Re: WHDH and Blue/ 1956

[Dan Strassberg <dan.strassberg@worldnet.att.net>]

At 09:00 PM 6/17/99 -0400, you wrote:
>
>"President Roosevelt pressed a button in his study in the White House
>last night as a signal for the opening of radio station WNEW, which will
>operate on a full-time basis with a transmitter at Carlstadt, N.J.  The
>new station represents a consolidation of WODA of Paterson, N.J., and
>WAAM of Newark."  (New York Times, 2/14/34)
>
>In other articles published prior to opening night, the Times saw fit to
>print the following facts:  424-foot tower in Carlstadt, main studio at
>Broad Street in Newark with auxiliary studio at 501 Madison Avenue in
>NYC

>Listings in the 1941 and 1945 Radio Annuals make it look like the calls
>and formats moved but the owners stayed with their frequencies, Wadaam
>on 1280 and the Greater New York Broadcasting Corp. on 1130.
>
>The '45 Radio Annual has WNEW on 1130 with 10-kw transmitter at
>Belleville Turnpike, Kearney, N.J., and WOV on 1280 with 5 kw from
>Carlstadt.
>
I remember that when I was a kid in New York in the 40s, WOV on 1280 was
owned by Wodaam Corp and had its TX in Carlstadt. In fact, at one point, the
station tried to change its COL from New York to Carlstadt. The FCC did not
approve, and the station began identifying as WOV New York and Carlstadt, a
practice it abandoned within a few years. I always wondered about the name
Wodaam (sounded Dutch). You've straightened me out on that; Wodaam came from
WODA and WAAM. WOV (now WADO--curious, huh? It seems that the calls went,
over many years, from WODA to WADO, by way of WOV. I don't think the WADO
calls had anything to do with the WODA calls. The initial format after the
call-sign change was Black oriented and the slogan was--Heaven help
me--Radio Way-Dee-Oh. The change to Spanish-language programming followed
very quickly--along with a name change to the current Rah-dee-oh Wah-doo. In
any event, WOV shared time with a Newark Station, WHBI, which operated on
Sundays only. WHBI used 2.5 kW-D/1 kW-N ND-U from a different TX site. WHBI
was owned by Hoyt Brothers Inc and had a Black gospel format. I believe that
the change from WOV to WADO coincided with WHBI's move to FM (105.9), which
allowed 1280 in New York to become a full-time station for the first time in
my memory. I suspect that this last change took place in the early 50s--at
about the time I went off to college.

- -------------------------------
Dan Strassberg (Note: Address is CASE SENSITIVE!)
ALL _LOWER_ CASE!!!--> dan.strassberg@worldnet.att.net
(617) 558-4205; Fax (617) 928-4205

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