Xxi.net Website Review

HISTORY OF THE OLD TIME RADIO BEFORE TELEVISION, RADIO WAS THE DOMINANT HOME ENTERTAINMENT MEDIUM. of radio broadcasting in the early 1920s until television's replacement of radio as the dominant home entertainment medium in the late 1950s. During this period, when radio was dominant and the airwaves were filled with a variety of radio formats and genres, people regularly tuned in to their favorite radio programs. In fact, according to a 1947 C. E. Hooper survey, 82 out of 100 Americans were theatrophone. Broadcasting began in the 1880s and 1890s with audio recordings of musical acts and other vaudeville. These were sent to people by means of telephone and, later, through phonograph cylinders and discs. Visual elements, such as effects and sight gags, were adapted to have sound equivalents. In addition, visual objects and scenery were converted to have audio descriptions.  On Christmas Eve 1906, Reginald Fessenden is said to have broadcast the first radio program, consisting of some violin playing and pas*ages from the Bible. While Fessenden's role as an inventor and early radio experimenter is not in dispute, several contemporary radio researchers have questioned whether the Christmas Eve broadcast took place, or whether the date was in fact several weeks earlier. The first apparent published reference to event was made in 1928 by H.P. Davis, Vice President of Westinghouse, in a lecture given at Harvard University. In 1932 Fessenden cited the Chistmas Eve 1906 broadcast event in a letter he wrote to Vice President S.M. Kinter of Westinghouse. Fessenden's wife Helen recounts the broadcast in her book Fessenden: Builder of Tomorrows published in 1940, eight years after Fessenden's death. The issue of whether the 1906 Fessenden broadcast actually happened is discussed in Halper and Sterling's article Seeking the broadcaster was offered in 2006 by Cambridge University educated Dr. John S. Belrose, Radioscientist Emeritus at the Communications Research Centre Canada, in his essay entitled Fessenden's 1906 Christmas Eve broadcast. (READ MORE)