Kre_history by Jfs

8/7/2019 Kre_history by Jfs

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THE HISTORY OFKRE, BERKELEY, CALIFORNIACopyright 1997, John F. Schneider

The call letters KRE are full of radio history.

They were first issued, in the beginning years ofthe twentieth century, to the side-wheeler steamship "Bay State", operated by the EasternSteamship Corporation. [5] Early in the morningof September 23, 1916, the "Bay State" ranaground in heavy fog at the entrance to theharbor at Portland, Maine, where she had beenbound from Boston. All of the ship's 150passengers were rescued safely, but the ship wasdamaged beyond repair and decommissioned. [6]Because of naval superstition, the ship's call

letters were abandoned, not to be used again onany vessel. Thus, the call letters KRE became"grounded".

In 1922, the Department of Commerce re-issuedthem to the Maxwell Electric Company, a smallradio store on Adeline Street in Berkeley.Maxwell Hallauer owned the establishment, andassigned the job of operating the station toemployee Thomas A. Fite. A small transmitterwas built and installed at the Claremont Resort

Hotel in the Berkeley Hills, and a studio wasassembled on the second floor. The station beganbroadcasting March 11, 1922.

[8]

[7]

However, in those days before advertising, thecost of operating a radio station was probably toomuch for the little company. The station was soldto the "Berkeley Daily Gazette" newspaper inMay of the same year, although the MaxwellElectric Company continued to operate thestation.

After it purchased the station, the newspaper'spages suddenly came alive with news of radio.Regular radio columns helped publicize the factthat the little station was now broadcasting anhour every Sunday night. The initial programunder the management of the Gazette was heldMay 23. The Gazette reported afterward:

Much interest was displayed Sunday in thededicatory program of the Gazette radiobroadcasting station at the Hotel Claremont. Aprogram of songs sung by local vocalists wasgiven, and during the concert several radio fanstelephoned their congratulations, declaring theconcert to be one of the best ever receivedlocally. An excellent equipment made possiblethe clarity of tone, and the efficient managementof operator Thomas Fite did the rest.[8]

The added financial backing and influence of theGazette brought several improvements to KREduring the ensuing months. The studio wasrebuilt and hung with draperies to improve theacoustics, a piano was loaned to the station byBenjamin's Music Store, and a phonograph byWhite's. A 50 watt breadboard transmitter,nicknamed "Big Mike", was constructed byMaxwell Electric and installed by Fite. It beganoperating in August. [8]

The antenna used at the time was a vertical wire,suspended from two poles at the top and bottomof the hotel tower. From the bottom of the tower,directly above the porch, several counterpoisewires stretched out in all directions. The antennawas so situated that it faced towards the SanFrancisco Bay, so it would project its signalacross Berkeley and Oakland and into SanFrancisco. [1]
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Program content was also improved. Programs

were expanded to two hours every Sunday. Fitedid the announcing, and for program content thestation enlisted Mrs. Wilda Wilson Church, headof the drama department of the Cora L. WilliamsInstitute, an all-girl school in Berkeley. Mrs.Church prepared a weekly variety of music andpoetry reading, drawing primarily upon studentsof her own college, students from Mill's Collegein Oakland, and students of private musicteachers in the area. She was to benefit greatlyfrom this introduction to radio, and would leaveKRE and the school in 1924 to become full-timedramatic director for the "KGO Players" at theGeneral Electric radio station in Oakland. Shewould go on from there to NBC, and wouldbecome one of the nation's better-known radiodrama producers in the thirties.

[8]

As listener response to KRE's programs grew,programming time increased. In early 1923,Wednesday night was added to the schedule.Raymond Boyd and Frank Smith from MaxwellElectric were added to assist Fite in the operationof the station. Program experiments were tried,usually with favorable results. On New Year'sEve, 1922, the microphone was moved to thehotel's main ballroom, and KRE broadcast themusic and activities of the New Year's Eve partythere from ten o'clock until twelve thirty. OnApril 8, 1923, KRE aired its first dramaticproduction. Members of the University ofCalifornia's Mask and Dagger Society gave a

performance of "Dulcy" on the station, afterthree successful performances on the university'sBerkeley campus. The station's usual musicalrepertoire consisted of classical music, but thiswas abandoned from time to time for programsof jazz. In July of 1923, the station initiated aseries of educational programs with a discussion

entitled "Stars and Planets" by Dr. R. B.Larkin.[8]

Prior to 1923, all radio stations had shared twofrequencies. But in April of that year, because ofthe increasing popularity of the infant radioindustry, the Department of Commerce assignedindividual wavelengths to each station. KREreceived an assignment to 278 meters (1079 kc)In the next few years, the station would alsooccupy 1170 and 1370 kc.

