Live radio

According to Encyclopædia Britannica, the first transmission sent over radio waves were voice and music signals transmitted in December 1906 from Brant Rock, Massachusetts.

Other experiments in radio before it became part of widespread culture were transmitted including those by Charles Herrold in San Jose, California in 1908.

In 1921, the first live sporting event aired; it was a boxing match with play-by-play by reporter Florent Gibson.

Radio stations had simplistic studios composed of walls covered in burlap for soundproofing, a microphone, and occasionally a piano to fill interludes.

Radio during the Golden Age began to fully develop programs with sound effects, music, dialogue, and narration.

Programming during the Golden Age included comedies, dramas, westerns, horror and suspense shows, science fiction, soap operas, sports, and news.

[1] In the heyday of radio, NBC and CBS built their empire using the mass media and emphasising the value of live broadcasting.

These companies and supporters of the "American system of broadcasting" defined radio as "commercial, national, live, and network on economic, technological, aesthetic and legislative levels."

[3] As popularity of radio grew, networks found that listeners preferred transcription programs recorded on discs more than locally produced live shows.