The Emergence of Community Radio in the United States: A Historical Examination of the National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 1970 to 1990

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The Emergence of Community Radio in the United States: A The Emergence of Community Radio in the United States: A

Historical Examination of the National Federation of Community Historical Examination of the National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, 1970 to 1990 Broadcasters, 1970 to 1990

Michael William Huntsberger

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THE EMERGENCE OF COMMUNITY RADIO IN THE UNITED

STATES: A HISTORICAL EXAMINATION OF THE

NATIONAL FEDERATION OF COMMUNITY

BROADCASTERS, 1970 TO 1990

MICHAEL WILLIAM HUNTSBERGER

A DISSERTATION

Presented to the School of Journalism and Communication

and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon

in partial fulfillment of the requirements

for the degree of

Doctor of Philosophy

Spring 2007

“The Emergence of Community Radio in the United States: A Historical Examination of

the National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 1970 to 1990,” a dissertation

prepared by Michael William Huntsberger in partial fulfillment of the requirements for

the Doctor of Philosophy degree in the School of Journalism and Communication. This

dissertation has been approved and accepted by:

________________________________________________________

Dr. Alan G. Stavitsky, Chair of the Examining Committee

____________________________________________

Date

Committee in Charge: Dr. Alan G. Stavitsky, Chair

Dr. Julianne Newton

Dr. Daniel Pope

Dr. Janet Wasko

Accepted by:

_________________________________________________________

Dean of the Graduate School

iii

An Abstract of the Dissertation of

Michael William Huntsberger for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

in the School of Journalism and Communication to be taken June 2007

Title: THE EMERGENCE OF COMMUNITY RADIO IN THE UNITED STATES: A

HISTORICAL EXAMINATION OF THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF

COMMUNITY BROADCASTERS, 1970 TO 1990.

Approved: __________________________________________

Dr. Alan G. Stavitsky

The National Federation of Community Broadcasters is the oldest and largest

organization of community-oriented, nonprofit radio stations in the United States.

Nevertheless, only a handful of scholars have considered the NFCB and its place in the

history of mass media in the U.S. In the years leading up to and following the

establishment of the NFCB in 1975, the public policy environment that guided the

activities noncommercial radio, and all of American mass media, changed dramatically.

This study provides a historical account of the NFCB during these formative years, and

examines the political, economic, and social forces that propelled the organization during

this period. The study examines the conflicts of idealism and realism, intention and action

that shaped the NFCB in its first years, and delineates the relationship of the NFCB to the

political economy of mass communications media in the U.S. The study explores the role

of dissent in the prevailing political economy of communication, and demonstrates how

issues of power unfolded in one sector of American broadcasting. The study relies on

qualitative and historical methods, employing a combination of document analysis and

in-depth interviews to gain a broad understanding of the origins and evolution of the

NFCB. The study demonstrates the decisive power and control over the political

economy of public broadcasting in the United States held by the U.S. Congress, and the

efficacy of the open marketplace for public radio programming envisioned by the

founders of the NFCB. The study addresses one of the significant historical controversies

in American community radio, finding that contemporary Low Power FM radio services

have benefited from the policies advocated by the NFCB in the 1980s. The study

concludes that community broadcasters provided the talents, knowledge, skills, and

abilities to push public radio in new directions, to become more open to change and more

responsive to listeners. In the process, the National Federation of Community

Broadcasters moved from the margins to the mainstream of public radio policymaking in

the United States.

CURRICULUM VITAE

NAME OF AUTHOR: Michael William Huntsberger

PLACE OF BIRTH: Palo Alto, CA

DATE OF BIRTH: July 11, 1955

GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED:

University of Oregon

The Evergreen State College

University of Colorado

DEGREES AWARDED:

Doctor of Philosophy, Communication and Society, 2007, University of Oregon

Bachelor of Arts, Music Technology emphasis, 1978, The Evergreen State

College

AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST:

Media and Society

Broadcasting History

Media Technology

Communication Ethics

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE:

Instructor, School of Journalism and Communication, University of Oregon,

Eugene, 2003-2007

Graduate Teaching Fellow, School of Journalism and Communication, University

of Oregon, Eugene, 2002-2007.

vii

President/CEO, Media and Communications Consulting, Olympia, Washington

and Eugene, Oregon, 2000-2006

General Manager, KAOS FM, The Evergreen State College, Olympia, WA,

1981-2000

GRANTS, AWARDS AND HONORS

Broadcast Education Association, Abe Voron Scholarship, 2006-07

University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication, Glenn Starlin

Fellowship in Telecommunications, 2005

University of Oregon, Foundation Scholarship, 2005

University of Oregon, Mary E. Russell scholarship, 2003

PUBLICATIONS

Huntsberger, Michael and Alan G. Stavitsky (2007). “The new ‘podagogy’:

Incorporating podcasting into journalism education.” Journalism and

Mass Communication Educator, 61:4, 397-411.

Huntsberger, Michael (2006). “Creativity, free expression, and professionalism:

Value conflicts in U.S. community radio.” Southern Review, 39:2, 44-61.

viii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I wish to express my appreciation to the members of my committee, Dr. Julianne

Newton, Dr. Daniel Pope, and Dr. Janet Wasko, for the guidance and encouragement they

provided over the course of this project. I am especially grateful to my advisor, Dr. Alan

G. Stavitsky, whose patient mentoring and enthusiastic support of my studies inspired me

throughout my graduate career. To all my instructors, advisors, and colleagues at the

University of Oregon, thank you for your contributions to my efforts.

I want to express my gratitude to Carol Pierson and Ginny Berson at the National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, who graciously allowed me to delve into the

extensive records of the NFCB in Oakland, California. Thank you to Tom Connors and

Karen King at the National Public Broadcasting Archive, who hosted my research at the

University of Maryland and provided invaluable assistance in my search for documents.

Thank you to John Crigler for his assistance with locating key historical evidence, and

especially to Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford, who responded to dozens of requests for

information and documentation from their personal records. To all of the people who

consented to be interviewed for this project, thank you for the generous donation of your

time, and your enthusiasm for my research. Without your participation, this project

would not have been possible.

This research was supported by several travel and research grants from the School

of Journalism. Thank you to the members of the Graduate Affairs Committee for your

support. I am particularly grateful for the award of the Glenn Starling Fellowship in

Telecommunications, which allowed me to travel to Maryland and consult primary

evidence that otherwise would not have been available to the project.

Finally, I am grateful to my friends and family for their support of my work, and

especially to my son Eric and my wife Karen for the love and care they shared with me

on every step of this long, complicated, and often arduous journey. Thank you for

making this dream come true.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter

Page

I. INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................1

The Alternative .............................................................................................................2

The Context of the NFCB .............................................................................................5

Significance of the Study ..............................................................................................9

Overview of the Study ................................................................................................11

Notes ...........................................................................................................................16

II. REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE ...................................................................18

Ownership and Control of Mass Media Assets and Structures ...................................18

Historical Development of Noncommercial Radio in the U.S. ..................................22

Community Radio and the NFCB ...............................................................................28

Pacifica ...................................................................................................................29

Community Radio Beyond Pacifica .......................................................................32

Mass Media, Society, and Cultural Studies ................................................................37

Notes ...........................................................................................................................40

III. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS .......................43

An Overview of Mass Communication Theory ..........................................................43

The Political Economy of Communication .................................................................48

Theories of the Community and Broadcasting ...........................................................54

Defining Community Radio ........................................................................................63

Political Economy and the NFCB ...............................................................................67

Research Questions .....................................................................................................68

Notes ...........................................................................................................................70

IV. METHODOLOGY ......................................................................................................74

In-depth Interviews ....................................................................................................75

Chapter

Page

Document Analysis .....................................................................................................78

Organization and Analysis of the Data .......................................................................83

Limitations ..................................................................................................................86

Notes ...........................................................................................................................88

V. A PREHISTORY OF THE NFCB ................................................................................90

Wireless Before World War I, 1900-1917 ..................................................................91

War and Free Enterprise, 1917-1926 ..........................................................................96

