Re: the real "all girl station" and WNAC history

[Donna Halper <dlh@donnahalper.com>]

Dan wrote:
>Did the letters WNAC stand for anything? I didn't think so. If that's the
>case, has your research on Shepard revealed why he wanted WNAC and why WNAB
>wasn't just as good in his mind? As far as I know, the National Association
>of Broadcasters didn't yet exist, so there was no conflict with the initials
>of the broadcasters' organization. Though, later on, when the NAB _did_
>exist, didn't Shepart pull out of it as a result of some grievance with the
>organization?. Also, didn't he change the calls of WASN to WAAB at some
>point?

Dan's point is a good one, but interestingly, the NAB absolutely DID exist 
and Shepard was one of its founders.  But the call letters WNAB pre-dated 
it by a year, so I guess they never complained. (The NAB was founded in mid 
1923.)  WNAC was a sequentially assigned call-- the station actually went 
on the air in late July of 1922 before it ever got call letters.  My theory 
is it used the ham calls of its chief engineer Irv Robinson, because no 
calls were assigned till September.  Until then, even the newspapers just 
called it the "Shepard Store station."  But in mid September of 1922, it 
was assigned WNAC.

WASN lasted about 6 months, became WBIS (Boston's information source) and 
then folded into WNAC around 1930.  As for WAAB, that was purchased by 
Shepard in 1931-- it was the old WLEX in Lexington, Carl Wheeler's station.

Dan also wrote--
>Was
>that the reason Shepard chose WAAB? I guess being first alphabetically is a
>nice distinction. (If potential advertisers used the Yellow Pages to find
>radio stations, WAAB would have been first on the list.) But, I don't think
>the letters WAAB stood for anything. (The calls might have stood for We're
>Always the Absolute Best, but I don't think they did.)

WAAB was also an assigned call.  Shepard always came up with good sales 
slogans, but first he had to see what the FCC gave him.  It's interesting 
that he never asked for (or at least never received) assigned calls for his 
initials.  WASN and WBIS seem to have been requested, but he never asked 
for WAJS (John Shepard) the way a few owners asked for stations with their 
initials...