Scott Childers, a lifelong Chicagoan, grew up under the influence of WLS. Childers produced the History of WLS Radio Web site, a comprehensive look at the station's rich past. He delivered news and traffic on WLS in the mid-1990s and in 2007 was tapped as the lead historical consultant for the daylong Big 89 Rewind special on Memorial Day. He has also served as a consultant for many television projects that have focused on WLS and The National Barn Dance.
Title: So Many Books, So Little Time
Author: Paul J. McLane
Publisher: Radio World
Date: 12/9/2008
Our cover story this issue about Dr. J.R. Brinkley was prompted in
part by the publication earlier this year of a book that is now
about to come out in soft-cover.
Let's wrap up our gift discussion with more ideas for the book
lover on your shopping list.
"Chicago's WLS Radio" by Scott Childers a Of keen interest to fans
of WLS will be this addition to the fabulous "Images of America"
photo essay series you've seen in bookstores.
The "Images" series began with books about specific towns and
cities a I have one about my hometown of Westfield, N.J. a and has
expanded to include various industries, ethnic groups and other
topics.
Readers will find numerous wonderful promotional and
behind-the-scene pix not only of early station talents but of more
recent notables like Art Vuolo, Kurt Hanson, Catherine Johns, Larry
Lujack, Dick Orkin and Dick Biondi.
If you have any interest in the storied history of WLS, buy this
soft-cover pictorial overview. Retail $19.99.
If Arcadia knows what's good for it, the company would launch a
full series of radio station history books in the mold of this WLS
title. They'd have a hit.
A fun thing for a history-minded reader to do: Visit the Arcadia
Web site, click on Images of America and browse the thousands of
topics in print.
Just within radio, the company has titles, in that series and in
others, on topics such as broadcasting in Birmingham, Ala.; Detroit
sports broadcasters; the history of WIVK(AM) in Knoxville, Tenn.;
the "Cincinnati Sound"; and WNAX(AM) in Yankton, S.D. That book
wasco-written by a man who literally grew in its transmitter
building.
"Clark Weber's Rock and Roll Radio a 1955a1975, The Fun Years" by
Clark Weber with Neal Samors a This book didn't reach me in time to
look over for this column but here's the summary from the
author:
"I'm Mother Weber's Oldest Son Clark. I was very much a part of
your rock and roll musical scene in the '50s, '60s and '70s. As the
program director and disc jockey at WLS radio in Chicago, I chose
the music that was played on that 50,000 watt rock and roll giant.
My new book is complete with dozens of pictures and a special CD
that returns you to those fun years. Come with me and we'll go back
in time to when rock and roll was clean and the Chicago River was
dirty."
Published by Chicago's Books Press, $37.50 hard, $29.50 soft.
"The HP Way" by David Packard a Not just a radio book but featuring
first-person electronics and business history, this is a favorite
of tech managers including Mike Dosch of Axia Audio.
"Catfish" recommended it to me as a fine example of how engineers
can find corporate success.
Packard co-founded Hewlett-Packard with Bill Hewlett in the late
1930s with $538 and a coin toss to determine who would get top
billing. Packard retired as chairman in 1993. Do you dream of
turning a garage-based radio/audio business into something bigger?
You'll enjoy this.
Packard deals out his share of corporate platitudes about HP
management; but this easy-to-read paperback is a pleasant
excursion. Published by Collins Business Essentials in the
mid-1990s, now in paperback, it retails for $14.95.
(Also on Dosch's recommended list: "The Innovator's Dilemma"
byClayton M. Christensen, published in 1997 and also part of the
Collins series, about how "disruptive technologies" and traditional
business practices overlap and diverge.)
"Passport to World Band Radio" a Here comes the 25th edition of a
popular title we've reviewed in Radio World before.
This remarkable resource includes reviews of dozens of receivers
and antennas; hour-by-hour descriptions of shows that can be heard
in English; country-by-country schedules in English and other
languages; frequency-by-frequency graphics of all channels and
languages; and a look at developments in South America, where radio
"serves as a powerful tool for the Colombian army, paramilitary
squads, Marxist rebels, missionaries and drug runners."
A handy tip sheet gives suggestions about the best times and
frequencies to maximize the listening experience.
Published by International Broadcasting Services Ltd. Softcover,
retails for $22.95.
Mass Media Unleashed" by Carl R. Ramey a The subtitle of this 2007
book is "how Washington policymakers shortchanged the American
public." Ramey is a communications attorney (and former radio
announcer) who thinks the country deserves better from its media
policymakers.
His topics include consolidation, deregulation and what he
considers the huge transformation of policy since 1980.
Ramey is realistic about such issues: "This is hardly a new
debate," he writes at one point. "For virtually its entire history
broadcasting has been enthusiastically embraced by the masses while
critics worried and complained that the medium was being controlled
by too few owners whose sole motivation was profit."
If you feel media aredelivering less public service and that their
concerns for the bottom line are deleterious to our society, you'll
find thoughtful discussion here.
You may however take issue with his provocative ideas for fixing
media regulation. He proposes a three-part policy that would give
commercial broadcasters permanent license status, expand antitrust
enforcement and "reenergize" the public broadcasting system.
He would do away with the "public trusteeship" model of regulation
for commercial broadcasting but retain that model for public
stations (for instance, among his goals is a return to the Fairness
Doctrine for public stations only).
The book is a thoughtful, academic, readable essay about the
history of media policy and Ramey's surprising views on what should
be done next. Agree with him or not, it's timely reading a perhaps
for any new presidents of the United States or FCC commissioners
out there.
Published by Rowan & Littlefield. Softcover, $29.95.
"Sounds of Change: A History of FM Broadcasting in America" by
Christopher H. Sterling and Michael C. Keith a Suitable as a
teaching reference (which is not surprising given that the authors
are college professors), this book portions the history of FM radio
into seven time periods: its creation (pre-1941), war and evolution
('41a45), the "dismal years" ('45a57), FM's turnaround ('58a65),
the period when the FM band was a "sound alternative" ('66a80),
dominance ('80a95) and "clouds in the air" (everything since).
This is a non-technical and straightforward retelling of
significant FM developments going back to Maj. Armstrong. It is
intelligent and well documented, but broad rather than deep. The
text is illustrated with some neat graphics such as a list of
pioneering FM experimental stations in the 1930s, a chart of
commercial FMs operating by late 1944 and a comparison of the
holdings of the largest radio owners in 1996 compared to 2007.
Useful appendices provide numerous charts and five national maps
showing how FM coverage has changed since 1945.
Published by the University of North Carolina Press, cloth $55.95,
paperback $22.50.
And don't forget "Charlatan: America's Most Dangerous Huckster, the
Man Who Pursued Him and the Age of Flim-Flam" by Pope Brock, about
Dr. Brinkley the "Goat Gland Man," currently in hardcover (I saw it
on sale recently for less than $17) and due in paperback in January
for $14.95 retail. Published by Crown.
The author is Radio World Editor in Chief/U.S.
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