found offensive. He may have cast aspersions on the musical talent of Frank Sinatra. That will get you the death penalty in New Jersey. After his attempted murder, his WABC-AM radio program was canceled. But his longtime supporter, Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Sliwa landed him a radio program on the then city-owned and operated WNYC. It's a good turn of luck for Silwa, former mayor Koch was totally opposed to the Angels.

In 1996 Sliwa returned to WABC, and later he became the co-host, with Ron Kuby, of the "Curtis and Kuby in the Morning" program aired weekdays during morning drive time on WABC-AM. The "Curtis and Kuby" radio show,which ran in the mornings.. until Imus came back. That must have stung a little, but he had to see it coming. his ratings in that slot were terrible. He got bumped and landed at 11am. It could have been worse. As of this spring, Curtis had also picked up a regular guest-hosting gig for The Bill O’Reilly Show.

Not bad for a guy that was managing a McDonalds when this all began.

Oscar Brand's Folksong festival

Oscar Brand started as a show host at WNYC-AM on December 9th 1945. It's been 62 years and looking back at the career of the 80 year old Brand, I realize that it wasn't even his first radio gig. He was already 25 years old.

This long-time radioman is Canadian-born but served for the U.S. in the Korean War. It was there in the Air Force that he began performing and then collecting songs. It was a batch of these songs that he took to Elektra Records producer Jack Holzman. Jack decided to have Oscar perform a selection of them with the Roger Wilco Four, naughty ditties and all. That album came out in 1959.

Of course Oscar was discharged in 1945 so theres a bit of discontinuity in the official biography but let's roll with it. Suppose he sat on the songs for over a decade and that he made the connection to Holtzman at Elektra thru WNYC. Seems plausible. The record did well enough to garner a follow up. And then another 97 albums. More here.

Anyway before WNYC Brand did a little time at WNEW-AM and WNBC-AM. At the time he was selling his writing, mostly plays and satirical comedy. In radio that's high art. They didn't' keep him. Their loss. WNYC held onto him as a host, then produced a few of his plays. Hermann Neumann the Station Manager gave Oscar the Folk Program. He never left it.

Don't forget, WNYC is a public radio station. Oscar is a volunteer. He's never been on the payroll. The whole six decades he's had to work on the side to make ends meet. His albums have made a pretty penny but he's also taught at NYU, given guitar lessons, written books, done voice over, and penned songs for dozens of artists from Ella Fitzgerald, to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

His list of accolades is too long to read in it's entirety. He's the curator of the Songwriters' Hall of Fame, In 1995 he Won a Peabody award. ...And more importantly the Guinness Book of World Records certified Brands as the longest running show on the air today.

The physical size of a radio wave

Radio waves are entirely real and physical things even though we cannot see them. It seems simple now that I write it but they are hard enough to imagine in the first place. An AM carrier wave varies in height because they are amplitude modulated. The height varies regardless of the frequency. But the wavelength is constant. For example 820 WNYC-AM has carrier wave with a wavelength of over 1,120 feet. 99.5 FM WBAI, also in New York, has a wavelength of about 10 feet. But because its Amplitude is not modulated, that too is constant. WBAI uses a microwave link between its studio and transmitter. This microwave link at 950 MHz has a wavelength of about 11 inches.

This physical size is behind the design for the "long wire antenna" Each type of long wire is suited to respond best to an even fraction of the full wave. A 1120 foot long wire antenna would be best to receive WNYC-AM. But also impractical inside a Manhattan apartment. At 560 feet it is tuned to the half-wave. At 280 feet the quarter wave. At 140 feet, an eighth and so-on. Great article on Long-wire antennas here.

This same concept applies to the broadcast of the signal. 880 WCBS broadcasts from a tower rigged to output almost a perfect half wave. More info here. There are no AM radio stations that I know of radiating a full half-wave. If you do, please fill me in.