By late 1923, programming began to fall into aregular pattern. Music was usually provided byVart Toujian's "KRE Serenaders". Wilda WilsonChurch had left the station, and the Gazette nowhad to arrange the programs itself. The stationbecame less of a new experience and more of aburden to the newspaper. Maxwell ElectricCompany dropped out of the operation inDecember of that year, and the operation wastaken over by L. H. Kettenger and G. B. Flood of

the U. C. Battery and Electric Company.[8]

By the mid twenties, programming had becomeeven more of a burden. Stations were nowrequired to be on the air more than just a fewhours weekly, and KRE was operating a weeklyschedule of fifteen hours. Programs heard duringthis period included Horace Heidt's ClaremontOrchestra with regular dance programs. (Heidtwas another person associated with KRE thatlater went on to national fame with the

networks.) Also during this period, the "KREPlayers" offered several dramatic productionsweekly. Thursday night was "educational night";and every Wednesday afternoon, "Aunt Pollyand Big Brother" presented their children'sprogram.[8] Finally, the Gazette decided to ridthemselves of the yoke around their necks. InJanuary, 1927, they took the station off the airand put it up for sale. [8]
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Meanwhile, the First Congregational Church inBerkeley was thinking about doing somebroadcasting. They were investigating thepossibility of leasing phone lines and airingweekly programs over KTAB in Oakland whenthey heard KRE was available. The churchcouncil minutes for January 19, 1927, show the

following entry:A motion was made that we authorize thetrustees to do whatever may be necessary for theestablishment of the broadcast station at theearliest possible date on our church property. [9]By the end of January, KRE had been purchasedfor the modest sum of $6,000. The churchshared in the purchase with the Pacific School ofReligion in Berkeley, and the two were also toshare in the use of the station. [8]

According to George Conklin, a retired professor

at the Pacific School of Religion and member ofthe California Historical Radio Society:PSR provided the money to make the initialpayment of $1,000 for KRE and $995 to erect theantenna tower at the church. The money camefrom a lectureship trust established by E. T. Earl,the man who invented the refrigerated railroadcar. He was a member of First CongregationalChurch in Oakland. The lectureship broughtsuch people as Teddy Roosevelt to Berkeley tolecture, and no hall was large enough to hold all

those who came. Therefore, the seminarytrustees provided the initial funds in order toprovide the lectures to a wider audience.[12]

KRE was off the air for several months while theequipment was moved and installed in the churchbuilding, at Dana and Durant Streets. A steeltower was erected, and an L-type wire antennawas strung from the tower to the church steeple.Underneath, a counterpoise was strung in anerratic manner to different parts of the building.[1]

Inside the church, the studio was less thanattractive. The transmitter and studio werecombined into a single compact room behind thepipes of the church organ. A 100 wattbreadboard transmitter was spread around theroom, most of it mounted on top of a kitchentable. The Claremont Hotel was retained as aremote studio and tied to he church by phonelines.

[1]

The station went back on the air in Spring, 1927,under the direction of Lawrence F. Moore. Itshared its frequency with station KZM inHayward, and the two stations alternated on theair several times daily. [9] Programming was amixture of religion and serious music. Where up

to this time KRE's music had been almostexclusively live, music programs were nowstrictly from phonograph records.

By 1929, the year of the Great Depression, theoperation of the station left something to bedesired. Funds were low, and the churchadmittedly knew very little about the operationof a radio station. Finally, the church had decidedit could no longer operate KRE alone. It enteredinto an agreement with KLS in Oakland,

whereby that station would also operate KRE,with an option to purchase it at a later date.However, after about five months, the churchwas not satisfied with the arrangement. KLS wasnot doing a credible job of operating the station,and KRE had received several off-frequencycitations from the Federal Radio Commission.

