kevin redding wrote:
On May 15, 2011, at 5:05 PM, bill kral wrote:
In the Old Radio category; correct me if I'm wrong but the Call
letters of US stations were started with the W because the first
eastern stations were operated by the Westinghouse (Electric
Company--not sure of this part of the name) with the strange
exception of KDKA Pittsburgh--the first Westinghouse station.
Sorry, not correct. What happened was there was a treaty where all
the countries got together and the US refused to go. When the
government finally agreed W and K were left and thats how it
happened.
Kevin Adamsville, TN
Also not exactly correct.
There was indeed a treaty - or at least a convention, the London
International Radiotelegraphic Convention of 1912 - but the US didn't
sit it out. It was an active participant, and it received a bunch of
callsign blocks, including most of N, all of W and most of K. (I believe
the current A callsigns came later, at least after WWI and possibly
after WWII.)
http://earlyradiohistory.us/1914reg.htm
The custom after the 1912 adoption of international callsigns was to use
"K" for shore stations on the Pacific coast, "W" for shore stations on
the Atlantic coast, and that custom continued into broadcasting. KDKA
was one of several stations that were anomalies; their callsigns came
from a call block intended for ships, and the custom then was that ships
in the Atlantic got "K" signs and ships in the Pacific got "W" signs.
http://earlyradiohistory.us/kwtrivia.htm
http://earlyradiohistory.us/recap.htm
s
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