J.J. Jackson at WTUR

[Dan Strassberg]

And don't forget the apparently true stories about train tracks and a
real-live 50-kW AM--KBOI 670 Boise ID, whose night signal used to be
legendary--until the owners of KIRN paid for a whole new DA that protects
the Simi Valley station. Now, I guess that KIRN can't officially be owned by
Iranians because I believe owners of US stations must be either US citizens
or entities controlled by US citizens, but surely whoever owns KIRN must
somehow be connected to Iran. That's got to be good for some great
conspiracy theories and urban legends.

--
Dan Strassberg, dan.strassberg@att.net
eFax 707-215-6367

----- Original Message -----
From: "Scott Fybush" <scott@fybush.com>
To: "Garrett Wollman" <wollman@csail.mit.edu>
Cc: <boston-radio-interest@rolinin.BostonRadio.org>
Sent: Tuesday, April 03, 2007 1:01 AM
Subject: Re: J.J. Jackson at WTUR


> Garrett Wollman wrote:
> > <<On Mon, 02 Apr 2007 23:58:59 -0400, "A. Joseph Ross"
<joe@attorneyross.com> said:
> >
> >> Is this actually technically possible?  Making the entire length of
> >> the tracks an antenna sounds rather like the old ads about the gadget
> >> that makes all of your house wiring an antenna.
> >
> > That's a complicated question, because it depends on the nature of
> > the tracks and the signaling system in use on the particular
> > railroad.  But in general, I would agree with your doubts.  Railroad
> > tracks are generally grounded (at least at the frequencies we're
> > talking about) but not as well as a proper AM ground system (or even a
> > proper electrical ground system).
>
> There is, further, a common urban myth of this kind at just about every
> college radio station that began as a carrier-current operation and had
> train tracks in plausible proximity. I even heard it about WLDB, the
> predecessor to WBRS, and anyone familiar with the Brandeis campus knows
> that it's quite the haul from the area where the studios would have been
> to the commuter-rail tracks south of campus.
>
> Did the myth originate from a real event at Tufts? I suppose that's
> possible.
>
> (And is it tied to the urban legend that a certain low-power AM outlet
> in the Boston area achieves its unusually good signal by hooking its
> ground system to the city water pipes?)
>
> s