Historical question

[4CX1000A]

A colleague of mine writes:

"The lead story in The College Pump in the summer issue of
Harvard Magazine recounts the triumphant field expedition of
the Class of '44's Harvard Guerrilla Unit, whose objective was
to be dropped behind the German lines to create havoc and
mayhem. They set out to 'blow up' a trio of broadcast
transmitting towers near Boston. 'After alerting the Crimson
to our intention, we breached the chain-link fence surrounding
the towers one night, we taped simulated explosive charges to
the legs of the towers.' Now, this probably uniquely identifies
the radio station, although if I ever knew I have forgotten."

Can anyone identify the station form this description? Presumably it was a 3-tower directional array of self-supporting towers.

I had an uncle in the class of 1944, but, alas, he was killed in a plane crash in 1958.

 

[fybush]

There were two three-tower arrays in use in that era: WHDH (now WEEI 850) out in Needham and WNAC (now WRKO 680) up in Burlington. I'm pretty sure WCOP 1150 hadn't yet built its three-tower array in Arlington, and I don't think its previous site on Soldiers Field Road (on the site of the WBZ studios today) wasn't three towers.

 

[DanStrassberg]

There were two three-tower arrays in use in that era: WHDH (now WEEI 850) out in Needham and WNAC (now WRKO 680) up in Burlington. I'm pretty sure WCOP 1150 hadn't yet built its three-tower array in Arlington, and I don't think its previous site on Soldiers Field Road (on the site of the WBZ studios today) wasn't three towers.

Back in 1944, what is now WRKO was Lawrence-licensed WLAW. It didn't become WNAC until around 1953. In 1944, however, WLAW's transmitter had not yet moved from Andover (where I believe it had three towers) to Burlington. That move didn't happen until 1947. But what was then the real WNAC 1260 also had a three-tower array of self-supporting towers (on the Quincy-Milton line) as did WCOP 1150 (at 75 Concord Ave in Lexington--NOT Arlington; AFAIK, there never was an AM broadcast station in Arlington). I believe that WCOP moved to the Lexington site around the time of NARBA (March 1941). My money is on WCOP because it would have been the easiest to reach from the Harvard campus. As for WHDH 850, until 1947, it transmitted from what is today the WROL site on the Lynn Marsh Rd in Saugus. WHDH was 5 kW DA-N at that time, but didn't it have just two towers in its night array? I suspect that WHDH's towers in Saugus were self-supporting, but the three towers in Needham of what was originally WHDH but is now WEEI are guy supported. Those towers went up in 1947.

 

[aerie]

Any idea where in Andover the WLAW site was located? I understand it was on River Road, but River Road is a fairly long street stretching almost from Lowell into Lawrence. I live a block from River Road and have always wondered where WLAW was located.

 

[DanStrassberg]

There is one piece of information in the original posting that suggests that WCOP was not the station that was targeted. Unless I misread it, the posting says that simulated sticks of dynamite were placed on three legs of each tower. The WCOP (now WWDJ/WAZN) towers have four legs; they are square cross-section towers. While dynamiting three legs of a square cross-section tower would surely cause the tower to fall, so would dynamiting just one leg. However, this might be a clue to the station that was the target of the simulated attack. It could have been a station with triangular cross-section towers. Sorry, but I don't know which stations met that criterion. I don't think triangular cross-section towers became popular until the 50s. Blaw-Knox, famous for its guy-supported "diamond" towers, but also the manufacturer of self-supporting towers, used to boast of its square cross-section design--and it's not clear why. Square cross-section towers are inherently more expensive than triangular cross-section towers and are actually not as strong. (It takes less force to distort a square into a rhombus than it does to distort a triangle.)

 

[DanStrassberg]

Any idea where in Andover the WLAW site was located? I understand it was on River Road, but River Road is a fairly long street stretching almost from Lowell into Lawrence. I live a block from River Road and have always wondered where WLAW was located.

I recall someone being interviewed on Bob Bittner's Let's Talk About Radio back when the program was just starting out (IOW, at least 15 years ago). The interviewee said (I believe) that he had located one of the old tower footings in somebody's back yard. The only other thing I remember hearing is that the location was a place that frequently gets flooded in the spring. I don't think that tells you enough to do any good.

 

[paulfromlowell]

The WLAW site wasn't on River Road.....it was where the Curt Cowdy WCCM/WCGY site was......now the site of 900am - whatever it is called this week.

Any idea where in Andover the WLAW site was located? I understand it was on River Road, but River Road is a fairly long street stretching almost from Lowell into Lawrence. I live a block from River Road and have always wondered where WLAW was located.

 

[aerie]

The WNNW site (nee WCCM) may be right. In looking at the site on Google satellite view, there seems to be a discontinuity in the vegetation that lines up in a straight line to the NE and SW of the WNNW tower. That discontinuity may be the remains of the original 3 tower array.

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=42.67389,+-71.19056+(WNNW-AM)&hl=en&ll=42.674055,-71.189963&spn=0.001976,0.003449&om=1&t=h&z=18

 

[on-air-in-NH]

If I'm not mistaken, isn't it on Chandler Rd in Andover (near Greenwood Rd)