1944: The beginnings of campus radio

In 1944, the Students’ Representative Council took steps towards a campus radio station, a dream that would take another twenty years to fully achieve, by establishing the Radio Directorate.  (Earlier university radio broadcasts, under the auspices of The Sheaf, had taken place as early as 1932; it is not clear how regular the programming was.)  Programming was for many years broadcast on CFQC with “The Voice of the Green and White” as one of the first weekly programs.  Programming included roundups of campus interviews, campus reviews, football reports, and student entertainment “with piano renditions and song stylings” and various campus orchestras. A second program, “Greystone Calling,” was being broadcast in Prince Albert and Regina by 1947.  Also in 1947, $2,500 worth of radio equipment was purchased.  The Sheaf reported on 16 September 1947 that “[w]hen operating, the equipment will be used for rehearsing and recording radio programs.  Broadcasts will be made direct from the campus by running a line to local outlets.”  A temporary studio was subsequently set up in Convocation Hall. 

By 1956, the radio directorate had become relatively inactive, but that year a radio station with all but a transmitter – described as “one of the most modern university radio setups” – was opened in the Memorial Union Building, laying the groundwork for the “revival” of campus radio.  In 1960, the radio director reported in the Greystone that “the long talked of college lounge network is now in operation.”  (A photograph of radio staff taken in 1964 includes a sign in the background: “If University Radio is not heard in your lounge, why?”)  By 1962, there were nine hours of regular programming per day.  The next year, a two-year expansion program had been completed, including the upgrading of facilities to include two fully equipped control rooms, an equipment repairs department, a news and continuity department, and a well-stocked library.  The director’s Greystone report of 1963 confidently stated: “This year’s operation has proven that students on this campus are capable of operating a radio station of their own, and within a few years this ambition will no doubt be realized.”  This was indeed the case.

Related Collections

Campus Radio fonds, MG 128.

Images

1944a: Al Hooker, first radio director. The Greystone, 1945.

Sources

The Sheaf, 28 January 1932; 16 September 1947; 24 February 1956; 2 March 1956.
The Greystone, 1945-1965.