Geschichte & Kritik

Since the first broadcasts of Buffalo, New York's pioneer radio stations during the 1920s, the medium has played an important role in the everyday lives of the city's citizens. From snowstorms to Super Bowls, radio and its talented broadcasters have helped to shape the city's identity. Buffalo's longest operating station, WGR, signed on the air in May 1922 and was soon followed by WEBR (1924), WKBW (1926), and WBEN (1930), among others. Over the decades, the city has been home to a number of legendary announcers, including Clint Buehlman and Billy Keaton and sports broadcasters Ralph Hubble, Bill Mazer, Van Miller, and Stan Barron, as well as beloved talk show hosts like John Otto and pioneer rock and roll DJs like George "Hound Dog" Lorenz. Buffalo became a breeding ground for network radio stars, including Howdy Doody's "Buffalo" Bob Smith, comedian Foster Brooks, NBC Tonight Show host Jack Paar, and Fran Striker, the creator of The Lone Ranger. Top 40 personalities like Joey Reynolds, Dick Biondi, Tommy Shannon, and Danny Neaverth ruled the airwaves with excitement and spontaneity during the 1960s.

Who are au féminin, the legends who shaped radio in Canada? What did they contribute locally, regionally, and nationally? How was their experience in radio broadcasting different from that of their male counterparts? Canadian Women and Radio offers an introduction to the women who built careers in the radio industry--yet whose contribution has often been overlooked simply because they were women. This collection of stories highlights the multi-faceted contributions they made to their field and explores issues specific to them. Academic research, interviews, personal reflections and accounts, historical reviews, and hybrid texts combine neatly, in this eclectic yet well-researched and edited volume, to reflect the fast-paced world of radio broadcasting. Whether through storytelling, direct quotes, or quasi transcriptions best read aloud, the reader will come away with a real sense of the aural nature of radio, of the voice unaccompanied, of the pure spoken word and how it differs from the printed word.

In 1939, when Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve first came to the attention of radio audiences, he was but a neighbor and one of the frequent visitors to the folks at 79 Wistful Vista on the popular Fibber McGee and Molly program. His verbal sparring with Fibber came to be a much anticipated and enjoyed segment of the program.Then in 1941, Gildersleeve moved to the town of Summerfield to take on a more serious role as the guardian of his orphaned niece and nephew. His bumbling efforts, his penchant for wooing various ladies, and his interactions with pals in the Jolly Boys club, made The Great Gildersleeve one of radio’s most listened-to weekly programs.Harold Peary brought "Gildy" to life on the McGee program and filled the role until mid-1950. Willard Waterman then took over, with a voice so similar to Peary’s that few listeners noticed the change. The two stars, supported by a talented team of writers and a cast of seasoned radio performers, kept listeners tuned in for 16 years.Old-time radio enthusiast Dan McGuire recalls the careers of Harold Peary, Willard Waterman, and the featured players who made The Great Gildersleeve a listeners’ favorite and one of radio’s most long-running programs.

From the beginning of commercial radio in 1920, Oklahoma City was on the leading edge of this new enterprise. WKY radio went on the air in January 1920, making it one of the earliest radio stations in America. Soon, the station began broadcasting regular programming and was the third station in America and the first west of the Mississippi to broadcast regular daily programs. In August 1928, E.K. Gaylord, owner of the Daily Oklahoman newspaper, purchased the station, and in December of that year, WKY became affiliated with the National Broadcasting Company (NBC). Gaylord's long association with NBC president David Sarnoff resulted in WKY originating programs for NBC out of the Oklahoma City studio from the mid-1930s extending through WKY-TV in the 1970s. WKY and KOMA became the launching pad for several well-known public figures, such as Walter Cronkite, Curt Gowdy, and Todd Storz.

In 1999 David Elstein delivered a lecture series examining the evolvement of UK broadcasting policy from 1949 to 1999. His sharp analysis is a valuable contribution to the post-war development of the British broadcasting system and unfolds many topical issues in current media policy debates.

Peter Jefferson presented The Shipping Forecast for over 40 years, and his familiar voice continued to be heard reading quotations on BBC Radio 4's Quote... Unquote. This book is both an affectionate memoir and a history of the science and BBC programming behind the forecast.<BR><BR>Peter explains how it came out, who collects all the information and what it's like to read this bulletin. Even though the information in the forecast is now readily available in many formats, The Shipping Forecast is something of a 'must listen' for fans gathered over the decades.<BR><BR>For reasons not quite understood, it has become a much-loved part of the British cultural landscape with an avid following of listeners who find its poetry is the perfect cure for insomnia. This book is perfect for those fans.

When a Des Moines insurance company started a radio station in 1924, no one imagined it would bring news from a world war home to families desperate for information, carry the exploits of University of Iowa athletics to fans nationwide, draw the ire of a Cuban dictator, and be home to a future president. From the earliest days of This is W-H-O. Who? Bankers Life, Des Moines to today's 50,000-watt, clear channel voice of the middle west, one of the most powerful radio stations in America has been part of Iowa life for nearly 90 years. With a signal that reaches from coast to coast, border to border, and then some, trusted voices such as Jack Shelley, Herb Plambeck, Jim Zabel, Lee Kline, and Duane Ellett have graced the WHO radio airwaves, while Van & Bonnie, Jan Mickelson, Bob Quinn, and others carry on the tradition today. From the Barn Dance Frolic and Phone Forum to Sportsman's Notebook and The Big Show, WHO has consistently reflected the values of Iowans.

A history of music radio between 1946 and 1996 told in 58 profiles of the medium's leading personalities.

This book chronicles the history of radio as technology and as media. Radio grew from a clumsy, temperamental form of wireless telegraph to a system that is so ubiquitous and easy to use that it has disappeared to users as a technology and became part of the fabric of human existence. This biography charts the growth of the technical end of radio, starting with the history of electricity, and moving through the invention of vacuum tubes, the heterodyne, FM, transistors, and microchips. But the history of radio is not just wires and electricity-it's the story of strange characters, deep thinkers, visionary mystics, hyperactive minds, ambitious souls, power hungry demagogues, and utopian humanists; all of whom strove to make radio into what they thought it should be.<BR><BR>In addition, Radio: The Life Story of a Technology looks at the technology as a cultural phenomenon, including the corporate aspects and history of the business of radio. In the middle of the 20th century people saw that radio could be used as an agent of social change, both good and bad. The transition of radio from private corporate device to public news provider to entertainment box back to political tool is at the heart of this work.

For two decades starting in 1955, millions of Americans spent their weekends listening to an extraordinary radio program--NBC's Monitor.Running continuously from Saturday morning through Sunday night, Monitor featured big-name hosts like Dave Garroway, Hugh Downs, Gene Rayburn, Ed McMahon, Henry Morgan, Barry Nelson, Joe Garagiola, Bill Cullen, Jim Lowe and Murray the K--all broadcasting from mammoth studios called "Radio Central."Monitor spotlighted a galaxy of feature reporters such as Arlene Francis, Gene Shalit, Bob Considine and Mel Allen. Comedy came from Bob and Ray, Nichols and May and Ernie Kovacs--and "Miss Monitor" gave her unforgettable weather forecasts.This is the vastly expanded, revised edition of Dennis Hart's inside look at Monitor. Included are doz