The firsts in broadcasting...

[Garrett Wollman <wollman>]

I recently added to the Archives a new Donna Halper essay about John
Shepard's involvement in early FM in New England.  I took the liberty
of subtitling this ``America's first FM network'', which I believe to
be true.  But it got me to thinking about some of the other firsts,
some of which we know ad some of which we don't...

Of the ones we know (these are all US-only):

KQW, San Jose -- first station to keep a regular broadcast schedule.
KDKA, Pittsburgh -- first station to receive a commercial license.
	(Curiously enough, this license had yet to be issued when KDKA
	made its famous first broadcast.  WWJ also broadcast the
	election returns that night, but was also operating under an
	experimental license.  1XE, later to become WGI, had been
	operating for about a year, and Marconi's XWA in Montreal even
	longer.)
WBZ, Springfield -- first station to receive a *broadcast* license.
WGI, Medford Hillside -- first station in Greater Boston

The ones we don't:

- - WHA, Madison has some claim at being the first, but of what?
- - Armstrong's W2XMN, Alpine, was presumably the first licensed FM
station, but which was the first non-experimental-licensed FM?  What
is the oldest still extant?
- - Which station was the first to do VHF-AM, and when did they finally
give it up?
- - What is the oldest extant TV license?
- - What is the oldest FM station in the non-commercial band?  TV
non-comm?
- - When did WWJ receive its commercial license?

- -GAWollman

- --
Garrett A. Wollman   | O Siem / We are all family / O Siem / We're all the same
wollman@lcs.mit.edu  | O Siem / The fires of freedom 
Opinions not those of| Dance in the burning flame
MIT, LCS, CRS, or NSA|                     - Susan Aglukark and Chad Irschick

------------------------------