Sports radio in the 1930s

[Garrett Wollman]

<<On Sat, 29 Oct 2011 18:18:10 -0400, "Dave Doherty" <dave@skywaves.net> said:

> I wonder how many of those stations still exist, and how many are at their 
> original sites...

[I had written:]

> At this time, Colonial was heard on WAAB (Boston), WEAN (Providence),
> WICC (Bridgeport and New Haven), WTHT (Hartford), WNLC (New London),
> WSAR (Fall River), WSPR (Springfield), WHAI (Greenfield), WBRK
> (Pittsfield), WLBZ (Bangor), WFEA (Manchester), WLLH (Lowell and
> Lawrence), WNBH (New Bedford), WATR (Waterbury), WLNH (Laconia), WRDO
> (Augusta), and WCOU (Lewiston and Auburn).

WNLC and WTHT are the only ones that no longer exist AFAIK.  WNLC was
deleted some years back, and WTHT died in 1954 when the /Hartford
Times/ got out of radio.  (Its 1230 kHz allocation was later
reactivated for a station in Manchester.)  WAAB is now in Worcester as
WVEI.

In a common practice at the time, most of the stations were affiliates
of some other network; Shepard's WAAB had Mutual, but WEAN was NBC
Blue, and WSPR appears to have been NBC Red.  Before the FCC's
chain-monopoly hearings, Shepard noted that only CBS and NBC Red had
enough programming to justify exclusivity; he said that WNAC was paid
$5000 a month in compensation for carrying NBC Red in Boston, but WEAN
received only $800 a month for carrying NBC Blue in Providence, hence
the need to supplement Blue with another network's programming.

-GAWollman