Charles Herrold
While at Stanford he was inspired by reports of Guglielmo Marconi's demonstrations that radio signals could be used for wireless communication, and began to experiment with the new technology.
During this time he received further inspiration from the novel Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy, which foresaw the transmission of entertainment programming over telephone lines to individual homes.
[3] Although these broadcasts generated interest among amateur radio operators,[4] especially after they were expanded to include daily weather forecasts and news summaries, the need to learn Morse code greatly restricted potential audiences.
On December 21, 1906, Reginald Fessenden demonstrated an alternator-transmitter of his own design, and one reviewer noted that it was "admirably adapted to the transmission of news, music, etc.
[7] As early as June 1907, a review of de Forest's test of his version of a Valdemar Poulsen arc transmitter noted that "the inventor believes that by using four different forms of wave as many classes of music can be sent out as desired by the different subscribers".
The college's primary purpose was to train radio operators, for handling communications aboard ship or staffing shore stations.
With hopes that they could develop a highly profitable point-to-point "arc fone" radiotelephone, he produced a system with good quality audio—colloquially described as "shaving the whiskers off the wireless telephone"[15]—although relatively low powered.
A number of successful tests for the U.S. Navy were reported, however, a conflict soon arose between Herrold and the company, and in late 1913 he both resigned and sued NWT&T on the grounds that he had not been fully compensated for his time and effort.
[19] Herrold's ultimate transmitter design employed a water-cooled microphone connected to six small arcs burning in liquid alcohol.
A review of a Christmas 1916 concert complimented the good audio quality of the "Herrold-Portal aerial system of telephony", reporting that "It was as sweet and beautiful as if it had been played and sung in the next room".
Moreover, the broadcasts came to an end on April 6, 1917, when all civilian station operations were suspended as a result of the entry by the United States into World War I.
[26] The government eventually adopted a regulation, which took effect on December 1, 1921, requiring that persons wanting to transmit entertainment to the general public had to obtain a Limited Commercial license.
Herrold did not profit financially from his pioneering work, and later became a repair technician in the Oakland, California school district, and a janitor in a local shipyard.
KSFO refused to sell, so CBS purchased KQW and moved it to San Francisco, changing the call letters to KCBS on April 3, 1949.
Although CBS management was not aware of the history of the San Fernando Street address when the move was planned, they quickly recognized and embraced its significance when informed at the bureau's opening celebration.
