As we chatted over lunch in the dining hall at Bowdoin College on a late August afternoon, Mason Daugherty, one of the Station Managers of college radio station WBOR-FM, said quick “hellos” to friends who he hadn’t seen in months. The verdant campus in Brunswick, Maine was coming to life, as students were beginning to arrive for orientation training and athletic activities. Daugherty had been there all summer, working at a job nearby and tending to the radio station at the small liberal arts college. Time was of the essence for my visit, as this fall is WBOR’s final semester in its home in the Dudley Coe basement.
WBOR’s Cozy Basement Home in Dudley Coe
Tucked away in the back of Dudley Coe, WBOR is accessed by descending a short set of concrete steps. As the front door opens, a soft glow emanates from a variety of sources, including string lighting, a shaded swing arm lamp, a pink neon sign, audio equipment, and a red, yellow, and green traffic light perched on a shelf. The typical college-issued harsh overhead fluorescent bulbs have been turned off and the subdued lighting sets the tone as both an inviting and relaxing space. A lounge area is outfitted with comfy chairs, an area rug, coffee table, and customized throw pillows with a cassette tape-themed WBOR logo.
The station walls are covered with posters, flyers, stickers, and handwritten notes and drawings from DJs past and present. While some of these musings were clearly scribbled for shock value (“I love boobs”), others hint at the intellectual pursuits of their authors. From existential crises (“You can send me to college, but you can’t make me think”) to short stories-in-the-making (“I feel like my mom doing heroin in the 90s”), to bittersweet love notes memorializing Bowdoin and WBOR (“Goodbye WBOR I mean Dudley Coe the only non sterile space on campus here’s to everything that has disappeared but meant everything at a time”); the prose on all the station spaces would take hours to fully document.
Music and Ephemera at WBOR
Decorative beads hang from a doorway that leads from the lounge into a room bordered by music. Vinyl records and CDs are stashed in shelves and drawers throughout the station, while fake flowers, plastic figurines, a lava lap, and other ephemera add to the funky atmosphere. There’s an Apples in Stereo painting by prolific artist Steve Keene (a college radio staple!) in one of the studios and a metal cabinet in the bathroom is like a 1990s (and earlier) time capsule, covered with a faded Del Rubio Triplets album cover and stickers from Buffalo Daughter, Komeda, Superchunk, Spiritualized and other bands of the era.
Modern Technology in the College Radio Station Studio
The large broadcast studio has a vintage “on-air” light hanging over the entrance and I was told by Mason that it is an antique from the station’s early days. Inside the studio are modern additions, including an interface that Mason had designed, allowing DJs to easily play through a series of station announcements. Computer monitors display station information, text messages from listeners, and playlist details. An LED sign perched behind the mixing board shows the date and time, but can also be configured to show details from EAS tests and alerts. While doing their live programs from this studio, DJs can play music from turntables, CD players and digital sources.
Evidence of the Past in Funky WBOR Space
Adding to the funkiness of the WBOR space is the building’s back story. Dudley Coe used to be the home of the Bowdoin infirmary and there are still remnants and reminders of those days, including a metal circuit breaker box with the word X-Ray stenciled on it in black ink. Apparently there’s also dumb waiter running through the building and claw foot bathtubs. Most of the organizations that were more recently housed in Dudley Coe have moved out, leaving WBOR alone in the basement.
Books and other items from the long-gone print shop are scattered throughout the adjoining rooms, alongside dust and cobwebs. When leaving the coziness of WBOR’s corner of the basement, the unoccupied rooms feel creepy in comparison and lend credence to rumors that the building is haunted. In spite of that, a handful of professors are using the upstairs rooms as temporary offices before the building gets demolished.
