As we previously reported, today marks the 75th anniversary of a major change in the standard AM broadcast band in North America.  At 3:00 AM on March 29, 1941, most stations in the United States and Canada moved up the dial slightly.  The broadcast band was expanded to accommodate Mexican clear channel stations, and the result was that most American and Canadian stations had to make changes to their transmitter frequency.

At the time, millions of American radio receivers had pushbutton tuning, and all of those buttons had to be reset for the new frequencies, resulting in a small boom for servicemen.  Shown above is the cover of the March 1941 issue of Radio Retailing, showing a serviceman making the change on a small table set.

The magazine stressed the fact that the change was an opportunity for dealers to make contact with customers, “an absolutely unique invitation to more more major merchandise, with the promotional expense at least partially covered by service and accessory sales.”

It noted that most dealers were charging about $1 for the service call, with higher charges in some areas. For example, the Philadelphia Radio Service Men’s Association recommended a $2 charge. Some dealers were charging $1 if the set was brought in, or $1.50 if the work was done in the customer’s home.

The magazine suggested that the service call could offer an opportunity to perform other service, such as cleaning or alignment, especially if the set had to be removed from its cabinet.

Being in the customer’s home also represented an opportunity to sell a new set or even another appliance.

The magazine’s April issue reported that the overall effects of the shift were good, with interference being eliminated in many cases. While dealers reported reports for service calls, there were not as many as expected, and there was no “service jam.” It also encouraged dealers to keep up their promotional efforts:

And a big job it is. The radio dealer’s opporunity to profit by using reallocation resetting as a stepping-stone to additional business is just beginning. 10,000,000 people with pushbutton-tuned radios can’t be contacted overnight. It will be weeks before the public becomes fully aware of what is missing through failure to have adjustments made. And it will take months of selling to induce them to do it.

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Happy Easter from OneTubeRadio.com!

The portrait of the Easter Bunny shown here comes from the cover of Manitoba Calling, April 1946, the magazine and program schedule published by CKY in Winnipeg.

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This graph provides an interesting glimpse of the state of American broadcasting 90 years ago. It appeared in the March 1926 issue of Radio Broadcast, and shows the number of stations, and their powers and frequencies, as of November 1, 1925. It shows a total of 536 stations then on the air.

The vertical axis shows the number of stations, and the horizontal axis is the frequency. The top of the broadcast band (1500 kHz) is at the left, and the bottom (550 kHz) is at the right. The most occupied channel was 1090 kHz, with 26 stations. Fourteen channels had one station of 5000 watts or more, those frequencies being 570, 580, 610, 620, 710, 720, 780, 790, 870, 920, 930, 970, 1090, and 1380 kHz.

Interestingly, the top of the dial, 1180-1480 kHz had considerably more stations. I assume that this was because the bottom of the dial was largely populated with legacy stations. 910 kHz was vacant. This frequency is the second harmonic of the most common intermediate frequency employed in most modern receivers, 455 kHz. Since there were few superhets in use at that time, I assume that 455 was later picked because 910 was vacant, rather than 910 being left vacant because of the IF’s.

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We’ve previously mentioned prolific radio author Tom Kneitel, best known by his 1960’s era call sign, K2AES.  Starting 50 years ago this month with the March 1966 issue of Electronics Illustrated, Kneitel wrote the regular column Uncle Tom’s Corner, which he continued until the magazine’s demise in 1972.

His first column carried a sidebar with a biography, calling him an “irascible misanthrope, a rabble rouser and the dirty old man of electronics.” It noted that he was the leading writer on the subject of SWL’ing who later “gave the Citizens Band its name and was instrumental in making it into the world’s most dynamic radio service.”

According to the biography, Kneitel was born in Brooklyn in 1933 and got his start in electronics as a disc jockey. He later spent six years with United Artists, “selling 16mm films in–of all places–Greenland and Liberia.” In 1966, he had lived in New York, Florida, California, and Oklahoma. It noted that he drove a Jaguar and had a bloodhound named Zelda.

Kneitel had earlier held the calls K3FLL and WB2AAI. Prior to his death in 2008, he was W4XAA.

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In an earlier post, we covered WMBB radio, which broadcast from the Trianon Ballroom, the “World’s Most Beautiful Ballroom” from 1925 to 1928. Shown here is more of the station’s on air talent, Lola Schofield. This picture appeared in the March 13, 1926, issue of Radio Digest, which noted that she helped make the station’s programs pleasant with her dramatic soprano voice. The station concluded its broadcasts with the cast singing, “W-M-B-B Chi-ca-go,” an early example of a station jingle.

Shown below is more of the station’s talent, “Dell Lampe’s Syncopators,” which, according to the caption, could always be depended upon to provide lively dance music.

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The 1941 issue of the Radio Handbook carried this ad for the Meissner Model 9-1081 2-1/2 Meter Transceiver.

This portable transceiver covered the 2-1/2 meter band, 110-120 MHz, and was reportedly built to withstand the abuse of portable service. It contained a compartment for microphone, headphone, and log book, and ad a built-in telescoping antenna.

The set measured twelve inches high, eleven inches wide, and 6-1/4 inches deep. It weighed 13 pounds without batteries.

Few details were given in the ad, and I haven’t been able to find any reference to a surviving example of this early portable. I suspect that the set was similar to the 5 meter transceiver I wrote about earlier, in that it probably used the same tube as both a superregenerative receiver and transmitter.

A later ad shows the price as $34.50.

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This advertisement from the March 1936 issue of Radio Today shows a Zenith car radio.

The ad touts Zenith as producing “America’s safest auto radio,” and details some of the safety features. The tuning and volume controls are mounted on the steering column to keep the driver from having to fumble with the actual radio, which would be mounted somewhere else under the dash.

The dial pointer on the large “safety dial” was illuminated, but only when the dial was actually being turned. The dial was viewable at any angle, with never any glare to blind the driver.

The ad in this trade publication was directed at dealers, and reminded them that this radio sold fast!

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