Hegemony, 1927-1934 ..............................................................................................101

Dark Times, FM, and War, 1935-1945 .....................................................................104

Lewis Hill and Listener-Sponsored Radio ................................................................106

Milam ........................................................................................................................114

KRAB .......................................................................................................................118

Public Broadcasting ..................................................................................................123

The Sixties ................................................................................................................130

Sex and Broadcasting ...............................................................................................134

Notes .........................................................................................................................139

VI. FROM IDEA TO ORGANIZATION, 1975-1978 ....................................................149

The Gang from Grinnell ............................................................................................149

The NARC ................................................................................................................156

From Columbia to the Capital ...................................................................................162

Open for Business .....................................................................................................170

Participants, Advocates, and Public Radio ...............................................................179

Down to Business .....................................................................................................189

Notes .........................................................................................................................198

VII. THE NFCB MATURES, 1978-1984 .......................................................................206

North to Alaska .........................................................................................................206

Down in the Valley ...................................................................................................211

The Pivotal Point.......................................................................................................219

“There Is a Good Deal to Be Concerned About” ......................................................225

Melt Down ................................................................................................................229

Distinguished Service ...............................................................................................237

Notes .........................................................................................................................240

Chapter

Page

xii

VIII. TRANSITION, CRISIS, AND ACCOMPLISHMENT, 1984-1990 ......................246

Once Again, Alaska ..................................................................................................246

Under (Not So) New Management ...........................................................................252

Channel 6, and a New Plan for Public Radio ............................................................255

Part of the System .....................................................................................................260

The New Team ..........................................................................................................266

“An Outlier in Community Radio” ...........................................................................272

Under New Management ..........................................................................................276

Party of Two .............................................................................................................279

Expansion ..................................................................................................................285

The Public Radio Expansion Task Force ..................................................................288

Notes .........................................................................................................................298

IX. THE PROMISE AND THE PRICE OF POWER .....................................................308

The Mechanisms of Power ........................................................................................308

The View From History ............................................................................................312

Significant Findings of the Study .............................................................................316

Limitations of the Study............................................................................................320

Implications ...............................................................................................................323

Suggestions for Further Research .............................................................................327

Notes .........................................................................................................................329

BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................331

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Recent advances in mass communication technology have made it possible for

millions of people to produce and distribute their own mass media content. With a

personal computer, a microphone, and an Internet connection, it is now possible for

millions of people to record their thoughts, feelings, and experiences and distribute them

over the World Wide Web. Personal, portable computing technology has revolutionized

communication, and empowered citizens around the globe to communicate on a mass

scale.

There was a time when such easy access to communication technology was

unthinkable. In the time before personal computers and public networking, access to the

tools and techniques of media production was available only to the few -- trained and

licensed specialists who had to secure the approval of government authorities before they

were allowed to program and operate radio and television broadcasting facilities. In that

past era, when three national networks dominated the television industry, and scores of

commercial interests controlled hundreds of radio stations, there was practically no

opportunity for ordinary citizens to gain access to broadcast facilities for the purpose of

producing and distributing their own programs. In the 1960s, the voices and images

available to the listeners and viewers of America’s broadcast channels were

overwhelmingly white and male, representative of the views, interests, and concerns of

the nation’s ruling elite.

Between 1970 and 1990, National Public Radio [NPR] emerged as the first

attempt to provide a publicly financed, nationwide, noncommercial broadcast radio

service to the United States. Nearly half a century after the emergence of the “American

System” of advertiser-supported, commercial broadcasting, NPR was established to

produce and distribute information and cultural programming for its member stations

across the country from its headquarters in Washington, D.C.. As cost-conscious

commercial operators shed their news functions in favor of less labor-intensive and more

cost-effective programming alternatives, NPR became the preeminent provider of radio

news and public affairs programming in the U.S. NPR continues this tradition to the

present day, the recipient of numerous citations for journalistic achievement, including

the DuPont-Columbia and numerous Peabody awards.

The alternative

During the same twenty-year period, another organization of noncommercial

broadcasters emerged alongside NPR, intent on developing a national presence for

independent, locally controlled and programmed ‘alternative’ radio services. Unlike

NPR, however, the National Federation of Community Broadcasters [NFCB] remains

unknown to all but a handful of Americans. The members of the NFCB pursued this path

in part by intention, and in part by circumstance. But in spite of its low profile, or

perhaps because of it, the NFCB has played an important role beneath the very public

surface of U.S. mass media through its influence on the nation’s broadcasting policies

and programming. NFCB radio stations were among the first to serve several sectors of

the nation’s increasingly diverse population with news and cultural programming. In

some cases, NFCB stations recognized and served the needs of citizens in isolated rural

area long before their own government identified those needs. Some of the founders of

the NFCB emerged as leaders in the nation’s public broadcasting sector. In the process,

they changed the mission and scope of the American system of public broadcasting. This

study provides a historical account of the early years of the NFCB, from the events that

led to its formation through its first years of operation, and examines the political,

economic, and social forces that shaped the organization during this formative period.

The National Federation of Community Broadcasters is the oldest and largest

organization of community-oriented, nonprofit radio stations in the United States. From

its establishment in 1975, by representatives of a small group of noncommercial

educational [NCE] stations, the NFCB has grown to represent the interests of more than

250 community broadcasting licensees and associated agencies located in nearly all fifty

states and overseas. Today, the stations of the NFCB are “large and small, rural and

urban, eclectic or targeted toward specific communities … distinguished by their

commitment to localism and community participation and support.”

The NFCB has navigated a turbulent sea of change over the past thirty years: The

membership has expanded and diversified, as have many of the individual member

stations. The organization has experienced triumphs and challenges. The public policy

environment that shapes and guides noncommercial radio, and all of American mass

media, has changed. Most significantly, the political, economic, and social assumptions

and conditions that surround and inhabit community radio and the broadcasting industry

have changed dramatically. Nevertheless, only a handful of scholars have considered the

NFCB and its place in the history of mass media in the U.S.

The founders of the NFCB were a remarkable group of broadcast activists. Some

envisioned an opportunity to develop a more democratic form of mass media, bringing

voices that had historically been excluded from broadcast radio – the young, the old,

women, ethnic groups, people of color, and non-English speakers – to the public. Others

wanted to bring radio to geographically isolated areas that were not served by other NCE

stations, or in some cases had no broadcast services of any kind. Some sought to build

independent havens for discussion and experimentation that could exist beyond the

economic and political pressures of the marketplace of U.S. mass media, while others

wanted to secure a viable position for community radio within that marketplace. All of

these individuals brought enthusiasm, determination, and vision to the project of building

a national organization for community broadcasting services. Most of them had little

practical experience with broadcasting and mass media, beyond what they had learned in

their own enterprises. Yet this group built an organization that has propelled American

community radio from an isolated phenomenon in a few localities to a nationwide

presence in scores of communities across the country.

As the organization grew and matured, its leaders implemented a set of goals and

objectives that shaped the development of NCE radio across the country. At the same

time, the nation’s public policy approach to broadcasting experienced a radical shift, as

the practices established in the relatively progressive years of the New Deal, the New

Frontier, and the Great Society sputtered and were finally overtaken by more

conservative, market-centered approaches to mass media regulation and social policy. In

this dynamic period, the NFCB emerged as a force in national policymaking, promoting

an ambitious agenda for change in the designation, allocation, and distribution of

resources for noncommercial broadcasting. Concurrently, NFCB improved the fortunes

of its members, and helped to establish dozens of new community radio services across

the U.S. Yet in hindsight, some of the most vocal and energetic activists in community

radio claim that the NFCB failed in its intended purposes, succumbing to “strong

institutional pressures towards professionalization and bureaucratization, [and]

undermining efforts at grassroots communications.”

iii

This study seeks to untangle the

threads of idealism and realism, intention and action that shaped the NFCB in its first

years, and clearly delineate the relationship of the NFCB to the political economy of

mass communications media in the U.S. The study explores the role of dissent in the

prevailing political economy of communication, and demonstrates how issues of power

unfolded in one sector of American broadcasting.

