[QuadList] Happy 90th birthday, Columbia Broadcasting System--WTOP-AM, FM and TV, Washington--Details that may surprise you!

Mon Sep 18 22:11:02 CDT 2017

Steve, you had the pleasure of working for WTOP-TV in the original Broadcast House atop Mount Reno when Channel 9 was wholly owned by Post-Newsweek, the Washington Post broadcast division created when the Post’s owners bought Newsweek magazine and its television stations.

You were there three years after the first Quad VTRs arrived in January, 1960, and 58 years this month since WTOP announced in September, 1959 that it would install videotape recorders, according to Royce Fish as noted by QuadList member and broadcast historian James Snyder in a webpage linked below.

I’ve not been able to find any trade press announcements or other indication of what brand, but it may be safe to assume Ampex, since CBS had purchased Ampex machines for the network and its other Owned stations/

Steve: Can you shed light on what was in place in 1963?  Do you have pictures?

CBS had a 45 percent interest in WTOP AM, FM and TV from June, 1950 to October 1954.  A month after it “bought in,” to the television station ownership, WTOP-TV got the first license to broadcast the CBS-developed 405-line field sequential color.

CBS sold its interests the WTOP radio and TV operations to comply with limits on the number of AM stations it could own… which was seven at the time.  

CBS acquired the radio station in 1931, after realizing the deal they’d made to have a primary affiliated station in the Washington, D. C . area put them “in bed” with a faction of the Klu Klux Klan.  A faction that was involved with taking over Republican Party organizations in Brooklyn, NY, among other places.

Read QuadList member James Snyder’s 2002 history behind what was originally WTRC, Brooklyn, NY,  how it moved to Virginia and became the CBS affiliate  for DC.
http://home.earthlink.net/~hdtv/History/Stations/WJSVhistory.html

See more of James’s work including Washington Post and New York Times items from 1937, 1928 here:
http://dcmemories.com/wjsv/WJSVHistory.html

DC public Public Television station WETA noted the background in this 2015 item:
https://blogs.weta.org/boundarystones/2015/01/13/klan-leaves-its-mark-washingtons-airwaves

The FCC History cards on the station can be found here:
https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/getimportletter_exh.cgi?import_letter_id=67712&.pdf <https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/getimportletter_exh.cgi?import_letter_id=67712&.pdf>

As WJSV, the station recorded a complete day of broadcasting on Thursday, September 21, 1939, using 38, double-sided 16” transcription discs.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WJSV_broadcast_day
https://www.loc.gov/programs/static/national-recording-preservation-board/documents/WJSV.pdf

You can listen to the broadcasts here:
http://xroads.virginia.edu/%7E1930s2/radio/day/radio.html

This broadcast and 54 other recordings were named to the 2003 National Recording Registry, aimed at preserving to preserve recordings that are considered "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”
Here is the list of nominees to the NRR: https://www.loc.gov/item/prn-04-061/

WTOP-FM began as an FM station co-owned with the Washington Post’s WINX AM.  The story of the FM station and development of WTOP-TV are chronicled in this RadioWorld story from February, 2010 by QuadList member James O’Neal:

http://www.radioworld.com/columns-and-views/0004/the-39insideout39-antenna-installation/322644

More about WTOP-TV (now TEGNA-owned WUSA) here:

Here’s James Snyder’shistory of WTOP in 1993 and 1998 while at The American University. 
http://home.earthlink.net/~hdtv/History/WTOP/WTOP-TV1.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WUSA_(TV)

Among the people who worked at WTOP-TV in its early years:
Walter Cronkite
Sam Donaldson
Andrea Mitchell
Max Robinson
Warner Wolf (who created his signature line “Lets go to the videotape” when the director didn’t catch the cue several times.  It got the director’s attention, and he told Wolf to keep doing that.)
Arthur Godfrey

WTOP-TV.net blog maintained by Lee Shephard, announcer there from 1961-69:
http://www.wtoptv.net

More about WTOP-AM, 1500 (now Hubbard-owned WFED)
 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WFED.  

WFED has a three-tower directional array in the Wheaton section of Silver Spring, Maryland on University Blvd. West adjacent to Amherst Ave <https://www.google.com/maps/place/39%C2%B002'31.0%22N+77%C2%B002'47.0%22W/@39.0419231,-77.0476041,575m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x0!8m2!3d39.041944!4d-77.046389?hl=en>.  to pump 50KW up and down the east coast, and protect Hubbard-owned KSTP-AM, Minneapolis-St. Paul. 

I remember being quite surprised to see these have these towers reveal themselves as I came around a bend on University in the late winter afternoon when visiting DC on business. The orangey glow of the low-angle sun created a warm impression as it heightened the color of the tower’s red paint and tinted the Art-Deco  transmitter building.