[3]

Meanwhile, the Chapel of the Chimes, acrematorium and mausoleum in Oakland, wantedto expand the audience for its program of organ
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music being broadcast from the chapel overKTAB in Oakland. Arthur Westlund, presidentof the chapel, arranged with KLS for theprogram to be broadcast simultaneously overKRE. However, after only two broadcasts, KREwent off the air and remained off for three daysbecause of equipment failure. Westlund talked to

directors of the church and found them to beunhappy with the operation of the station byKLS. Westlund offered to operate the stationhimself, and the church promptly agreed. OnJanuary 4, 1930, the Chapel of the Chimes tookover KRE, and Westlund became chairman ofthe church radio committee .[3] Westlund tookupon himself the task of placing KRE back intoefficient operation. And it was a formidable one.According to the lease agreement with thechurch, the chapel would keep all the profits, as

well as absorb any losses. KRE had attemptedlittle on-air advertising up until this time, soWestlund began the station's first full-timeadvertising campaign. At first, he discovered hehad a bad reputation to combat. According toDon Hambly, a KRE employee for many years,"the joke was that the manager would throw hishat into a store, and if it didn't come flying backout, he would go in and try to give a sales pitch.It had that bad of a reputation!" Hambly alsodescribed KRE's transmitting equipment: "It had

a breadboard transmitter scattered all over theroom. To see if you were on frequency, you'dlisten to the thousand-cycle beat oscillator overin the corner. If you wanted to tune thetransmitter, you'd take a pool cue and hit thetrimmer condenser with it, because your bodycapacity would put the transmitter out of tune ifyou got too close. It was a miserable mess" [1]Westlund's Chief Engineer Ad Bideman replacedthe transmitter with a 100 watt DeForest factory-built transmitter. Programming was geared

toward the people of Berkeley. For example,KRE became the official station of the "DailyCalifornian", the University of California's dailynewspaper. This usually amounted to studentHenry Schacht coming to the station everymorning and reading the newspaper on the air forfifteen minutes.[1]In 1931, additional studios were constructed atthe Capwell Central Market in downtownOakland. This was a supermarket owned by

Capwell's Department Store, and located acrossthe street from the store. KRE's studios andoffices were on the mezzanine floor, on abalcony overlooking Telegraph Avenue. Thestation broadcast from here during the daytime,and from the church and rebuilt Claremont Hotelstudios at night. One of the programs emanating

from the Capwell studios during this period waslive country music by the Smokey Oaks HillbillyCowboys.[1,4]

Not too long afterward, the church received apetition from its neighborhood residents,complaining that the studio monitor speakercould be heard all over the neighborhood atnight, through the station's open window. Thechurch asked Westlund to move the studios outof the church. Because they could not use theirCapwells studios at night, this necessitated a

move to a full-time location. In the winter of1933, the studios were moved to the Glenn-Connoly Building on Shattuck Avenue inBerkeley. The transmitter remained at thechurch.

[1]

The year 1934 brought the Communications Act,and with it the Federal Communications
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Commission. Things changed rapidly after that,usually to the little station's benefit. KZM hadleft the air in 1930, but KRE had been given onlyan additional three hours of air time by the oldFederal Radio Commission. In 1934, Westlundapplied to the FCC for full-time operation. It wasgranted, and KRE became the first 24-hour

station in Northern California. Jack Roseberg, aBerkeley college student, was recruited for thefirst all-night position. [1,3]

In 1935, the station was authorized to increase itspower to 250 watts during the daytime, and thestation's engineers constructed a home-brewlinear amplifier. The station continued to operateat 100 watts nights until the winter of 1939,when it was authorized for 250 watts full time. [1]A 1935 ruling by the FCC expressly prohibited

the operation of a radio station under a leaseagreement such as the one between the Chapel ofthe Chimes and the church. Thus, an applicationwas made to the FCC for the sale of KRE toCentral California Broadcasters, a wholly-ownedsubsidiary of the Chapel of the Chimes. The salewas approved in December, 1936.

[9]One of the

terms of the sale agreement stipulated by theCongregational Church stated that certainreligious programs would be maintained by thestation. These continued to be aired for a few

years, until the FCC also declared this to beillegal, ruling that all program material must bein control of the management. [1]Because the transmitter was still located at thechurch, a new transmitter site needed to befound. Westlund decided that the best locationfrom a technical standpoint would be the bayshore. He asked Don Hambly to conduct aninvestigation and find out what Berkeleywaterfront property was privately owned. Hediscovered that the only piece of private property

was at the southeastern edge of the city, and wasentirely under water. As Hambly recalls, theproperty was owned by "two little old ladies.They evidently had to do quite a bit of dickeringto get the property from them"[1]

Thus, KRE acquired the site known as 601Ashby Avenue. The land had originally beentideland, and had been landlocked by the land fillfrom the construction of the bayshore freeway.