The context of the NFCB

The NFCB was not the first organization to represent the interests of those who

sought to increase the role of private citizen activists or noncommercial interests in

American radio broadcasting. Though the Radio Act of 1912 excluded amateur radio

operators from broadcasting activities, some organizations continued to lobby

government authorities for increased access to the spectrum for individuals, and

continuing partnerships between amateur, military, and commercial broadcasters.

The

NFCB followed in the footsteps of several organizations that sought to represent the

interests of institutionally based, noncommercial educational broadcasters, including the

National Advisory Council on Radio in Education [NACRE], and the National

Association of Educational Broadcasters [NAEB].

The decade prior to the formation of

the NFCB had seen the passage of the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967, followed in 1970

by the establishment of National Public Radio and the Association of Public Radio

Stations.

Such organizations served the needs of large, well-established NCE stations,

most of them licensed to colleges and universities. The NFCB was created, in part, to

represent a group of stations that did not conform to this prevailing model of NCE

broadcasting.

The Federation began as an initiative of the first National Alternative Radio

Convention, held in Madison, Wisconsin, in June, 1975.

vii

The following August,

representatives of 17 “community-oriented broadcast organizations” met in Columbia,

Missouri, “to create a national organization that would represent their interests at a

national level, provide services that could only be achieved on a cooperative basis and

facilitate an efficient use of their all-too-scarce resources.”

viii

Seeking to improve the

institutional, economic, and political fortunes of “a growing number of non-commercial,

listener supported [radio] stations,” the group established the NFCB to “foster the

development of public policy…seek an equitable distribution of federal funds…facilitate

exchange of program materials…publicize our activities and represent our

interests…[and] assist the organization of new and innovative broadcast stations

throughout the country.”

Guided by this set of ideological and strategic commitments, the NFCB

established offices in Washington, D.C., and Champaign, Illinois, to “represent a spirit

and force that has long been absent from American broadcasting...[and] work for the

growth of vibrant, responsive and human broadcasting.”

The Washington office, under

the direction of St. Louis community radio station manager Tom Thomas and his partner

Theresa [Terry] Clifford, pursued the Federation’s ambitious public policy agenda,

developed in consultation with the organization’s members. The Champaign office,

directed by Thomas’ brother Bill, was the hub of a program distribution service,

acquiring content from producers, duplicating, and disseminating tapes to community

radio stations around the country. These founding executives played crucial roles

throughout the first fifteen years of the NFCB, even after their formal relationships with

the Federation ended.

From the outset, the NFCB faced a host of logistical, financial, and political

challenges. The member stations of the NFCB operated on the margins of American

broadcasting, with little capital, minimal facilities, and small audiences.

Radically

different from the dominant commercial model of broadcast service in both form and

content, many of the Federation’s participants believed that their noncommercial status

would “insulate them from the influence of the profit motive and the capitalist

marketplace, thus enabling them to develop alternatives to the dominant commercial

broadcasting formats and structures.”

xii

Over its first fifteen years, as the NFCB became

a force in noncommercial broadcasting and public policy, the organization would test,

and be tested by, this set of assumptions.

Within months of the organization’s establishment, NFCB took on a host of

thorny internal issues. The members continually wrestled with the terms and conditions

that might characterize community radio and define the appropriate ideological and

practical requirements for membership. Dedicated to the advancement of those who had

historically been absent from radio broadcasting, the organization struggled to find

methods to actualize that commitment in its membership, services, and programs. When

the dues assessed from members proved to be an inadequate financial base, the

Federation’s staff had to develop the skills and expertise with government and foundation

funding opportunities. These issues, and many more, shaped the capacities of the NFCB,

and contributed to the outcomes of the organization’s initiatives.

At the same time, NFCB faced an equally daunting external agenda. In the years

between 1975 and 1990, the NFCB Program Service confronted successive and rapid

developments in technology, as audio distribution moved from reel tape and telephone

lines to digital recorders and satellites. The noncommercial portion of the FM spectrum

became increasingly competitive, as religious, educational, and public radio agencies

maneuvered to occupy available frequencies across the U.S. Concurrently, the

administration of President Ronald Reagan brought wholesale changes to the

government’s approach to the oversight and financing of public broadcasting.

xiii

Some

of the most pervasive change took place at the Federal Communications Commission

[FCC], as Chairman Mark Fowler embarked on a program to systematically deregulate

broadcasting, eliminating such long-standing policies including program documentation

requirements, community ascertainment procedures, and the Fairness Doctrine.

xiv

These

circumstances would fundamentally restructure common understandings of the terms and

conditions that drove broadcasting in the U.S., especially the rhetoric of “the public

interest, convenience, and necessity” that has been part of U.S. communications policy

since the Radio Act of 1927.

Significance of the study

This study is significant for a number of reasons. In general, little scholarly

literature explores the topic of community radio in the United States. Most often, the

topic has been subsumed within the broader study of noncommercial, educational, and

public broadcasting or nonconformist, alternative, and underground radio. Though

alternatives to corporate, commercial broadcasting have existed since the earliest days of

radio, few researchers have chosen to focus on the theory of locally controlled, citizen-

programmed radio, and the stations and agencies that put the theory into practice. A

small body of literature focuses on the Pacifica Foundation and its licensed FM stations

in five major markets, but these studies do not speak to the NFCB specifically, or to the

scores of community radio services in cities, towns, and rural localities throughout the

U.S that are not affiliated with Pacifica. Fairchild examines the broader field of

community radio through case studies in the U.S. and Canada, while a handful of articles

provide survey information about American community radio or examine specific

subtopics, including Mahler, Salter, Barlow, and Bekken.

xvi

A more comprehensive

investigation of the formative years of community radio and the NFCB by Bergethon is

now more than 20 years old.

This study is also significant because it examines a body of evidence that has not

been explored by other scholars. While a few of community radio’s important founders,

most notably Lewis Hill and Lorenzo Milam, have shared their thoughts and experiences

in written and oral forms, the vast majority of those who were present during NFCB’s

formative years have never had the opportunity to share their stories with academic

researchers. Similarly, few researchers have consulted this history as it was originally

documented in the papers and publications of the NFCB, particularly in the periodic

newsletters that have been published regularly since the organization’s inception. This

project seeks to fill in the historical record by consulting, documenting, and interpreting

these primary sources.

Finally, this study is significant because it narrates a history that echoes through

the contemporary emergence of grassroots, Low Power FM [LPFM] radio. Ironically,

the FCC’s efforts in the 1970s to eliminate protections for low power FM signals,

structured in direct response to the concerns of the NFCB, contributed to the public

discontent and disillusionment that spurred the Commission to rewrite interference rules

and create a new class of FM service in 1999.

xvii

Today, these LPFM stations face many

of the same challenges encountered by the NFCB and its member stations in their

formative years, including organizational development, capitalization, public

telecommunications policy, and mission issues. Through the examination of this period

in American mass media history, this study provided insight into the continuing evolution

of LPFM and other emerging grassroots media, such as Internet-based streaming audio

and on-demand audio program production and distribution (“podcasting”).

At a time when historic conceptions of service to geographic localities are being

supplanted by models of pervasive, globalizing media, this study resonates with

contemporary issues in the political economy of mass media.

xviii

In 1975, the NFCB was

established to promote the role of decentralized and independent media in the service of

liberal democratic principles, anticipating the work of contemporary scholars who focus

on concentration of ownership and control, demassification of the audience,

personalization of content, and especially the role of mass media in democratic society.

xix

The NFCB provides a case study of how these issues and principles play out within the

constraints of the marketplace and political system. The NFCB pursued this mission at a

point in history where those constraints were re-forged by a new generation of

policymakers who were dedicated to weakening the ties between government and

broadcasting, and expanding the influence of the market. This unique confluence of

political, economic, and social forces provides the NFCB with a significant place in the

history of mass media in the U.S.

Overview of the study

This project is organized in three sections. Chapters II through IV summarize the

existing literature relevant to the topic, and detail the theoretical framework, research

questions, and research methods employed in the investigation. Chapter V through VIII

take a generally chronological approach to the historical developments that led up to the

establishment of the NFCB, following the evolution of the organization through the

winter of 1990. The final chapter discusses the research findings, the limitations of the

project, the implications of the research for current issues in mass media and

communication, and offers directions for future research.

