RoddyFreeman
Walk of Fame Participant
I meant to post this yesterday, which was WSB's 95th birthday. The station signed on March 15th, 1922.
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WSB's 95th Birthday
- Thread starter RoddyFreeman
- Start date
Here is a link to the history of the station's first 50 years:
WSB 50th Anniversary
secondchoice
Star Participant
here is the FCC history cards on WSB:
https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/p...ortletter_exh.cgi?import_letter_id=66984&.pdf
they take a little time to download.
I believe the address was 4111 Lavista Road Tucker then in 1930 they had a CP to move to the corner of Chandler and Glenwood roads. I am not sure if LaVista go renumbered. Some counties renumbered almost everything when they did 911.
It is kind of weird that WSB started on 700. I mentally always associate 700 with Cincinnati. They were on 630 in 1927 then 740 before the big reallocation in 1941.
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Thanx. That's where I found the picture of their "new" 5k transmitter in the East Lake area with no address, so I'm still lookin'
WSB was owned by The Atlanta Journal. Their competitor, The Atlanta Constitution, put WGM on the air just two days later. WGM didn't make it and was given to Georgia Tech in 1923 as WBBF, which renamed it WGST in 1925. I would like to find some detailed history about that one; Wikipefia says WGM was licensed from experimental station 4FT which was "on the air" before WSB.
Maybe the downtown library has an old copy of The Atlanta Constitution. Hmmmm. (I guess someday my curiosity will increase enough to make the trip downtown and play in the Atlanta traffic, which has become a blood sport.)
Or maybe you guys can help (plueeese
Thanks. We were posting at the same time
RoddyFreeman
Walk of Fame Participant
The Lavista Road address is the current site.
thegrhof
Regular Participant
More info
In 2008 Mike Kavanagh passed away and left the original WSBHISTORY.COM website to the Georgia Radio Hall of Fame for preservation and maintenance. Mike was one of our founding board members. He is a 2009 Legacy inductee. We partnered with the Georgia State University Library's Special Collections department to merge their vast holdings with everything Mike passed on to us. The result is here . It is a work in progress as we have hundreds of artifacts and memorabilia which are being cataloged. Slowly but surely the never before see material is being posted, however, all the archives are available for researchers and families of former and present WSB employees. There is also a large amount of material on our website under Georgia Stations/Atlanta
In 2008 Mike Kavanagh passed away and left the original WSBHISTORY.COM website to the Georgia Radio Hall of Fame for preservation and maintenance. Mike was one of our founding board members. He is a 2009 Legacy inductee. We partnered with the Georgia State University Library's Special Collections department to merge their vast holdings with everything Mike passed on to us. The result is here . It is a work in progress as we have hundreds of artifacts and memorabilia which are being cataloged. Slowly but surely the never before see material is being posted, however, all the archives are available for researchers and families of former and present WSB employees. There is also a large amount of material on our website under Georgia Stations/Atlanta
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Thanks for sharing that, David! Take the time to read this...it is absolutely fascinating!!
Thanks for "adopting" Mike's old site and updating it. I have enjoyed reading the histories of many of the stations I grew up with as a Georgia native. I appreciate all the work your organization does to honor, and appreciate Georgia radio stations and personalities.
That was interesting. I particularly liked the picture of the WSB truck that listed WSB's three media:
WSB
TV - CHANNEL 8
AM - 750 KC
FM - CHANNEL 283 (that was 104.5).
Never knew that FM ever used the channel numbers as a public dial location (vs. technical and legal uses like by the FCC for translator call signs).
RoddyFreeman
Walk of Fame Participant
The STL tower behind the WSB broadcast complex once held the antennas for channel 8 and 104.5, the original WSB-FM.
K
kf4rca
Guest
Ch8 was the old WCON...
that later became WXIA. When the Atlanta Journal and the Atlanta Constitution newspapers merged, one of the TV's had to be sold off. It later moved to Ch11 and ch 8 was reallocated to public broadcasting. Thats the story as I heard it.
that later became WXIA. When the Atlanta Journal and the Atlanta Constitution newspapers merged, one of the TV's had to be sold off. It later moved to Ch11 and ch 8 was reallocated to public broadcasting. Thats the story as I heard it.
Picking a nit...
WXIA was never channel 8. But the station that became WXIA (after stints as WQXI-TV, WAII, and WLWA, better known as Crosley's WLW-A to tip the hat to The Big One) was channel 8. I think it moved from 8 to 11 in the Crosley era.
It moved due to interference with WROM Channel 9 in Rome, which later moved to Chattanooga.
OK, let’s get this right….
• WSB (Atlanta Journal) signed on 9/29/48 on channel 8.
• WCON (Atlanta Constitution) had a CP for channel 2, but never hit the air because the newspapers merged in 1950.
• WSB then chose to move to channel 2 in 1951.
• Then, on 9/30/51, channel 8 signed on again as WLTV.
• In 1953, WLTV changed to WLWA.
• Also, in 1953, WROM signed on in Rome as channel 9 and mostly covered the Chattanooga market.
• Channels 8 and 9 caused interference with each other, so to over-compensate, the FCC, in 1953, moved WLWA to channel 11 and reduced WROM’s power – declaring Rome (and all North Georgia) to be part of the Atlanta market.
• As a result, WROM lost its network affiliation(s), tried being independent, went dark in 1957, moved to Chattanooga, and signed on again 2/11/58 as WTVC/channel 9 (ABC). This solved a problem with channel 9 in Columbus and opened up the channel 8 allocation in North Georgia.
• WLWA became WAII, then WQXI, then WXIA – all on channel 11.
• On 5/23/60, WGTV in Athens signed on the air on channel 8.
Oh, yeah … WXIA swapped network affiliations with WSB in 1980 and moved into the WATL (channel 36) studios in 2008. Channel 36 was WQXI in 1954-55.
Gotta love the Atlanta market.
K
kf4rca
Guest
Which one carried the Dumont network-the original 4th network?
WAGA Channel 5 was a part-time DuMont affiliate. It was also a part-time ABC affiliate until WLTV hit the air.
Interesting because many of the old DuMont affiliates later picked up Fox (although WAGA switched from CBS to Fox when and because it became a Fox O&O).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WAGA-TV
K
kf4rca
Guest
Dumont was absorbed into the ABC network. Dumont was most famous for sports and game shows.
Mike_Rafone
Frequent Participant
"Trusty",
Did you mean 64-65 for WQXI-TV? And what was the original call for Channel 46?
Did you mean 64-65 for WQXI-TV? And what was the original call for Channel 46?
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