Happy World College Radio Day! October 6, 2023 marks the 13th annual College Radio Day. As part of the festivities at Radio Survivor, we did a special episode of the podcast/radio show: College Radio’s Hidden Early History. On the show, I talk about the role that radio clubs played in germinating some of the first […]
A casual comment during a college orientation session in 2020 was the spark that led to the revival of college radio station WHRC at Haverford College. Although Haverford had one of the earliest student-led radio stations in the 1920s (WABQ, whose first broadcast was 100 years ago in 1923!) and a very active AM carrier […]
World College Radio Day takes place on October 6, 2023 and in honor of that, we dig into the early history of college radio on our latest episode of the show. Jennifer Waits walks us through her research about college radio in the 1920s and earlier, sharing details from a paper that she presented this […]
Lorenzo Milam, who passed away on July 19, led a fascinating life, evangelizing and launching numerous community radio stations and also championing the rights of people with disabilities. Like many in the community radio world, he got his start in college radio, although that part of his radio history is rarely told. Milam’s first foray […]
Scholars focused on college radio are a pretty tiny subset of the already small universe of radio scholars, so I am thrilled to see the publication of a student radio-themed issue of Interactions: Studies in Communication & Culture this week. Brian Fauteux shared the news yesterday on Radio Survivor and he and I also have […]
As I perused the list of the most recent call sign changes issued by the FCC, I found some interesting tidbits. The call sign for the former Vanderbilt University FM radio station, WRVU, is making a terrestrial radio comeback of sorts (WRVU.org is still used by an online station at Vanderbilt, but the now sold […]
Earlier this week, Salon.com posted an article with the title “College radio is dying — and we need to save it.” In the piece, Garrett Martin outlines the situation at WRAS-FM (in which student DJs will soon lose access to the FM station during daytime in order to allow Georgia Public Broadcasting to air public […]
This weekend I’ll be immersing myself in college radio history during some special events honoring the 90th anniversary of student radio at Haverford College (see the full alumni weekend schedule here). I’m hopeful that many alumni will attend, as I’m looking forward to learning even more about the storied past of the many stations at […]
College radio history is largely undocumented, with much lore locked away in the memories of its participants. Glimpses of the past can be found by digging into the archives of student publications, particularly yearbooks and newspapers, where radio activities were often chronicled. Luckily for college radio history buffs like myself, it’s getting easier and easier […]
I was doing a random search on Twitter this weekend when I ran across a photo of a radio reception stamp for the first Haverford College radio station WABQ. It turns out that some of the current radio station participants at Haverford College found this gem on eBay, just in time for this year’s 90th […]