The literature reviewed in chapter II falls into four broad categories. The review

begins with an examination of work drawn from the body of mass communication

scholarship that examines the ownership and control of mass media agencies and

systems, including the work of Smythe, Murdock and Golding, and Mosco. Building on

this foundation, the chapter surveys efforts to document the history of the radio industry

in the United States, and looks more specifically at the body of scholarly literature on the

history of American noncommercial radio, including the work of Blakely, Rowland, and

Witherspoon, Kovitz, Stavitsky, and Avery. After a brief consideration of literature that

explores other radical and alternative traditions in mass media, the chapter turns to

scholarly efforts to compile the history of community radio in the U.S., including the

studies undertaken by Lasar, Barlow, Lewis and Booth, Walker, and Fairchild. The

chapter closes with a treatment of those studies that treat issues in community radio

within the framework of mass media, society, and cultural studies.

Chapter III details the theoretical foundations of the study, beginning with a

summary of the variety of theoretical approaches scholars have taken to the study of

broadcast media, and asserts the appropriateness of critical political economy as a

framework for the investigation of the NFCB as a public policy advocacy agency. The

chapter develops an operational definition of community radio, and explains how this

definition frames the historical circumstances, issues, and events detailed in the study.

The chapter closes with the statement of the four research questions addressed in the

following chapters.

Chapter IV provides a description of the research methods employed in the

investigation. This project is a historical study, relying on qualitative methods

appropriate for historical research. The study relies on in-depth interviews with 35

individuals who were either directly involved with the establishment and development of

the NFCB, or were engaged in the broader public radio industry in the years framed by

the study. The research also relies on the analysis of more than 4,000 pages of

documentary evidence, including nearly every edition of the periodic newsletter of the

NFCB, published continuously from the organization’s founding in 1975. In addition,

the study examined a variety of contemporaneous documents, including transcripts of

congressional testimony, policy and position papers, meeting minutes, memoranda,

financial statements, annual reports, and other artifacts from the Federation’s annual

conferences and business meetings.

Chapter V offers an historical examination of the issues, events, and people that

contributed to the foundations of community radio in the United States. Between the

invention of radio broadcasting and the end World War II, a succession of educators,

policy makers, and broadcast activists worked unsuccessfully to establish a system of

noncommercial broadcasting in the context of the prevailing American system of

privately owned, advertiser supported radio and television service. With the

authorization of NCE channels in the postwar years, a number of individuals and

agencies worked to finance, build, and operate noncommercial broadcasting outlets,

including the first community radio stations. The work of three pioneers of

unconventional radio services - Lewis Hill, Lorenzo Milam, and Jeremy Lansman –

inspired a generation of radio broadcasting activists to create community radio stations

around the country.

Chapter VI narrates the story of NFCB’s establishment, from the organization’s

founding in the summer of 1975 through the organization’s participation in the second

Carnegie Commission study of public broadcasting. In this period, the key figures in the

founding of the organization began to craft the formative agenda for national policy, and

bring together the resources required to operate a program distribution network for

community radio stations. In this period, the founders established key relationships with

other public broadcasting advocates and agencies, and struggled to address the ambitious

goals of the Federation with meager financial resources. Consequently, the NFCB turned

to outside agencies, including well-established private foundations, to gain financial

support for the organization’s projects and policy agenda.

Between 1978 and 1984, the NFCB became one of the most active agencies in

public broadcasting. Chapter VII discusses the first years of the Reagan administration

and the bold attempts of free market conservatives to deregulate the entire broadcasting

industry and systematically de-fund the American public broadcasting system. In this

challenging environment, the NFCB built a record of success before the FCC on issues of

channel allotment and authorization, and in negotiation with other key agencies of public

broadcasting, especially NPR and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. When a

major debt crisis at NPR threatened to bring down all of public radio, NFCB participated

in the first major restructuring of the public radio system. At the same time, changes in

technology challenged the NFCB Program Service, as distribution moved from tape to

satellite. The chapter closes with the departure of Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford from

the NFCB.

Chapter VIII opens with the NFCB’s difficult transition from the founders to new

leadership. Overseeing the organization from 1984 to 1986, Carol Schatz brought strong

professional skills and experience to the NFCB, but found it difficult to assume the

leadership of the independent-minded members and operate within the severe financial

constraints of organization’s meager resources. In 1986 and 1987, the NFCB was on the

brink of collapse, when key members emerged to take control of the organization, and

found a new leader to take control of the NFCB’s finances and re-energize the

Federation’s policy agenda. Rededicated to the organization’s founding goals under the

leadership of Lynn Chadwick, the NFCB joined other agencies to press the Corporation

for Public Broadcasting for major changes in policy that allowed a more diverse public

radio system to serve more diverse audiences.

The final chapter discusses some of the outcomes of NFCB’s first fifteen years,

and examines the implications of the organization’s history on the present state of public

broadcasting, mass media, and communication. The conclusion outlines the limitations

inherent in the study, and suggests approaches that future research may take to enhance

the findings of the present project, or augment those findings with investigations of

people and issues that deserve more extensive investigation.

While the pressures of the prevailing political economy of the broadcasting

industry in general and of public broadcasting in particular compromised the founding

principles and objectives of the NFCB to some extent, the persistence and

resourcefulness of the Federation’s leaders and members allowed them to accomplish an

ambitious agenda. The history of the NFCB provides a blueprint for those presently

involved in efforts to establish more democratic approaches to mass media that serve the

interests of citizens, rather than the apparent desires of consumers or the profit motives of

commercial interests. In an era when activists call for initiatives at the federal, regional,

and local levels to reform the media and make them more responsible to the civic and

cultural needs of their audiences, the formative history of the NFCB demonstrates that it

is possible for a small group of intelligent, energetic, and committed people to influence

the national expression of public service and the public interest.

CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

The literature relevant to the historical development of the NFCB cuts across four

broad areas of inquiry: (1) The ownership and control of mass media assets and

structures; (2) the historical development of noncommercial radio in the U.S.; (3) the

institutional, political, economic, and social development of community radio and the

NFCB; and, (4) cultural studies of mass media and society.

Ownership and control of mass media assets and structures

Unlike neoclassical economics, which often describes economic activity through

static models, critical political economy examines issues of mass media ownership and

control within the broad, dynamic context of social movements. In particular, political

economy views markets as sites of social interaction and activity, rather than naturally

occurring products of entrepreneurial initiative. By examining the actual processes and

outcomes of economic behavior, political economy calls into question the neoclassical

paradigm of the “invisible hand” that guides market activity.

Smythe (1960), a former Chief Economist of the Federal Communications

Commission, was among the first to apply the principles of political economy to the mass

media sector. For Smythe, the purpose of the political economy of communication was

“to evaluate the effects of communication agencies in terms of the policies by which they

are organized and operated.”

Smythe identified the key concerns as policy on the

quantity and quality of goods or services; policy on the equality in the distribution of

services; and patterns of capitalization, ownership and control. Observing the industrial

history of the American television and film industries, Smythe demonstrated how

ownership interests have asserted control over the market, even as some forms of

operational and program control were exercised in the arena of public policy. Smythe

(1977) also asserted that audiences of commercial mass media content supply content

providers with uncompensated labor, in the form of consumer attention. This attention,

documented by audience research firms, constitutes a commodity that is sold to

advertisers. For Smythe, the primary purpose of this “consciousness industry”

xxi

was to

acculturate audiences into appropriate consumer behavior, for the benefit of media

ownership interests.

