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WNBO - SILVER HAVEN, PA

B

Bob E. Nelson

While browsing some old (circa 1930) newspapers for Washington County, I came across radio listings for WNBO at 1200 on the pre-NARBA dial. A check of White's Radio log for that era shows it was a typical 100 watt Class IV licensed to Silver Haven, PA but serving little Warshington.

Other than that, WNBO is a mystery to me. It obviously predated WJPA. Even the city of license, Silver Haven, is unknown. Was that a community later absorbed by one of the larger nearby towns?
 
I found a station listing that shows John Brownlee Spriggs as the owner. Google him and you'll get a bunch of links.

One of them says that an early performer on WNBO was one Perry Como.
 
I also found a WABT Washington pa. but cannot find any info on it. WNBO's Address was the Warner Brothers State Theater Bldg in Washington Pa. Is it still around?
 
In 1928 WNBO was on 1420 with 15 Watts, in 1930 they were on 1200 with 100 watts . On March 15,1935 WNBO "Voluntarily Surrendered their license." I Cannot Find a Sign On date Or when they Changed Channels.
 
I recall the Trib doing a story once about a similar station in Westmoreland County that existed around the same time.
Apparently there were a number of hobbyists who were able to get commercial licenses at one point.
Many of them running under 100 watts with homemade transmitters. The FCC started to clean these up
in the 1930's and by WW II they were gone. (the War Department actually considered the remaining ones
as a potential security threat by that time). WNBO may have been like the station mentioned in the Trib
story...run out of the owner's home on an irregular schedule.
 
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