Category Archives: Personal History

The Tower of Power

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This week I ran into a long-time broadcaster I called on back in my affiliate relations days. We chatted for a few minutes and the subject of towers came up (I have no idea). He mentioned that he had tried to sell his AM tower but got no takers. Then he tried to give it away. Nope. Now he’s paying someone to take it down and haul it off. As far as I know, that is nothing unusual. But it struck me as somehow… foreboding?

A radio station tower is …iconic. Usually the tallest structure in small towns throughout America. You didn’t need much of a studio but you had to have that transmitter and a tower. The bigger the better.

Every radio guy I know has at least one tower story.

Like the DJ who pulled his UHaul truck into the parking lot of the station where he was to start working the next day. In the downpour, he didn’t realize he’d snagged the truck’s trailer hitch on a guy wire and pulled the tower down. And he didn’t get fired.

Or a story about the insane guys who did tower maintenance, climbing four or five-hundred feet to paint or change a bulb.

[Momentary aside: If someone drops a wrench from 400 feet above you, is it better to remain still or to run? Discuss]

What once took studios filled with control boards and tape decks and cart machines… can now be done with a couple of laptops.

The equation once was:

Good programming (content) + big transmitter + big tower + good frequency = big audience

Now it’s:

Good programming (content) + big transmitter + big tower + good frequency = big audience

I’m sorry I never interviewed one of those tower guys.

A thousand people in the street (millions online)

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molotov-cocktailI’ve been thinking about the disruptive power of the Internet. How it can undermine institutions. The record industry, publishing, and media come to mind. I’m sure I could come up with others if pressed.

I’m hoping for even more chaos. Clearly, our two party system of government is broken and I’d really like to see some chaos there. Why not three or four or more political parties? Hard to make a case that our government could be less effective than it is.

The Obama campaign really showed the power of the Internet to raise money and coordinate millions of supporters. I hope we see more of that but with the power on our end of the pipes. I have no idea how this can or might come about but the first step has to be sand in the greased gears of our two party system.

Joe Bankhead’s History of KBOA

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joebankhead

Joe Bankhead was there when radio station KBOA went on the air in 1947. One of the original employees. He recently retired (at the age of 92) and set down at his manual upright and banged out 17 pages of memories about the early days. My thanks to Joe (and his son, Jimmy) for allow us to share them here. You can hear some of Joe’s recollections in his own words (recorded in 1982)

AUDIO: Excerpt of interview with Joe Bankhead

Here’s Joe’s “History of KBOA” (PDF)

Internet service restored

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After a few misstarts, my Internet service was restored yesterday. The problem was a tiny broken wire and as I watched the tech repair it, I marveled at just how much flowed through that gossamer thread (come on, when will I get another chance to write “gossamer thread”?).

Movies, photos, TV shows, audio, conversations from a world away. It makes a boy think about the “digital divide.” Every child should have high-speed access to the net. And I believe they will. Mobile access to the Internet will continue to change the world. And for the better.