Another political economy tradition arises within the context of European

noncommercial, state-owned mass media. Murdock and Golding (1973) observed that

the mass media “can only be understood in the light of historical process and economic

necessity.”

xxii

Looking primarily at print media, Murdock and Golding observed

concentration as evidenced by horizontal (across levels of production) and vertical

integration (into other related areas of manufacturing, production, and distribution). They

also observed the increasing diversification of media enterprises, including cross-

ownership of media properties, and the internationalization of mass media, exporting

media products and gathering foreign investment. They found that these patterns

“establish the general and systematic constraints on information and leisure provision

which result from the necessities of survival and profitability.”

xxiii

The political economy

of mass media constructs information as a commodity, and constrains access to and use

of information by common citizens, thus constraining public debate. While they

identified local press agencies as sites of decentralization and resistance, Murdock and

Golding contended that “much of this remains in the realm of fantasy, part of grasping at

straws of a fighting national press.”

xxiv

Garnham (1986) asserted that the strength of noncommercial media lies in the

separation of political and economic forces. In the political realm, individuals are

defined as citizens, working within a communal structure of rules and laws. The object

of political engagement “is essentially social and the legitimate end of social action is the

public good.”

xxv

In contrast, individuals in the economic realm are defined as producers

and consumers. The object of economic engagement is self-interest, operating towards

the goal of private advancement. Garnham argued that this contradiction cannot be

resolved, and that mass media provide the best example of the contradiction because they

operate in both realms simultaneously. Beyond issues of ownership and control,

Garnham found clashes of value systems and social relations, as state-owned

noncommercial media engage in an accelerating competition with private, commercial

providers.

Beyond simply identifying patterns of ownership and control, Gandy (1992)

asserted the critical approach of political economy is important to identify and explore

“inequality in the provision of information goods and services, distortions in the labor

market, and biases in the coverage of issues of social importance.”

xxvi

Gandy identified

how imperfections in the communications and information markets tend towards

instability, concentration, and monopoly. Further, Gandy contended that the state is

incapable of acting as an objective and unbiased regulator of communications markets

and infrastructures, based on the existence of “a never-ending stream of examples of state

involvement on behalf of particular interests.”

xxvii

And, he asserted, “institutions, not

individuals, are the dominant forces in the political economy.”

xxviii

Mosco (1996) provided a substantive analytical framework for considering the

social, economic and political issues of mass media in modern society. Building on

Smythe’s work, Mosco asserted that content and audiences act as commodities in the

mass media marketplace. Mosco also identified the process of spatialization, or the

ability of mass media enterprises to work across and break down geographic and social

boundaries. In addition, Mosco described the process of structuration, or the media's

ability to manifest, influence, and perpetuate social structures, relationships and classes.

Mosco’s concepts of commodification, structuration and spatialization provide a three-

dimensional map for locating communications in terms of social customs, processes and

practices.

xxix

Peters (1997) examined the relationship between political economy and culture

within the metaphor of the marketplace of ideas. For Peters, the metaphor brings to mind

goods valued or devalued, bought and sold by bare-knuckled entrepreneurs seeking

personal gain through the satisfaction of utilitarian needs. But unlike wheat, corn or

soybeans, ideas are the prevailing currency of communication. More powerful than any

commodity, the essential and critical substance of human communication is simply too

valuable to be subjected to the rough-and-tumble machinations of markets that are never

free or fair.

In his scholarship on alterative media organizations, Hamilton (2000) found that

the issues of commercialism and professionalism represent a “deep and powerful set of

conventions on which capitalist societies rest that alternative media and communication

must resist and absolutely challenge.”

xxx

Calling into question “the corporatized,

professionalized definition of public broadcasting, which casts doubt on just how

participatory and politically vibrant such a practice can be,” Hamilton called for more

democratic forms of communication, characterized by reduced reliance on capital, broad

citizen participation, spontaneous forms of organization, and integration into the common

practices of daily life.

xxxi

“Such goals would help to erase the division between producers

and consumers and become popular means of cultural organizing and exploration instead

of individualized media products to consume.”

xxxii

These insights echo many of the

founding principles of the NFCB.

Historical development of noncommercial radio in the U.S.

The consensus view of American broadcasting, articulated in such survey texts as Head

and Sterling (1998), chronicles the ascendancy of commercial radio, propelled by the

inventions and initiatives of private entrepreneurs and national corporations. In this

narrative, the broadcast media in America “provide the classic example of a

predominantly permissive or laissez-faire system…. The industry argues that resulting

commercialism creates more lively, popular, and expertly produced programs than are

usually found elsewhere.”

xxxiii

Noncommercial broadcasting services have little effect on

this system: The whole of community radio is summarized as “several hundred

noncommercial FM stations and a growing number of low-power AM stations … lumped

under the progressive format, which mixes live and recorded music and talk, usually at

the whim of the presenter.”

xxxiv

Later, Sterling with Kitross (2002) offered a more

generous account of noncommercial broadcasting within this prevailing paradigm.

Beginning with the efforts of educators and other pioneers of wireless communication,

this history documents the many challenges and few successes of American

noncommercial broadcasters in both radio and television.

xxxv

Identifying contemporary

noncommercial services as “the public broadcasting alternative,”

xxxvi

Sterling and Kitross

nevertheless situated noncommercial broadcasting within the market system, as “a

stepchild of commercial radio and television.”

xxxvii

Barnouw’s three-volume history of broadcasting in the U.S. provided a more

detailed and critical investigation of the development of radio and television

broadcasting, from its inception through the postwar period. Barnouw chronicled radio’s

initial technical and institutional development (1966), the rise and consolidation of the

national radio networks (1968), and the prominent transition from radio to television in

public policy and culture (1970). This narrative focuses on contests for control of

American broadcasting, first among government, educational and commercial interests,

and later among industrial interests aided by government regulators. These

circumstances allowed first radio, and then television, to achieve immense popularity and

power as national communications media. While Barnouw’s approach favors industrial

and political movements over sociological effects, the work clearly documented how

industrial power shaped U.S. mass media markets, and demonstrated the difficulties

encountered by noncommercial broadcasters and the FCC, especially under Newton

Minow, to secure spectrum for NCE services.

xxxviii

In the first decade of the 20

century, the invention and development of radio was

undertaken by a variety of academic researchers, and amateur tinkers of all sorts, usually

acting alone, or in small groups. Douglas (1987) documented how private citizens, acting

as amateur radio operators, played a paramount role in the technical and practical

development of radio during this period. Douglas (1999) also demonstrated how radio

was constructed as a male-gendered medium, a characteristic that would become a focus

of the NFCB’s efforts to broaden participation.

McChesney (1993) documented how the interests of noncommercial agencies

were systematically eclipsed by the forces of national, commercial broadcasting between

1928 and 1935, as the U.S. adopted a more comprehensive approach to broadcast

regulation. McChesney particularly cites the Federal Radio Commission’s General Order

40, and the reallocation of more than 90 percent of the spectrum. McChesney explains

that directive, in combination with the FRC’s designation of high power, advertiser-

supported, network-controlled stations as the best expression of service in the public

interest, relegated other services to secondary status as “propaganda” stations. Services

licensed to labor unions, social organization, and educational institutions were forced to

reduce power, share time, and scramble to find financial support for their services.

McChesney demonstrated how the actions of the FRC and private broadcasters

particularly threatened stations licensed to schools, colleges, and universities.

In his consensus history of American public broadcasting, Blakely (1979) offered

a narrative of principled and hardworking individuals who labored for decades to

establish and promote broadcast services that would serve the educational and cultural

interests of American citizens. In Blakely’s history, noncommercial broadcasting

operates beyond the marketplace of mass media, overcoming a series of funding and

operational challenges through partnerships with government and private agencies,

especially the Ford Foundation. These efforts culminated in the passage of the Public

Broadcasting Act of 1967, and the subsequent formation of the Corporation for Public

Broadcasting [CPB], the Public Broadcasting Service [PBS], and NPR.

In the introduction to his edited volume on the state of public broadcasting, Cater

(1976) documented two fundamental, unresolved issues at the heart of the U.S. approach

to noncommercial radio and television services. The first was the Carnegie

Commission’s intention to develop public broadcasting through locally controlled,

independent stations and production centers, in contrast to highly centralized commercial

networks. While such a plan was philosophically sound, in practice it “goes directly

against the laws of broadcast economics, and has set public broadcasting at war with

itself in trying to budget scarce resources.”

xxxix

The second was the haphazard and

generally neglectful approach to long range funding for public broadcasting agencies and

services, and the resultant political pressures that emerged through repeated cycles of

short-term and stop-gap federal appropriations. Asserting that “money seldom comes

without strings,” Cater observed, “public broadcasting’s future weal will lie in being alert

to undue influence from any source.”

