Where did they go?

[johnbasalla]

Lots of 'talk' on the 58 years topic about the syndicators who supplied the music on reel-to-reel tapes for B/EZ stations. So, a few questions.

Did the syndicators also sell and, maybe, help set up the automation equipment/studios for member stations or did the stations purchase the necessary equipment from other manufacturers such as RCA? Was there equipment standardization so that stations could be sure that the system would work with their syndicators reels?

What happened to all those reel-to-reel tapes? How often did they get replaced/updated? Did the syndicator require that old reels be sent back to them, or was the station expected to dispose of them?
(Side note: I worked a couple of years at a particular station almost 40 years ago. They had an Adult Contemporary format. I recall that they were continuing to use reel-to-reel automation tapes from a service that they no long subscribed to, and made their own tapes too, along with carting up new music and using some 45 rpm discs.)

I would assume that some, maybe many, of these tapes exist. After all, during WWII, the U.S. Government produced 78 rpm records that would be sent to the war zones for the entertainment of the troops. Even though there were instructions to destroy the discs after use, that often was not done as they can be found on the collectors market today.

 

[gr8oldies]

Lots of 'talk' on the 58 years topic about the syndicators who supplied the music on reel-to-reel tapes for B/EZ stations. So, a few questions.

Did the syndicators also sell and, maybe, help set up the automation equipment/studios for member stations or did the stations purchase the necessary equipment from other manufacturers such as RCA? Was there equipment standardization so that stations could be sure that the system would work with their syndicators reels?

What happened to all those reel-to-reel tapes? How often did they get replaced/updated? Did the syndicator require that old reels be sent back to them, or was the station expected to dispose of them?
(Side note: I worked a couple of years at a particular station almost 40 years ago. They had an Adult Contemporary format. I recall that they were continuing to use reel-to-reel automation tapes from a service that they no long subscribed to, and made their own tapes too, along with carting up new music and using some 45 rpm discs.)

I would assume that some, maybe many, of these tapes exist. After all, during WWII, the U.S. Government produced 78 rpm records that would be sent to the war zones for the entertainment of the troops. Even though there were instructions to destroy the discs after use, that often was not done as they can be found on the collectors market today.

I didn't work Beautiful Music but worked with automated formats. The syndicators would tell stations what the requirements were to run the format, but did not supply or install equipment. I never remember any site visits from syndicators. Actual automation systems were made by broadcast equipment manufacturers like IGM, Brroadcast Electronics, Harris/Gates, etc,

As I recall, tapes were returned after they were replaced by updated tapes. There's a Facebook group called Analog Radio Automation full of guys who rebuild old automation systems and they have tapes. Sometimes someone will stream their old automation system. WPTW in Piqua, Ohio still has one in working order.

 

[TheBigA]

What happened to all those reel-to-reel tapes? How often did they get replaced/updated? Did the syndicator require that old reels be sent back to them, or was the station expected to dispose of them?

It depends on the company. I know that Bonneville required stations to return the tapes (tails out) in the boxes they were sent in. They were reused, and sent back to the stations. The policy was after a certain number of passes, the tapes were retired. Some were donated to college radio stations. Some were just destroyed.

BTW NPR had a similar system for their programming such as the various opera and symphony shows. They were sent to stations in plastic mailers, and the stations were required to send them back. NPR had an internal tape duplication department on the first floor of their DC office. Once the network switched to satellite in 1980, the reel system was phased out, and the tape duplication department switched to making cassettes of programs which were sold to listeners.

 

[radiofan2023]

There are some reel tapes on ebay from Drake Chenault, etc.

 

[Dick's History]

Lots of 'talk' on the 58 years topic about the syndicators who supplied the music on reel-to-reel tapes for B/EZ stations. So, a few questions.

Did the syndicators also sell and, maybe, help set up the automation equipment/studios for member stations or did the stations purchase the necessary equipment from other manufacturers such as RCA? Was there equipment standardization so that stations could be sure that the system would work with their syndicators reels?

What happened to all those reel-to-reel tapes? How often did they get replaced/updated? Did the syndicator require that old reels be sent back to them, or was the station expected to dispose of them?
(Side note: I worked a couple of years at a particular station almost 40 years ago. They had an Adult Contemporary format. I recall that they were continuing to use reel-to-reel automation tapes from a service that they no long subscribed to, and made their own tapes too, along with carting up new music and using some 45 rpm discs.)

I would assume that some, maybe many, of these tapes exist. After all, during WWII, the U.S. Government produced 78 rpm records that would be sent to the war zones for the entertainment of the troops. Even though there were instructions to destroy the discs after use, that often was not done as they can be found on the collectors market today.

IGM, Gates, Schafer, Programatic, Alto Fonic for a while assembled and sold you automation systems as well. The other syndicators let you know what kind of systems their software was compatible with and made recommendations for upgrading your system to better serve their standards as far as brains were concerned. SRP oftentimes required a whole set of new equipment before they would even take you on as a client. The larger companies had a technical consultant they would send to a station to make recommendations. A portion of the syndicator's tapes were to be returned to the syndicator when new ones or updates were received. This was eventually not adhered to or insisted upon so a lot of the tapes were just discarded into a dumpster or thrpown into a back room after they had served their purpose only to be carted to a dumpster when the station changed format or they chose to clean house.

