radio history at Tufts and claims of being the first broadcast station

[Donna Halper]

At 08:45 AM 11/11/2010, George Allen wrote:
>An interesting history of radio at Tufts is in the current alum 
>mag.  They say: "Not only did Tufts' radio station make the first 
>continuous radio transmission in history. It may well have been the 
>first broadcast station in the country."
>http://www.tufts.edu/alumni/magazine/fall2010/planet-tufts/good-morning.html

Umm, absolutely true on the first broadcasting station claim-- 
although they are contesting it with 8MK (WWJ) and KDKA and the 
Madison station later know as WHA.  We may never know for a fact 
which station was really first, but we do know it was NOT KDKA, 
contrary to their massive publicity dept.  As the champion of our 
little pioneering radio station 1XE (later WGI), I know for a fact 
that they were broadcasting music concerts in January 1916 (there are 
newspaper reports of it) and on the air sporadically from 1917 
onward.  I'll betcha that article in the alum mag didn't credit any 
of my research, but that's okay... 1XE/WGI was an amazing little 
station and we should all be proud of it.  It had the first woman 
announcer in New England, the late great Eunice Randall, the first 
African-American performers including the legendary stage actor 
Charles Gilpin, the first rabbi on the air (the equally late and 
great Harry Levi), and the first economist on the air (Roger Babson), 
in addition to a large amount of other important firsts.