These issues of localism and financial control

would figure significantly in the evolution of the NFCB.

While educational broadcasting found support from philanthropic interests in the

postwar period, Rowland (1986) asserted that the reasons behind this support were not

entirely altruistic. While Ford may have been interested in serving the greater good, the

foundation’s grants to educational broadcasters also supported the elitist principle of

cultural advancement, by embracing public television's capacity to expose the masses to

the content of high culture. In turn, some in the philanthropic and educational

communities believed that these influences would contribute to a society of more

educated citizens, who could advance the goals of commercial enterprise in their

capacities as workers and consumers. While private support spurred the establishment of

educational broadcasting facilities, and paved the way for the first public funding of

noncommercial broadcasting facilities in 1962, Rowland echoed Barnouw and

foreshadowed McChesney, asserting that noncommercial broadcasting has historically

been shortchanged by U.S. public policy.

Within their concise history of educational and public broadcasting, Witherspoon,

Kovitz, Avery, and Stavitsky (2000) focused on the conflict that arose in the 1980s

between public broadcasting’s mission-driven services and the desire of public

broadcasters to secure a larger share of the mass media market. While most

noncommercial broadcasters rejected the use of audience surveys and ratings data as

“creeping commercialism,” during this period “CPB and increasing numbers of stations

embraced audience research as a tool for assessing programming and fundraising.”

xli

This issue would be particularly troublesome for the NFCB, pitting those individuals in

the organization who were most committed to overcoming the dominant paradigm of the

market against those who believed survival and prosperity lay with a market-centered

approach.

The issues of localism and local service have been equally difficult for the NFCB.

Stavitsky (1994) documented the shift from services targeted at geographically defined

audiences to those delineated by demographics and psychographics; the parallel

development of the public policy debates that accompanied the historic use of the

spectrum for 10-watt FM stations; and the contemporary debate over spectrum

allocations for Low Power FM services (with Avery and Vanhala, 2001). As an advocate

for public policy, the NFCB was substantially engaged with both of these issues during

its formative years, and both shaped the character and direction of the organization.

A related body of literature explores historical forces and events that contributed

to the broader development of other nontraditional and noncommercial media in the U.S.

Kessler (1984) traced the historical threads of dissident American media from the

founding of the republic through the postwar period. Focusing on the publications of the

utopian socialist movement, abolitionists, suffragists, labor radicals, ethnic communities,

and pacifists, Kessler demonstrated how social and political dissidents have used media

to reach key constituencies, articulate ideology, and expand the marketplace of ideas in

the U.S. These publications presented new ideas to the public, and perhaps more

important, offered a location for identity, expression, and support for disenfranchised

groups and individuals.

Tracy (1996) offered a concise history of the postwar radical pacifist movement,

and the impact that these groups and individuals had on social dissent in the U.S. through

the 1960s. The author asserted that the radicals’ resistance to traditional analysis of labor

and class issues, and traditional leadership structures, privileged an anti-authoritarian

philosophy that became “a key contributory factor in the ultimate unraveling of the

political left in the late 1960s.”

xlii

Tracy briefly records the involvement of Lewis Hill,

who would later establish the Pacifica Foundation, with David Dellinger’s magazine,

Direct Action, articulating Hill’s belief that the American public would never share the

radical pacifists’ goal of nonviolent revolution.

Peck (1985) offered a personal recounting of his involvement with the

underground print media of the 1960s. Underground papers, staffed for the most part by

young, white, middle-class Americans with little background in journalism, offered a

different view of the era’s political turmoil and counterculture movement. But for the

most part these papers, dependent on advertising revenue, failed to attract the audiences

necessary to endure in the marketplace. At the same time, Peck demonstrated how some

of these efforts survived as community media, targeting race, gender, environmental and

other particular issues. Such issue consciousness would shape the NFCB in its early

years, articulated in some cases by individuals who had been a part of the earlier

underground print movement.

Community radio and the NFCB

Few scholars have explored the role and mission of the NFCB. Most often the NFCB is

considered in the context of other noncommercial broadcasting institutions, especially the

Pacifica Foundation.

Pacifica. Founded in San Francisco, California in 1946, the Pacifica Foundation

and its five radio stations have provided both a model and a locus of institutional power

for American community radio, and played a crucial role in determining the nature and

direction of the NFCB. Because the history of the NFCB and Pacifica are intertwined,

this body of literature sheds light on many of the people, events, and issues that shaped

the Federation.

The individual most frequently identified as the intellectual force behind

community radio in the U.S. is Lewis Hill, Pacifica’s founder and the first general

manager of KPFA FM. A radical pacifist who came of age between the world wars, Hill

believed that ongoing dialogue, disseminated over noncommercial radio, could overcome

political and economic differences, and contribute to social consensus. Reasoning that

such a radio station could be financed by voluntary contributions from the audience, Hill

delineated his theory of listener-supported radio in a report to the primary underwriter of

educational and noncommercial broadcasting in the 1950s, the Ford Foundation’s Fund

for Adult Education (1957). The report details Pacifica’s philosophy of citizen-centered

broadcasting, the station’s operations, facilities and programming, and tracks the stations

efforts at “promotion” (fundraising), which had never been attempted in noncommercial

broadcasting. Hill also explained Pacifica’s intention to engage an audience of

individuals through a wide range of programs. Hill’s ideology would infuse all efforts

that followed in American community radio.

Ragan (1963) provided the first descriptive study of the Foundation and KPFA

radio, offering a detailed analysis of Pacifica’s articles of incorporation and by-laws, and

a focused discussion of the advantages and limitations of the listener-supported model.

Concentrating on Pacifica’s economic issues, the study did not touch on the broader

organizational or political issues faced by Pacifica, or on the historical context of the

organization’s development.

Stebbins’ study of Pacifica (1969) concentrated on the organization’s political and

social history, and especially its ongoing difficulties with federal authorities. Utilizing

document analysis and interviews with the individuals engaged at Pacifica stations,

Stebbins documented Pacifica’s engagement with the FCC, the Senate Internal Security

Subcommittee, and other political entanglements. A listener survey documented the

reality of Hill’s listener-sponsor theory and supported the connection between listener

sponsorship and editorial independence.

Lumpp (1978) offered a thorough examination of Pacifica’s place in the broader

scheme of alternative media in the U.S, grounded in communications and social theory.

The study located Pacifica’s ideological and operational characteristics on a twelve-point

continuum to demonstrate how the organization established priorities and reached

decisions, and how these characteristics are played out in Pacifica’s programming,

especially in relationship to labor and free expression issues. While the historical focus is

clearly secondary, the work established the importance and relevance of Pacifica within

the larger framework of mass media and society. Though it is contemporary with the

Federation’s, the work makes no mention of the NFCB.

Concentrating on Pacifica’s contribution to the understanding and interpretation

of the First Amendment, Land (1999) examined Pacifica’s underlying ideology in the

context of moral philosophy. The study covered the pacifist movement, the early history

of noncommercial radio, the establishment of KPFA, and the conflicts and challenges of

the 1970s that led Pacifica away from Hill’s vision of radio dialogue into uncritical,

constituency driven programming. Demonstrating Pacifica’s role as a microcosm of

progressive political movements and a champion of dissent in a democratic society, Land

asserted that passionate speech has the moral and intellectual power to overcome the

brutality of war. The author’s enthusiasm and admiration for the subject were clearly

evident: His analysis of Pacifica’s crusade does not touch on the personal costs paid by

those who were caught up in the organization’s contentious internal battles over elitism,

marginality, and economic survival.