The land had to be filled, and management filledonly enough land to hold a building, tower and asmall parking area. This was located in themiddle of the water, and a narrow road was filledin to connect the building to the shore.[1]

The transmitter building was completed in June,1937. It contained the 250 watt transmittermoved from the church, plus audio equipment, asmall control room and a workshop area. A 180-foot self-supporting tower was constructed, andthe station's call letters were mounted on its sidein large illuminated letters. "Broadcasting"

magazine at the time commented, "six miles ofground wire were laid in the salt water near thetower to increase its efficiency." The results werepromising: calls from listeners indicated thatKRE's coverage had nearly doubled.

[1,4]
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Within the following year, the owners beganconstructing studio and office facilities at thesite, turning the existing transmitter building intoa state-of-the-art "art deco" facility. Hamblyrecalled that the sound of pile drivers crept ontothe air quite frequently during this period.Finally, the entire operation was consolidated

under one streamlined roof in November, 1938.[1]

The building was one of the very few in the areaconstructed specially for broadcasting at thattime. It included a control room and large studio,and an elevated announce booth that looked overthe studio from a large bay window. No expensehad been spared in soundproofing the studio.Westlund was a member of the radio committee

for the 1939 World's Fair on Treasure Island, andwas in charge of constructing radio studios at thefair grounds. He had hired some of the nation'stop engineers to design the studio, and managedto railroad them into designing KRE's studio aswell, at no extra cost. It was built exactly to theirspecifications. There was actually a room withina room -- a floating studio. The inner walls of thestudio were insulated from the outer walls by athree inch layer of insulating material. A three-inch thick, lead-lined door was the only access to

the room. It was, at the time, considered a dreamstudio.[3]

However, even a dream studio isn't alwaysperfect, as Herb Caen pointed out in the "SanFrancisco Chronicle" in early 1941. The stationwas located directly adjacent to the SouthernPacific railroad tracks, and the sound of a roaringfreight train would rumble through the studiosseven times daily. It was Don Hambly who

finally conceived of a solution. The railroad wascontacted and an advertising agreement wassigned. Technicians installed a microphone onthe roof of the building. Every time a trainrumbled past the studios, the engineer wouldblow his whistle, and the announcer would fadeout the record and ad lib a Southern Pacific

commercial![10]

KRE's frequency up until this time had been1370 kc. In 1941, the FCC ordered a widespreadre-allocation of frequencies, and KRE moved toits present location of 1400 kc.[4] KRE'sprogramming during these years had evolvedconsiderably. Although still mainly a musicstation, the programming was divided into blocksof different kinds of music. The eveningsfeatured mostly classical music. The afternoons

were devoted to a program called "Open House",hosted by Bert Solitaire, which was an importantpart of KRE for 25 years. This was a jazz requestprogram, emphasizing big band jazz, especiallythe "hot clarinet" sound exemplified by BennyGoodman and Artie Shaw. The organ in theChapel of the Chimes was featured several timesdaily, for fifteen or thirty minute intervals. And,Italian and Portuguese programs were aired fromtwo to three hours daily. Weekends were almostentirely devoted to religious and foreign

language programs.[2]

There was very little news on the air during thisperiod. The format was almost entirely music ofone form or another, with the announceradlibbing informally between records. [2]KRE's music format was a success, and thestation rode the crest of popularity through theforties. After the war, Les Avery joined theannouncing staff, and his evening program ofclassics, "Music of the Masters", developed atremendous following through the late forties and

fifties.[2]

KRE was one of the first stations in the Bay Areato obtain an FM license. It constructed atransmitter site atop Round Hill Mountain in theBerkeley Hills, and KRE-FM went on the airValentine's Day, 1949, simulcasting its AMprogramming on 102.9 mc. The FCC did not yetallow remote control of transmitting equipment,however, so an engineer had to be stationed at
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the transmitter site at all times. [1,4] Publicresponse to FM was disappointing, despite thenumber of stations on the air, and KRE soonfound its FM station to be just an added expense,especially the cost of maintaining an engineer atthe transmitter. Within a year, the transmitter hadbeen moved to the AM site, and the land and

tower were sold to the telephone company.Shortly thereafter, the FCC approved remotetransmitter operation, but KRE-FM had alreadyforfeited its prime transmitter location. [1]

