Chicago share timers

[Russ Butler]

Three, 250watt stations shared the broadcast day in Chicago from 1928 to 
1997.  They were all first on 1210AM, then beginning in 1941, shared 1240AM.

WSBC started in 1923 by the Silvertone Battery Company, later World 
Battery Company, makers of batteries for radio power before 
electricity.  (The Atlass Brothers also made batteries for radios when 
they started Chicago's WBBM in 1911 with the slogan "World's Best 
Battery Maker" W=B=B=M)  Broadcast tower for WSBC 1Kw signal is still at 
4949 W. Belmont Ave.

WEDC started in 1926 by The Emil Denemark Cadillac dealership to 
advertise their cars at Ogden and Cermak.  Their broadcast time was from 
Midnight to 8 a.m. (nighttime only) with a deejay in the showroom with 
turntables who took phone requests for records from the nurses and 
flight attendants living in an apartment complex across the street.  
Just for fun, he occasionally tooted the Cadillac's horn in the showroom 
when a caller won a onair contest! Transmitter was on top of the 
dealership.

Incidentally as an aside and somewhat comparable - WEBH-FM returned to 
Chicago's Edgewater Beach Hotel in the mid-1950's with "fishbowl" 
studios in the elegant lobby of the hotel (I worked onair there as hotel 
guests gawked in the window) with transmitter on the hotel's roof.  
Originally, WEBH 810AM started in 1924 to broadcast dance bands in the 
same hotel location until 1929 - and, Amos 'n Andy got their start as 
"Sam and Henry" at the WEBH hotel studios before they went to WMAQ-NBC.

WCRW was started by Clinton R. White (W=C=R=W) and his wife, Josephine 
also in 1926 to broadcast the live orchestras who played on the roof top 
of their Pine Grove Apartments where they lived at 2756 N. Pine Grove.  
The transmitter tower was on the roof  with 100watts of power, originally. 

Their shared time was a divided day with WSBC, each had some daytime 
hours and nighttime hours to broadcast programs 8 a.m. until Midnight. 
Josephine was the only deejay in the 1920's and 30's and did the office 
work, while Clinton sold advertising and did the technical work.  He 
died in the 1950's during a meeting on the roof about his transmitter 
and tower improvements, and Josephine died in 1990 at age 90.  In later 
years, she would take the elevator to the penthouse where WCRW was 
located wearing slippers and a housecoat and nobody thought anything 
about it, it was "their radio station" after all!

WSBC bought out the other share time stations in 1997 and all were 
programming ethnic shows by then and all were broadcasting 1Kw.

=Russ Butler  songbook2@comcast.net