The Big Broadcast

"The Big Broadcast" is a radio Show on WFUV in New York City. When I lived in the City, it was a station I listened to on a daily basis. Rich Conaty hosted the program spinning vocal pop and jazz from the 1920's and 1930's. It's not the only Big Broadcast, but you have to start somewhere.What I find most interesting abotu The Big Broadcast program. is it's duration. Rich started the program 35 years ago. That's before WBGO even began airing Jazz. Now strangely in 1992 Conaty left WFUV in an attempt to take the program to a commercial venue, 1560 WQEW-AM. Conaty himself actually claimed that the gig was for less money. He goal was to reach a bigger audience. Ultimately it didn't work out. Commercial radio is narrow, unforgiving and always under pressure to sell ads. In 1997 he came back home to WFUV. A year later WQEW dropped their under performing Nostalgia format and became a Radio Disney Station.

I tell you all this because "The Big Broadcast" is has a great etymology. In 1932 it was the name of a feature film (series of films actually) There was a Big Broadcast film in 1936, 1937 and 1938. They were films about radio variety Shows. The 1938 version Stars Bob Hope as the Radio host Buzz Fielding on New York radio Station WADX.

Inexplicably There is also a Big Broadcast at WAMU in Washington D.C. This one is hosted by Ed Walker but mixes in more oldies to the playlist reaching as far up at the 1950s. That program dates back to 1964, but only picked up the "Big Broadcast" name in 1990. It's also the name of an encyclopedia of radio history by Frank Buxton known to contain a number of errors. (hello kettle)

High Fidelity AM radio

No not HD, IBOC dosen't actually work on AM you already know that.

Starting in 1934 U.S. frequencies above 1500 were allocated only to four experimental stations. the experiment was High Fidelity AM Radio. They broadcast with a signal 20 kHz wide for this improved AQH. The High Fidelity stations were converted to regular broadcasting(and regular call signs) with the NARBA frequency move.

But from December 19, 1933, until then The FRC allowed the three channels, at 1530, 1550, and 1570 kHz, too operate at double the Khz making high-fidelity broadcasting possible without interference from adjacent stations.

These stations were:

on 1530 W1XBS to which became WBRY (later WTBY, then WQQW; went dark in 1989)
on 1590 W9XBY to KITE(wenr dark in 1942)
on 1550 W2XR to WQXR (now 1560 WQEW-AM) which survives today
and also on 1550 W6XAI to KPMC (now 1560 KNZR-AM)

KITE-AM has a great history page here: http://www.qcwa.org/w9xby_station.htm
WBRY-AM history here: http://www.cosmos-monitor.com/hist/kc/w1xbs.html
a WQEW-AM page here: http://www.wackradio.com/wqew/index.html

There was actually a fight over 1530. There were two Kansas City applicants for 1530 kHz. The Unity School of Christianity, owner of WOQ, was seeking the channel as a means of staying on the air if it lost its fight to stay on 1300 kHz. The commission had attempted to deny WOQ a license renewal in 1931. The other Kansas City applicant was First National Television, Inc., operator of a radio engineering school and holder of an experimental television license, W9XAL. First National was partially owned by Arthur B. Church, the principal owner of KMBC.

There were only six applicants for all four licenses.
Unity School of Christianity, Kansas City,
American-Republican, Inc., Waterbury, CT
First National Television, Inc., Kansas City,
John V. L. Hogan, Long Island City, New York,
Pioneer Mercantile Co., Bakersfield, California,
Fred W. Christian, Jr., and Raleigh W. Whiston, Los Angeles,

Two weeks later, the Commission approved all except the Unity and Los Angeles applications. According to Broadcasting, "The fact that more applicants for the newly opened wave lengths did not appear has produced considerable surprise, particularly in the ranks of the Radio Commission."