 

[DavidEduardo]

I actually owned a program syndication service from 1981 to 1987. I programmed Beautiful Music for Latin America.

A description with photos and demo tapes and even the manual are at https://www.davidgleason.com/1981-1985-Musica-en-Flor.htm

Each station had a library of about 100 hours of programming on 100 tapes, run on 4 decks. Each month, about 6 to 8 of the tapes were cycled out of service, replaced by a like number of new ones. Due to shipping costs, old tapes were discarded and removed from use.

The reason for 4 tapes in 4 decks is that it gave stations thousands of combinations of the same songs, done by using different sets of 4. Further, tapes were done by music type: vocals, soft, medium and bright tempo. Depending on the time of day, a station might not use "soft" in the morning or "bright" at night.

A few (expensive) syndicators used "matched flow" tapes, where each 15 minute segment was pre-programmed rather than random selected. Those services, I believe just done by Shulke (SRP) Bonneville and Churchill, were much more expensive and tapes were used fewer times.

Technically, each station ran 4 tape decks and many used simple manual systems made custom by Mark Peterson in Minnesota.

 

[DavidEduardo]

Did the syndicators also sell and, maybe, help set up the automation equipment/studios for member stations or did the stations purchase the necessary equipment from other manufacturers such as RCA?

Several responses have been made, but most syndicators only recommended or approved station equipment. All systems used the same system of 25 Hz tones for EOM (end of message) sequencing. Depending on the station commercials were recorded on various kinds of machines that selected from 24 up to 72 different cartridges for commercials, IDs, liners and other program elements.

IGM in Washington both had a syndication division and made multi-cart devices, the Instacart and the Go-Cart.

https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Catalogs/Miscellaneous-Manufacturers/IGM-Automation.pdf shows a newsletter with pictures of equipment and station installations. (There are many, many pages in that download, with newsletters, price sheets, data sheets and lots of pictures.)

Here is a drawing of a system with Instacarts and 4 tape decks from around 1985:



The Go-Carts on the left were about $4,000 each. Stereo Instacarts, in the middle, were $19,000 for stereo. Reel to reel decks could run from $1200 to $4000. Stations used playback only decks usually.

Was there equipment standardization so that stations could be sure that the system would work with their syndicators reels?

All reels were 7.4 ips and used 25 Hz EOM (end of message) tones. That was standard, and there were many brands of decks that worked for reel tape.

Stations also could do things like time checks, where two cartridge tape decks had odd and even minutes for all 12 hours and the automation caused one to jump ahead while the correct one was cued up and ready.

Typical Beautiful Music automation (the two cart decks below the left pair of Instacarts were for time checks)



In systems I had for a Top 40 AM and Salsa FM in Puerto Rico around 1970, we also had a big rack of carts for every weather condition. "70 degrees and raining" to "85 degrees and sunny" and so on. Since the temperature range there was only about 20 degrees all year long, and it could be sunny (or "clear skies" for night time), cloudy, showers, heavy rain and practically nothing else, it only took about 200 carts to have every possible non-hurricane situation. Custom carts were done if there was a tropical storm.

What happened to all those reel-to-reel tapes? How often did they get replaced/updated? Did the syndicator require that old reels be sent back to them, or was the station expected to dispose of them?

Almost all services required tapes returned. None that I know of re-used the tapes, as they could be worn, stretched, spliced or otherwise damaged. The returned reels had the aluminum "sides" removed and a new reel of tape on its factory hub was placed in the old sides.

Tape hub ready to have the reel sides screwed on.



Flanges and hub with no tape in them, ready to have a fresh hub inserted:



The reason for getting tapes returned was to prevent stations from keeping them and then cancelling the subscription to the syndicator once they had enough. Contracts had big penalty charges for failure to return.

I would assume that some, maybe many, of these tapes exist. After all, during WWII, the U.S. Government produced 78 rpm records that would be sent to the war zones for the entertainment of the troops. Even though there were instructions to destroy the discs after use, that often was not done as they can be found on the collectors market today.

Phonograph records last for a long time. Tape deteriorates as the substance that adheres the magnetic particles to the tape backing dries and the tape "sheds". The tape backing also becomes brittle and will break if played in many cases. Syndicators did not use the best tape, as it only had to last, at most, about 12 months before being cycled out of use and destroyed.

 

[johnbasalla]

I have reel-to-reel tapes from 1952 and 1953 of the ABC radio series "Mr. President", starring Edward Arnold. They would, occasionally, break upon playback at the splicing point of old commercials which were cut out of the reels. After reattaching them, they have played fine and sound good.

 

[TheBigA]

Almost all services required tapes returned. None that I know of re-used the tapes, as they could be worn, stretched, spliced or otherwise damaged. The returned reels had the aluminum "sides" removed and a new reel of tape on its factory hub was placed in the old sides.

At one point, I had tapes from Bonneville and TM. Both were pre-loaded on grey plastic reels, in boxes with the company logo on them.