L
Les
Guest
When I was a kid WSAR operated from a combined studio/transmitter site
along The TAUNTON River in Somerset. Not to be confused with the
present Home Street Site.
On the old site they had a 4-tower array. The towers were of square
cross-section and, I believe, top loaded. The building housed a 5-kW
General Electric transmitter and, if memory serves, a 1-kW GE backup.
It was a very old-style operation with one central console (also GE)
and a couple of announce booths from which announcers used hand-signals
to give direction to the engineer on duty. I was in the building just
once, back when they had just flipped to an all-music format from the
former "full service" format which included stuff like Soap Operas and
Don McNeil's Breakfast Club. Bob Bassett and Art (Arnie) Shepard were
the major voices.
Somehow I managed to never get around to taking any pictures, particularly
of the towers.
Sometime in the late 50's or early 60's they sold the land for use as
the site for a nuclear power plant that was never built. They build
a new four-tower array on Home Street, Somerset, along The LEE's RIVER.
Several years later a station they had been protecting, I think in
Canada, went off the air and they were able to get down to a two-tower
array which continues to this day.
Anybody have any photos of that old site? If so, please contact me
at the address in my profile.
Oh...anybody have a photo of the tower atop the old Durfee Theater Building
in Fall River? It was a bit of an oddity; a Wincharger of narrow cross-
section, made up of angle stock. There was an old-style FM plyon antenna
at the top. It dated back to the days when The Sisson Brothers started up
an FM which they killed off when they got 250-Watts authorized for WALE
at 1400. In my earliest days in radio I used to climb up the vertical
ladder in the projection booth of the theater to get to the roof to take
base current readings. That was part of the job when one worked the
Sunday evening shift; there were half-hour programs off ET's. When you'd
head for the roof you'd just pray that the needle didn't get stuck
while you were away!<P ID="signature">______________
"Only sick music makes money today."
--Friedrich Nietzsch (he said this before
rap was invented, or even rock!)</P>
along The TAUNTON River in Somerset. Not to be confused with the
present Home Street Site.
On the old site they had a 4-tower array. The towers were of square
cross-section and, I believe, top loaded. The building housed a 5-kW
General Electric transmitter and, if memory serves, a 1-kW GE backup.
It was a very old-style operation with one central console (also GE)
and a couple of announce booths from which announcers used hand-signals
to give direction to the engineer on duty. I was in the building just
once, back when they had just flipped to an all-music format from the
former "full service" format which included stuff like Soap Operas and
Don McNeil's Breakfast Club. Bob Bassett and Art (Arnie) Shepard were
the major voices.
Somehow I managed to never get around to taking any pictures, particularly
of the towers.
Sometime in the late 50's or early 60's they sold the land for use as
the site for a nuclear power plant that was never built. They build
a new four-tower array on Home Street, Somerset, along The LEE's RIVER.
Several years later a station they had been protecting, I think in
Canada, went off the air and they were able to get down to a two-tower
array which continues to this day.
Anybody have any photos of that old site? If so, please contact me
at the address in my profile.
Oh...anybody have a photo of the tower atop the old Durfee Theater Building
in Fall River? It was a bit of an oddity; a Wincharger of narrow cross-
section, made up of angle stock. There was an old-style FM plyon antenna
at the top. It dated back to the days when The Sisson Brothers started up
an FM which they killed off when they got 250-Watts authorized for WALE
at 1400. In my earliest days in radio I used to climb up the vertical
ladder in the projection booth of the theater to get to the roof to take
base current readings. That was part of the job when one worked the
Sunday evening shift; there were half-hour programs off ET's. When you'd
head for the roof you'd just pray that the needle didn't get stuck
while you were away!<P ID="signature">______________
"Only sick music makes money today."
--Friedrich Nietzsch (he said this before
rap was invented, or even rock!)</P>