Lasar (2000) offered the most comprehensive history of the Pacifica Foundation

and its five radio stations. The author documented the experiences that contributed to

Lewis Hill’s dedication to the ideal of peaceful dialogue, the ideological nature of

Pacifica, its interpersonal, political, and financial struggles, and the organization’s

emphasis on unfettered personal expression. Based on document analysis and extensive

interviews with Pacifica’s principal figures, Lasar illustrated how patterns of internal

conflict were repeated regularly over thirty-five years. Lasar’s history centers on the

value conflicts that emerge in an organization of idealists, radicals, artists and

professional broadcasters, detailing how Hill’s ideal of dialogic pluralism has been

replaced by uncritical and uncontested advocacy statements from particular

constituencies.

Though none of these studies specifically references the NFCB, they catalog a

body of ideologies and issues that characterize the NFCB and its member stations. In

addition, because the Pacifica Foundation and its five stations marshal substantial

financial resources and serve relatively large audiences in major markets (New York, Los

Angeles, San Francisco, Washington D.C., and Houston), they have had a significant

impact on the Federation’s position and direction throughout its history, particularly after

the Pacifica stations became members of the organization.

Community radio beyond Pacifica. Where Lew Hill promoted the concepts of

voluntary association and listener-supported radio to serve the goals of Pacifica’s

centralized organization, Lorenzo Milam sought to develop noncommercial stations that

would be controlled directly by the communities they served (Barlow, 1988). After

volunteering at KPFA in the 1950s, Milam established a series of volunteer-operated,

noncommercial radio stations across the U.S. in the 1960s and 1970s, operating under

distinctive call signs including KRAB (Seattle); KBOO (Portland); KCHU (Dallas);

KTAO (Los Altos, California); and KDNA (St. Louis); and licensed to nonprofit

organizations with such idiosyncratic names as the Nathan B. Stubblefield Foundation

and the Pataphysical Broadcasting Foundation. In Sex and Broadcasting (1971) Milam

claimed, “broadcasting as it exists now in the United States is a pitiful, unmitigated

whore … perpetuated by nitwits who should know better.”

xliii

Taking broad swipes at

commercial, religious, and educational broadcasters, the FCC, attorneys, and authority in

general through 345 pages of self-published text, Milam nevertheless offered a

comprehensive, step-by-step guide to licensing, financing, building, and operating a

community station that “should be a live place for people to sing and dance and talk: To

talk their talk and walk their walk and know that they (and the rest of us) are not finally

and irrevocably dead.”

xliv

Milam’s mixture of critical understanding, compassion, and

anti-authoritarianism was equally evident in his attempts to convince the FCC to place

limitations on reservations noncommercial spectrum for religious and institutional

broadcasters (as Allworthy, 1975) and in his essays on a variety of topics in radio (1986).

One of the first scholarly and critical discussions of community radio can be

found in Fortunale and Mills (1980), who offer one chapter summarizing issues in

noncommercial radio in the context of a culture dominated by television. Fortunale and

Mills briefly describe Milam’s role as “the resource center of this new radio,” as well as

Milam’s relationship with NFCB President Tom Thomas, one of the key figures in the

history of the organization.

xlv

Fortunale and Mills provide a single paragraph describing

the founding goals of NFCB “to promote sharing of ideas and programs among member

stations and to give those scattered stations a voice in Washington.”

xlvi

The authors

devote the greater portion of their examination to National Public Radio.

Bergethon (1982) compared and contrasted a variety of characteristics of Pacifica

and other community radio stations. Through historical document review, interviews,

and a mail survey, Bergethon described the variety of funding sources, programming,

volunteer involvement, and market characteristics. Noting that the field had been

collectively self-defined, Bergethon relied on the NFCB’s criteria for membership to

structure a scholarly definition of community radio. The result was a self-referencing

descriptive study that invited a deeper investigation of the NFCB and its relationship to

the broader sphere of mass media control.

Barlow (1988) asserted a more ideological definition of community radio, based

on noncommercial status, local involvement in program production, and democratically

governed operating practices and processes. For Barlow, the commonality in U.S.

community radio stations can be found in “the same broadly defined ideological

orientation and … the same social constraints in their day-to-day operations. In addition

to community involvement, their ideology champions progressive politics, alternative

cultures, and participatory democracy.”

xlvii

In this view, the NFCB exists to coordinate

the development of community stations around the U.S., cooperating with NPR in

“something of an unwritten ‘gentlemen’s agreement’ with respect to the demarcations of

the public radio domain.”

xlviii

The tensions observed by Barlow, between artistic and

political motivations, and the clashing styles and objectives of grassroots activists and

national leaders (including the NFCB), form a basis for further investigation.

Bekken (1998) was more outspoken for the ideology of participatory democracy,

and more strident in his criticisms of the institutional constraints that are “reshaping

community radio.”

xlix

In this view, federal policies that encourage signal expansion, local

revenue development, and audience growth have led to circumstances where “it is no

longer possible for many listeners to hope to participate in running their ‘community

radio’ station.”

Bekken was especially critical of the NFCB’s efforts to advance a

“professional broadcasting ideology” on behalf of community radio’s station managers,

at the expense of community activists and volunteers.

Lewis and Booth (1990) investigated the forms and structures of community radio

in many nations, including the U.S. Finding that the purposes of community radio are

generally expressed in commitments to local control, community access (especially for

those who have been excluded from the mass media), and clear statements of intent, they

asserted: “For the NFCB, the key features of community radio can be summarized as: an

element of control by the local community, typically in a board of management; a

commitment to community access, especially for those normally excluded from the mass

media – women, ethnic groups and people of color, the elderly and young people. This

policy implies the use of volunteers. In turn, this requires a training program. Paid staff

and volunteers should have a voice in policy, which implies the definition of a clear

purpose to which all can relate.”

lii

While the authors observed the importance of FCC

Commissioner Nicholas Johnson in advancing the Federation’s media reform agenda

during the 1970s, they were otherwise silent on the institutional development of the

NFCB.

Like Bekken, Fairchild (2001) took issue with the NFCB’s policy initiatives of

the 1980s. Finding fault with NFCB’s cooperation with the FCC, CPB and Pacifica on

several issues, Fairchild claimed that NFCB ignored community radio’s ideological

commitments to grassroots activism, choosing instead to serve “the self-interest of those

who were most able to divide the spectrum up among themselves and influence policy-

makers to transform self-interest into law.”

liii

This “collusion of the FCC, NFCB,

Pacifica, and the CPB on numerous issues is merely symptomatic of a larger split within

and between the progressive media establishment and more locally focused grassroots

agitation.”

liv

Relying on secondary evidence, Fairchild’s analysis focused almost

exclusively on the control of the means of production and the needs of content producers,

while giving less attention to the organizational, financial, and audience service concerns

that formed the foundations of the NFCB.

Similarly, in his historical narrative of alternative, underground, and unlicensed

“pirate” radio on the commercial and noncommercial bands, Walker (2000) briefly

summarized the early evolution of the NFCB, and the Federation’s role in the

“subversion of community radio” by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

While he

acknowledged that the leaders of the NFCB “almost certainly believed that they were

doing what was best,” Walker contended that the Federation’s willingness to

accommodate CPB requirements and directives in order to obtain grants for some stations

exerted a corrupting influence on community radio.

lvi

Asserting that NFCB “sometimes

seemed to be lobbying for the Beltway’s interests inside community radio,” Walker

demonstrated how “federal aid has brought with it incentives to professionalize, to

centralize, to homogenize. Whatever its effect on individuals stations, its net effect on

community radio has been poor.”

lvii

However, Walker limited his investigation to

particular sites of ideological conflict, giving less attention to the broader landscape of

political, economic, and social forces that were at play within the NFCB during the

period from 1975 to 1990.

Mass media, society, and cultural studies

The social and cultural consequences of mass media, and radio broadcasting in

particular, have captured the attention of communication scholars for a century. This

body of research examines the relationships that exist among ideology, content, audience

experience, and the meaning found in mass media content.