WBOR’s Impending Move
When January comes, the station’s operations are scheduled to be moved across campus to Coles Tower, once the tallest building in Maine. WBOR’s antenna is already atop the 16-story residence hall. The new first-floor space is radically smaller than the existing WBOR digs. Carved out of a former TV studio (which also operated as an interview room) the new WBOR will have only a few distinct rooms. A long entryway leads to an open area with wooden shelving for vinyl records on one wall and there’s already a copy of the 12″ of Prince and the Revolution’s “Another Lonely Christmas” sitting on the largely empty shelf. A window and doorway occupy the opposite wall, which leads to the studio. There are also a few small nooks, but the full layout is very much TBD. Mason anticipated not bringing much from the old space, telling me that they would likely digitize the CDs and then store them off-site.
Work to Save Radio History and Capture WBOR’s Past and Present
In anticipation of the move, WBOR has already started bringing historical items, like paperwork, zines, program guides, and posters, to Bowdoin College’s Special Collections so that this material will be preserved. The challenge, as Mason pointed out, is documenting everything scrawled on the walls and ceilings throughout WBOR. One idea is to do a 3D capture, so that people could potential walk through the station virtually in the future. Some short videos have already been shot, including a TikTok shot by Mason that went viral, garnering over a million views.
While I’m saddened by WBOR’s impending move, it’s encouraging that WBOR and Bowdoin College are working to save station materials. This was apparent to me during my visit to the library’s Special Collections and Archives, where I spent an afternoon combing through boxes and files full of radio station-related goodies. Carefully stored in archival boxes were WBOR ‘zines, playlists, DJ log books, posters, manuals, memos, FCC paperwork, stickers, flyers, reels, carts, and more — all capturing a history dating back to the 1950s for WBOR and back to the 1940s for broadcast radio activities on campus.
Storied History of College Radio at Bowdoin
Originally, students and faculty led radio projects under the banner of BOTA, for Bowdoin on the Air. While productions were recorded on campus, the broadcasts aired on other local stations. By 1950, Bowdoin was testing out its own AM signal, officially launching WBOA (for “Bowdoin-on-air”) in May, 1951 over 820 AM. A few months before launch, WBOA sent delegates to a regional college radio conference hosted by the Smith College Radio station WCSR. This event brought together station representatives from the east coast and was a sign of the growing number of collaborative endeavors by college radio stations in the 1940s and 1950s.
An FM frequency was added in 1956 and that marks the beginning of WBOR (for “Bowdoin-on-radio”) 91.1 FM. According to WBOR’s history timeline, “Most Bowdoin students didn’t own an FM radios during this period, so station management built and installed illegal Heathkit FM tuners and miniature AM transmitters in each campus dorm and fraternity house. The station transmitted on 640 kHz, which was then a CONELRAD frequency (used to broadcast emergency warning information in the event of a nuclear attack on the US).”
WBOR in 2024: Active and Thriving Radio Station
Today, WBOR is a very active group at Bowdoin, with around 200 participants, which is more than 10% of the student body. During the academic year, the makeup of WBOR is around 85% students, with community members (including faculty and staff – even deans!) comprising the remainder. The station has a freeform programming philosophy and it’s possible to tune in and hear shows that play wildly different music genres back to back. Some of the programs in spring 2024 included “Unspoken Guitar Heroes,” “Pink Finger: Riot Grrl Radio,” Your Dad’s CDs,” “PopRocks,” “La Bruja Azul,” “Coastal Classical,” “If It Sounds Country, That’s What it Is,” and more. Other shows were devoted to The Pixies, jazz, and other more esoteric themes, including one that sought inspiration from an episode of the Simpsons.
Getting ready to begin senior year, Mason remained upbeat about the station’s move, reasoning that it would be impossible to take everything with them, while also pointing out some of the benefits of the new space, including greater accessibility (no stairs) and more windows. Less hidden from view, it will be located in a building that houses dorm rooms and meeting spaces.
Thanks to WBOR + More Radio Station Tours
Thanks to Mason Daugherty for the wonderful tour of WBOR. And many thanks to everyone in Bowdoin College Library’s George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections and Archives for all of their help before, during and after my visit to their reading room.
This is my 174th radio station tour report and my 116th college radio station recap. View all my radio station visits in numerical order or by station type in our archives.
