Did a little more digging, and the chronology looks like this: from opening in 1929 until 1939, 485 Madison was a studio center for most of CBS Radio, including being home to the network newsroom.
In 1939, the need for more studio space led CBS to buy the nearby 49 E. 52nd building, which became its primary radio studio facility, though the network newsroom stayed around the corner at 485.
The last hourly newscast before the move to West 57th came from 49 E. 52nd in 1964, followed an hour later by the first hourly from the Broadcast Center. There's a "Farewell to Studio 9" broadcast floating around our there that was the 1964 finale from East 52nd. (That building then became a Columbia Records studio for a few decades and also originated CBS Radio Mystery Theater.)
It's well documented that in the early years, most of the Murrow team at CBS Radio looked at TV as a gimmicky newcomer, which may help explain why it was operating from Grand Central and Graybar instead of network HQ.
Local radio in NYC was even more of an afterthought, handled mostly by network announcers into the 1950s before WCBS belatedly began to get more of its own dedicated staff and programming in the decade or so leading up to the launch of Newsradio from its own completely separate facility at Black Rock.
Even in the post-Black Rock years when 880 moved into the Broadcast Center, it was totally isolated from the network on an upper floor of the office tower there. The network staff key cards didn't open the doors to the 880 floor, much to the chagrin of at least one of my tour guides there over the years.
In 1939, the need for more studio space led CBS to buy the nearby 49 E. 52nd building, which became its primary radio studio facility, though the network newsroom stayed around the corner at 485.
The last hourly newscast before the move to West 57th came from 49 E. 52nd in 1964, followed an hour later by the first hourly from the Broadcast Center. There's a "Farewell to Studio 9" broadcast floating around our there that was the 1964 finale from East 52nd. (That building then became a Columbia Records studio for a few decades and also originated CBS Radio Mystery Theater.)
It's well documented that in the early years, most of the Murrow team at CBS Radio looked at TV as a gimmicky newcomer, which may help explain why it was operating from Grand Central and Graybar instead of network HQ.
Local radio in NYC was even more of an afterthought, handled mostly by network announcers into the 1950s before WCBS belatedly began to get more of its own dedicated staff and programming in the decade or so leading up to the launch of Newsradio from its own completely separate facility at Black Rock.
Even in the post-Black Rock years when 880 moved into the Broadcast Center, it was totally isolated from the network on an upper floor of the office tower there. The network staff key cards didn't open the doors to the 880 floor, much to the chagrin of at least one of my tour guides there over the years.