The Library of Congress has a number of vintage photos of the then-WJSV transmitter facility that CBS built in Wheaton, MD as part of the deal it made with the station’s Klu Klux Klan affiliated ownership.
https://www.loc.gov/search/?in=&q=WJSV&new=true&st=

Here’s a special section of the Washington Post on March 3, 1940 regarding the new transmitter facility:
http://lookoutlee.blogspot.com/2003/06/just-yesterday.html along James’ history of WTOP-AM.

Trivia questions:  	What department store owned stations on channel 9 in two major East Coast markets?

					The illuminated “9” logo number from the original WTOP Broadcast House is owned by one of our members.  Whom? 

Cheers,

Ted

Ted Langdell
Secretary, Quad Videotape Group
ted at QuadVideotapeGroup.com <mailto:ted at QuadVideotapeGroup.com>
+1 (530) 301-2931
www.QuadVideotapeGroup.com <http://www.quadvideotapegroup.com/>
https://www.facebook.com/QuadVideotapeGroup <https://www.facebook.com/QuadVideotapeGroup>

> On Sep 18, 2017, at 3:05 PM, Steve White via QuadList <quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com> wrote:
> 
> From: Steve White <steve at 800callnow.com>
> Subject: Re: [QuadList] Happy 90th birthday, Columbia Broadcasting System
> Date: September 18, 2017 at 3:05:25 PM PDT
> To: Quad List <quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com>, Ted Langdell <ted at quadvideotapegroup.com>
> 
> 
> Thanks, Ted.  Good stuff.
> 
> My first job was at WTOP-TV, in 1963.  The station provided production facilities for all CBS television originating from DC...studio and remote.  It was a great place to be in '63.
> 
> Steve
> 
> On September 18, 2017 5:54:23 PM John M via QuadList <quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com> wrote:
> 
>> 
>> RE: Happy 90th birthday, Columbia Broadcasting System
>> From	John M <john at jmit.com.au>
>> Date	Sep 18, 5:54 PM
>> To	'Ted Langdell' <Ted at quadvideotapegroup.com>, quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com
>> 
>> 
>> Regarding CBS, they have recently acquired the TEN / WIN network here in OZ. It covers capital cities and eastern Australia. Hopefully they do a better ob programming wise than the last lot.
>>  
>> John Miller
>> Rocky River
>> NSW
>> Australia
>> 0477 083 730
>> john at jmit.com.au
>>  
>> 
>> From: Ted Langdell [mailto:Ted at quadvideotapegroup.com] 
>> Sent: Tuesday, 19 September 2017 01:18
>> To: quadlist at quadvideotapegroup.com
>> Subject: Happy 90th birthday, Columbia Broadcasting System
>> 
>> Today is the 90th anniversary of the Columbia Phonographic Broadcasting System's first broadcast.
>> 
>> Back then, that meant radio. Today's CBS Corporation is shedding its radio arm in a merger with Pennsylvania based Entercom. 
>> 
>> It's a complicated business "dance" that takes 300 pages to describe in SEC filings. 
>> 
>> http://www.insideradio.com/free/entercom-reveals-step-by-step-details-of-merger-with-cbs/article_08d9feb8-201c-11e7-a770-278ebffd1579.html <http://www.insideradio.com/free/entercom-reveals-step-by-step-details-of-merger-with-cbs/article_08d9feb8-201c-11e7-a770-278ebffd1579.html>
>> 
>> 10 years from now, will CBS radio hold a 100th anniversary celebration?
>> 
>> And will CBS television try to assert that it is 100 years old?
>> 
>> CBS television's first broadcast was July 1st of 1941.
>> 
>> You can read more about the companies'business and broadcast history here...
>> 
>> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/CBS <https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/CBS>
>> 
>> ... Including its growth from a 16 station chain founded by a New York talent agent, purchase by The manufacturer of Columbia Records  and Columbia Phonographs, and how William S. Paley became a controlling owner and grew the company into a major broadcast entity.
>> 
>> Along the way, the company has had involvement with program production, equipment development and manufacturing (CBS Labs, HyTron,) and publishing.
>> 
>> It's had a variety of controlling ownership, including William S Paley, who brought Paramont pictures into a 49% ownership position, and then built the radio network into a powerhouse that enabled Columbia to buy back the stock from Paramount.
>> 
>> CBS's history is an interesting read. 
>> 
>> Happy 90th Anniversary. We may not get to wish you 💯. 
>> 
>> We now return you to your regularly scheduled activity.
>> 
>> Ted
>> 
>> Ted Langdell
>> Secretary, Quad Videotape Group
>> Ted at quadvideotapegroup.com <mailto:Ted at quadvideotapegroup.com>
>> (530)301-2931
>> 
>> Dictated into and Sent from my iPhone, which is solely responsible for any weird stuff I didn't catch.
>> 
> 
> 
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