Re: radio in '22

[dan.strassberg@att.net]

So have I got this right? After WHAZ would have come 
WIAA, WIAB, and WIAC? There is or was a WIAC in San Juan 
PR, and I guess the station may be old enough to have 
gotten its calls through sequential assignment in this 
way. But what about WBBM and WICC? WBBM was allegedly a 
sequentially assigned call sign (notwithstanding the 
slogans that were made up to "explain" the call sign). 
WBBM would have come quite a while after WZAZ. I don't 
know about WICC, but those calls have been around a 
_long_ time. WICC would have been asigned quite a while 
after WZBZ, right?

Aren't there 676 two-letter combinations in our 
alphabet? To get all the way from WAAA to WZAZ by the 
method I think you're describing, I believe the FRC 
would have had to assign 676 sets of calls. And to get 
from WABA to WBBM would have taken another 39, right? 
We're up to 715. I guess I can believe that. When it 
reached WZBZ, the FRC/FCC would have made 1352 
sequential assignments. Then from WACA to WICC would 
have taken another 211 for a total of 1563.

Still possible I guess but starting to get a little 
harder to believe. Just before World War II there were 
only about 800 radio stations in the US. A lot of 
stations had gone belly up and the calls weren't reused, 
but some calls were reused. And then there were the 
ships. My head is hurting.

--
dan.strassberg@att.net
617-558-4205
eFax 707-215-6367
> <<On Wed, 07 Nov 2001 22:59:14 +0000, dan.strassberg@att.net said:
> 
> > was A in _all_ of the AM calls the FRC issued. I suppose 
> > the A was used in a failed attempt to create a 
> > distinctive sequence of calls for standard-broadcast 
> > stations to differentiate them from ships, which also 
> > used four-letter calls beginning with K and W.
> 
> No, it's simpler than that.  In the sequence of assigned four-letter
> callsigns, the third letter is the most significant digit.  So after
> WZAZ would come WABA.  The 97.3 station in Orange was originally
> assigned WFUB as a sequential callsign; I think that the sequence has
> now wrapped around.  WFUB was never used on the air, IIRC; the change
> to WJDF happened before the CP was built.
> 
> -GAWollman
>