Directional ex-Class IA AMs

[Dan.Strassberg]

Years, but since they were three-letter calls, there was no worry
about someone else getting them. The problem was satisfying the FCC
that Westinghouse should get them back. Westinghouse started WJZ but
no longer owned it when the calls were changed to WABC. And the new
WJZ was a TV station not a radio station and was in Baltimore, not
Newark or New York City. Only recently did the WJZ calls return to AM
(in Baltimore).

-----
Dan Strassberg (dan.strassberg@att.net)
eFax 1-707-215-6367

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <vzeej5wn@myfairpoint.net>
To: "Dan.Strassberg" <dan.strassberg@att.net>; "A. Joseph Ross"
<joe@attorneyross.com>
Cc: "'Boston Radio Interest'"
<boston-radio-interest@rolinin.BostonRadio.org>
Sent: Wednesday, November 25, 2009 9:10 AM
Subject: Re: Directional ex-Class IA AMs


> How long were the WJZ calls mothballed before Westinghouse reclaimed
> them for Channel 13 in Baltimore?   -Doug
>
>
> Quoting "A. Joseph Ross" <joe@attorneyross.com>:
>> On 24 Nov 2009 at 7:54, Dan.Strassberg wrote:
>>
>> > Yes, but better to say 660 became WNBC and 880 became WCBS in
>> > November
>> > 1946, because nearly everybody who sees WABC immediately thinks
>> > of
>> > 770, which did not switch its calls from WJZ to WABC until
>> > several
>> > years after 880 gave up the WABC calls. What confusion there
>> > would
>> > have been if there had been a three-way call sign change in New
>> > York
>> > on the same day in November 1946! But this does bring up the
>> > question
>> > of what became of the WABC calls after 880 gave them up. I wonder
>> > whether anyone had yet thought of "warehousing" calls back in the
>> > 1940s. I suspect somebody had already done that, although I know
>> > of no
>> > examples. Was it pure luck that the WABC call sign was unused
>> > after
>> > the Blue Network changed its name to ABC and wanted the WABC
>> > calls for
>> > its New York City O&O? Or had somebody taken the calls, requiring
>> > the
>> > newly renamed network to pay them off in order to transfer them
>> > to 770
>> > in New York? And if the WABC calls were in use when ABC Inc
>> > wanted
>> > them for 770 in New York, who had the calls at that time? The
>> > answers
>> > to those questions might make some great radio trivia.
>>
>> Indeed it would.
>> The oldest example of warehousing call letters that I know of is
>> when
>> WNBC became WRCA, and the WNBC calls were put on channel 30 in
>> Connecticut.  I assume that was an attempt to warehouse the calls.
>> And another bit of radio/TV trivia would be why RCA/NBC decided to
>> change WNBC to WRCA and its Los Angeles station to KRCA.  And then
>> why the decided to change back.  Anyone know anything they can
>> share?
>>
>> -- A. Joseph Ross, J.D.                           617.367.0468
>>  92 State Street, Suite 700                   Fax 617.507.7856
>> Boston, MA 02109-2004
>> http://www.attorneyross.com
>>
>>
>
>
>