casting System bought KQW, changed its call and Reuben - to install a station in that store to KCBS, and the station was established as a and let him operate it. The first program was on major outlet in . the air on April 17, 1922. In 1968, KCBS began broadcasting news In 1924, KFRC began broadcasting with an only. Today it continues to be the primary radio exceptionally strong signal, heard on the East news source for millions of listeners daily. coast, Hawaii, Alaska, even New Zealand. Yet its transmitter was considered "relatively low - Broadcasting Grows powered" and its antennas only modest. Engi- neers studied the phenomenon, could not agree But back in the early 1920s in San Francisco, on why the signal was so powerful, but decided other radio stations were also going on the air. that perhaps the building which housed the sta- Famed electronics inventor Lee De Forest started 6XC, later known as KZY. His station tion, the Whitcomb Hotel, might have been situ- ated on land that was an ideal ground - that is, went on the air in May 1920, six months before connection with the earth. KDKA, that station so widely believed to be the One of KFRC's announcers, Dean Maddox first. De Forest's station featured three half-hour concerts a day. Music was by a theater organist- also known as "Buddha" - became my idol. One day I watched him present one of his many and by Hermann Heller's Symphony Orchestra. man -on -the -street interviews. Afterwards, I Another pioneering San Francisco station, asked him for an autograph. I was but a child KDN, started broadcasting in June 1921, as 6XG. and had no paper or pen with me. He smiled It was one of the first of several radio stations broadly, signed the script for a commercial he'd that transmitted from the Fairmont Hotel, ideal just delivered, and gave it to me. for broadcasting because of its location atop of KFRC aired many performers who became San Francisco's Nob Hill. Former ship's radio Carleton E. Morse, reviewing bound copies of famous, including Don Wilson, well-known later officer Alan Cormack was hired to be the on -air some of the scripts he wrote for such programs as Jack Benny's announcer. Other voices heard personality. He played music on an old wind-up as "One Man's Family" and "1 Love a Mys- in the early days of that station were Morey phonograph that had to be rewound frequently. tery." "1 Love Adventure," "Adventures by Amsterdam, Ben Benederet - well-known fe- Another early radio station in San Francisco Morse," and "NBC Mystery Serial." Morse male announcer - Ralph Edwards, Mery Grif- was KPO, started by former Navy radioman Joe died May 24, 1993, in Sacramento, CA, at age fin, Art Linkletter, John Nesbitt, and Harold Martineau. He convinced the owners of Hale Peary. 92. Brothers Department Store - Francis, Marshall,

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December 2000 MONITORING TIMES 23