In 1950, a second story was added to the studiobuilding, adding additional needed office space.Stereo became the latest audio craze in 1957, andKRE equipped for stereo broadcasting. It wasone of the first stations in the Bay Area tobroadcast in stereo, transmitting one channel on

AM and the other channel on FM. Thiscontinued until 1959, when FM multiplexing wasallowed. [4]

Disaster struck KRE April 17, 1957. A suddenwindstorm descended upon the Bay Area, anddid considerable damage. KRE operator JackDunn walked out the back door in time to see thestation's tower falling toward him. Luckily, thewind shifted and the tower twisted around andfell in the other direction. It broke off twenty feet

above the base and stuck into the mud like atoothpick. The wind had apparently picked upthe tower by the huge call letters mounted on itsside. [1, 11] The station was off the air for severaldays until a temporary long wire antenna couldbe strung from the building to a nearby telephonepole. The station operated from this antenna forsix months until a new tower was installed. Thecoverage was pitiful, and the station could not beheard with an adequate signal in downtownOakland. [1]

In December, 1961, KRE's daytime power wasincreased to its present 1,000 watts. [4] Up to thistime, the station had been under the continuousmanagement of Art Westlund and the Chapel ofthe Chimes. However, Westlund decided it wasbecoming too formidable a task to try andmanage both the chapel and KRE. And so, onMarch 15, 1963, the station was sold to theWright Broadcasting Company, owners of the

successful New York area station, WPAT,Patterson, New Jersey. Howard Haman becamethe new manager. KRE thus became KPAT onApril 29, 1963, at twelve noon. The format was aduplicate of WPAT -- continuous good music.Programs were divided into six program blocks,titled simple "KPAT Music One through Six".

Each music block was introduced by the tickingof the KPAT metronome.[4] KPAT-FM raised itspower from one thousand watts to fifty kilowattsin December, 1963, and broadcast multiplexstereo for the first time in June, 1966. Toincrease its AM coverage, a taller tower wasneeded. So, in February, 1965, a 449-foot guyedtower was completed. In 1968, San Francisco'sKFRC moved its transmitter to the AshbyAvenue site, and the two stations begantransmitting from the same tower. [4]

KPAT experimented extensively with its formatin the ensuing years, but was not able to gain asignificant foothold in the competitive SanFrancisco radio market. Finally, in 1970, KPATwas sold to Horizon Communications ofCalifornia, Inc. Dale Moudy, manager of KNBRin San Francisco, became the new stationmanager, later replaced by Ollie Hayden. Thestation's new programming was called "RadioEastbay", and in many aspects it recreated the

successful Eastbay-oriented KRE programmingof decades before. On June 11, 1972, KREcelebrated its fiftieth anniversary with a hugecelebration. In an unusual event, the FCC gavepermission to KPAT to revert to its previousthree-letter call sign. So "Radio Eastbay" againbecame KRE, alive and well and living inBerkeley!


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POST SCRIPT: This article was written by the author in 1972, to commemorate KRE's fiftiethanniversary. It was printed in the November 1972 issue of "Performing Arts" magazine. KRE has hadnumerous call letter changes since, becoming KFDN, KBLX, KBFN and finally KVTO.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Interview between Don Hambly and author, Nov. 17, 1970[2] Interview between Les Avery and author, Sept. 24, 1970

[3] Interview between Art Westlund and author, March 23, 1971

[4] "KRE/KPAT History", a term paper by Patrick J. Hilliard Dec. 9, 1966

[5] U. S. Government Callbook", July, 1916

[6] "New York Times" Sept. 24, 1916

[7] "San Francisco Examiner" March 26, 1922

"Radio Service Bulletin", Bureau of Navigation, Department ofCommerce,

May 1, 1922

Listed in "The History of Radio to 1926", by Gleason L. Archer 1938, New York

[8] "Berkeley Daily Gazette" radio column May 20,1922 throughJan. 12,1927.

[9] Congregational Church Board of Trustees minutes. Supplied byEugene Frickstadt, clerk of the First Congregational Church.Minutes for the meetings of Jan. 19, 1927; Feb. 1, 1927; May 8,1927;;

July 10, 1934

[10] Herb Caen, "San Francisco Chronicle" January 14, 1941

[11] "San Francisco Chronicle" April 17, 1957.

[12] Letter to author by George Conklin May 4, 2004

Copyright 1997 John F. Schneider. All rights reserved.

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