Re: "former" college stations

[umar@nerodia.wcrb.com]

On Mon, 30 Oct 2000, Garrett Wollman wrote:

> A number of the college-affiliated stations around here are under
> legally separate ownership, including both Cambridge's only commercial
> FM and Cambridge's only non-commercial FM.  People involved with both
> stations are on this list and might perhaps speak up and tell us why
> things ended up that way.

Harvard University has never been very interested in radio either as an
educational or public relations tool or as a subject of academic study.

WHRB is treated no differently than the student newspaper, the Harvard
_Crimson_ ("Cambridge's only breakfast-table daily"). In fact, the
organization that owns and operates WHRB was originally a division of the
_Crimson_ and called itself "the Harvard Crimson Network" in its infancy.
After becoming independent of the newspaper it ran a carrier-current AM
station for twelve years before applying for, and receiving, a Class A
commercial FM license, a move which the university neither supported nor
hindered. 

WHRB's move to new quarters in 1994 and to its new transmitter site a year
later was financed by contributions from station alumni (and over $50,000
from an on-air fundraiser). Today WHRB is entirely advertiser-supported as
it has been for most of its history.

--
Rob Landry
umar@nerodia.wcrb.com
"Orgy" is a registered trademark of The Harvard Radio Broadcasting
Company, Incorporated.