Re: "The Radio Rabbi" and early remotes

[Rob Landry <umar@nerodia.wcrb.com>]

On Fri, 15 Oct 1999, Donna Halper wrote:

> Perhaps some of the engineers on this list can explain something to 
> me.  WNAC back then was on Winter Place, which I gather was across from 
> where the Park Street "T" station is today.  In order for WNAC to run 
> remote lines all the way from downtown Boston out to the Boston University 
> area, how would they have done it?  I mean, that's a fairly long distance 
> for 1924.

I wonder what the actual cable mileage is from Park Street to B.U. I'm
guessing it was done with two runs of perhaps a couple miles each (one
from Park Street to a telephone company central office; another from the
central office to B.U.).  Analog telephone transmission technology didn't
advance very much from the twenties until the digital era; they would have
used passive equalizers at the end of each run to compensate for the
natural high-frequency roll-off in the lines by attenuating the bass and
midrange to match, then they would have used an amplifier to bring the
signal back up to standard level.

The classic Western Electric 111C repeat coils (now highly coveted for
their sonic quality) and KS-20159 equalizers date from the 1930's, I
think; I'm not sure what their predecessors were.


Rob Landry
umar@nerodia.wcrb.com