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The Bakelite Hour
In an era that largely predated radio advertising, sponsored programs were the norm. In that environment the Bakelite Hour debuted on WJZ-AM in February of 1926. It ran on Sundays from 8:00 PM to 9:00...
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DJ Doc Hopkins
Born in 1900 (or maybe 1894, 1899, or 1901), Howard "Doc" Hopkins was a barber, a musician, a machinist and disk jockey. His career peaked in the 1930s and 1940s singing and playing banjo on both the...
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Transcription Mystery Disc #207
This is a paper-core Wilcox-Gay Recordion acetate recording. It is labeled in pencil on the back side "Dolores Mary ? ? nac lekelede" That last word is in the illegible ancient code known as cursive....
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The Carrington Event
In both science fiction and science fact much hay is made of an EMP, an electromagnetic pulse. On March 9th, 1989 a coronal mass ejection (CME) reached Earth causing a geomagnetic storm. It caused...
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My Name Is Not Merv Griffin
...With all due respect to Gary Muller, and the late great Dr. Demento. For the record, Merv is no stage name. He was born Mervyn Edward Griffin Jr., so that much is wholly true. After founding Merv...
View ArticleRNI Pirate Radio Shut down!
July 28th, 1987 the FCC shut down RNI, the Pirate station Radio New York International. They were operating from a ship off the coast of Long Island near Jones Beach.Allan Weiner the founder of RNI...
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This Station Rules The Nation
Two companies have historically controlled broadcast media in Jamaica. The first began in 1949: Radio Jamaica Rediffusion Limited (RJR). The company inherited ZQI (formerly NJ2PZ and VP5PZ) from...
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Transcription Mystery Disc #208
This is a metal-core 6.5-Inch Wilcox Gay Recordio. It spins at 78 rpm and for once it is at least partially labeled. The markings read "Tom + Norm + Ma" and below that more impenetrable cursive "When...
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Who Gave Gibby Hayes a Radio Show?
You just can't say it started out "innocently enough". It started out with Gibby Hayes, lead singer of the Butthole Surfers. Someone gave him a radio show and that someone was programming 101.5 KROX in...
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Roberto Landell de Moura
Roberto Landell de Moura is mostly forgotten, but belongs in the pantheon with Marconi, Nikola Tesla and Nathan Stufflefield. He publicly demonstrated a radio broadcast of a human voice on June 3rd,...
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AIREP to PIREP
A PIREP (Pilot Weather Report) is an unscheduled pilot report regarding actual weather conditions encountered by an aircraft while in mid-flight. This data is usually relayed to a the nearest ground...
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Transcription Mystery Disc #209
This is an 8-inch, metal-core Duodisc brand acetate recording disc. Both sides are recorded, but only one side is labeled. The markings are in pencil and cursive. I think it reads "Tumble Weeds, Buch +...
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There Is No Aether Either
Science achieves progress largely through consensus. That consensus is never that we are exactly right but that our assumption is probable. We proceed with it as an accepted theory and dominant...
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XKCD: Electromagnetic Spectrum
This is a much more interesting representation of the Electromagnetic Spectrum than the FCC Frequency Allocation Chart. The above chart actually contains so many clever asides that it's broken down...
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Grateful Dead DJs on KPFA
KPFA is a set of call letters that come up often on this blog. Even for a radio station that's been around for 65 years they have truly been notable. It's really gone from extraordinary to downright...
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Jim Shumate: Bluegrass Fiddler Supreme
They called him "Handsome'' Jim Shumate. Writer Thomas Goldsmith called him the "Bluegrass Fiddler Supreme." He's probably in his early 20s above. The 1980 LP I have is actually titled, "Bluegrass...
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Transcription Mystery Disc #210
This is an 8-inch, metal-core, 78 rpm Capitol Pro-Disc acetate. It look sin worse shape than it actually is. The needle plowed thorough all that garbage stuck to it and right through the discolored...
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The Glory of the CW Keyboard
They just don't make these anymore. A CW Keyboard was a device which could produce Morse code from a typewriter-like keyboard. Today we have Raspberry Pi and Arduino board kits that can convert the...
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