Dewey’s (1925/1988) theory of knowledge centers the processes of

communication in the human imagination. For Dewey, the process of receiving and

interpreting messages in the imagination “terminates in a modification of the objective

order, in the institution of a new object that is other than a merely added occurrence. It

involves the dissolution of old objects and a forming of new ones in a medium which,

since it is beyond the old object and not yet in a new one, can properly be termed

subjective.”

lviii

Put another way, imagination is the medium where the non-narrative

sensory data of daily life are captured and rearranged into patterns of understanding,

making imagination both the site and the agent of new knowledge. This process makes

communication, “the tool of tools,” capable of reordering perception and altering

knowledge.

lix

In this view, communication fundamentally shapes community and social

intercourse, and provides the bedrock of participatory democracy. Concurrently, Dewey

(1927) conferred power to the spoken word, conversation, and dialogue:

“The connections of the ear with vital and outgoing thought and emotion are

immensely closer and more varied than the eye…. There is no limit to the liberal

expansion and confirmation of limited personal intellectual endowment which

may proceed from the flow of social intelligence when it circulates by word of

mouth from one to another in the communications of the local community.”

These sentiments presaged Lew Hill’s ideology of dialogue and community building.

Where Dewey was enthusiastic about the democratic capacities of

communication, the scholars of the Frankfurt School, as demonstrated by Adorno and

Horkheimer (1947), were fundamentally elitist and pessimistic in their considerations of

culture, society, and radio in particular, which “turns all participants into listeners and

authoritatively subjects them to broadcast programs which are all exactly the same.”

lxi

By turning the products of artistic processes, particularly music, into commodities of the

mass market, “the fusion of culture and entertainment that is taking place today leads not

only to a deprivation of culture, but inevitably to an intellectualization of amusement.”

lxii

Echoing the concerns for public access and free expression that emerged in the U.S. in

the 1920’s, they noted how “private broadcasters are denied any freedom. They are

confined to the apocryphal field of the ‘amateur’, and also have to accept organization

from above,” prohibiting “any trace of spontaneity.”

lxiii

Such concerns reverberate with

the NFCB’s efforts to expand the role of private citizens as producers, and bring

authentic voices to the broadcast spectrum.

Williams (1961) asserted that the understanding of any culture begins with the

discovery and understanding of the patterns of belief and behavior that characterize its

members. Analyzing the development of mass communication, in the form of the written

and printed word, and its relationship to the development of culture, Williams contended

that the process of communication forms a circulating narrative that transforms unique

individual experience into the collective cultural knowledge. For Williams, the

institutions and structures of political economy are one part of the larger fabric of many

cultural conventions. Williams asserted that the American system of corporate,

commercial mass media leads to “massification,” dividing culture into powerful elites

and an apathetic, disengaged public.

lxiv

Williams contended that public broadcasting in

the United States operates “in the margin, or as a palliative,” rather than a primary

service.

lxv

Unlike Williams, Hoggart (1972) was concerned with manifestation and variety

of culture reflected in forms of speech. In his comparative study of the British

Broadcasting Company [BBC] and the common speech of citizens in several areas of

Great Britain, Hoggart explored the multiple meaning contained in spoken language,

asserting that “inside our own society … we have a code book for reading the signals that

society provides.”

lxvi

Hoggart criticized the noncommercial BBC as an elitist institution

for its isolation and its lack of connection with the daily experiences of common citizens.

In his critique of broadcasting, Hoggart called for institutions that were insulated from the

political system, encouraging artistic and intellectual freedom and a diversity of voices.

These sentiments would later emerge in the early rhetoric of the NFCB.

Representing a second generation of Frankfurt School critical theorists, Habermas

(1962/1991) examined the relationship of the state and civil society, and the origins of

democracy. Habermas asserted the progressive power of intersubjective communication

in the public sphere, a conceptual space where individuals come together to discuss and

work out social problems. Habermas viewed the public sphere as an extension of the

private realm of the family, and as a mechanism to defend the private citizen from the

power of the state. For Habermas, the media exist to capture and distribute information,

in order to both document and inform the public sphere, rather than distracting the public

from engagement with powerful elite interests.

Hilmes (1997) specifically applied these cultural studies perspectives to the

historical development of radio in the U.S, examined as set of social practices. Building

directly on the legacy of Dewey, Williams, Hoggart, and Habermas, Hilmes

demonstrated that “radio was in many ways unique from any preceding or subsequent

medium in its ability to transcend spatial boundaries, blur private and public spheres, and

escape visual determinations, while still retaining the strong element of ‘realism’ that

sound – rather than written words – supplies.”

lxvii

Processed in the human imagination,

these elements create the basis for the sort of community that the founders of the NFCB

envisioned through their collective activities.

While this body of cultural studies literature offers powerful insights into the

relationships of mass media producers, content, and audiences, it also touches on

considerations that go far beyond the NFCB’s role as an institution of public policy.

CHAPTER III

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS

Though the National Federation of Community Broadcasters is closely associated

with many agencies of the mass media, the NFCB has never owned and operated

broadcast stations, engaged in the production of programs, or distributed content to

consumers. Rather, the NFCB is primarily an advocacy agency, created to serve the

needs and advance the interests of its constituent members. Those members, in turn, are

mass media agencies, or more specifically, nonprofit, noncommercial, broadcasting

stations controlled and programmed by groups of citizens, generally described by

circumstances of geography. Given this unique and complex relationship, a wide range

of theoretical approaches could be appropriate to consider the people, events, and issues

that characterized the NFCB in its formative years. This chapter summarizes these

approaches, and asserts a framework based on the political economy of communication

as the most suitable for analyzing the forces that shaped the NFCB between 1975 and

1990. The framework provides the basis for a series of questions that guide the research

and support the overall purpose of the study.

An overview of mass communication theory

In the first four decades of the 20

century, as the phenomenon of radio

broadcasting developed rapidly from experimentation through maturity to become a

dominant social force, scholars of philosophy, sociology, and political science offered

numerous theories to account for the medium’s power and influence. Ranging from the

functionalist explanations of Cantril and Allport to the searing critiques of Adorno and

Horkheimer, scholars explored radio’s capacity for shaping and guiding public

perception, sentiment, and understanding. Encouraged and underwritten by

Westinghouse, the Columbia Broadcasting System, and other privately held industrial

concerns eager to expand their audiences and their advertising revenues, research in the

United States focused on marketing and audience behavior, with less consideration of the

more complex issues of ideology, representation, and social control.

lxviii

It was only after

World War II that scholars turned their attention to the nature, function, and influence of

radio broadcasting organizations and institutions. By that time, the dominant forces in

American broadcasting – especially the commercial networks, and the regulatory

structures that supported them - were firmly cemented in the political, economic, and

social architecture of the U.S.

Peters describes three broad traditions in the scholarship of mass communication

theory.

lxix

Each draws on previous work in other disciplines, and all three approaches

have been employed to scrutinize the radio medium. The first, the liberal social science

tradition exemplified by the research of Lazersfeld, Katz, and Merton, considers

communication and interpretation as phenomena of a consensus social reality, built on

Lasswell’s linear model of information transmission and reception. Firmly associated

with quantitative methodologies, this body of effects-oriented literature shares a pluralist

view, “that the ‘power’ of media rises and falls, conceptually, as a function of the

importance attributed to the intervening processes of selectivity and interpersonal

relations.”

lxx

This body of functionalist theory can be characterized by investigations of

such topics as persuasion (Katz and Lazersfeld, 1955), diffusion (Rogers, 1962), agenda

setting (McCombs and Shaw, 1972), and uses and gratifications (Blumler and Katz,

1974). Though very narrowly applied, evidence of the effects tradition can be found

today in the quantitative audience studies conducted by the Nielsen and Arbitron

companies, and in the efforts of public radio and television broadcasters to understand the

behaviors of the noncommercial audience, as documented by Stavitsky (1993, 1998).

These approaches to research wield “additional power in the realm of noncommercial

media,” asserts Stavitsky, where “the broad application of audience research reflects the

tension between the imperatives of those who fund the service, whether they be

consumers or corporations, and traditional conceptions of public broadcasting’s social

role.”

lxxi

The second tradition, distinguished by the work of Dewey, Park, and Carey,

emerges from the foundations of social philosophy and cultural studies. Grounded in

theories of epistemology and social anthropology, this body of theory considers

communication and interpretation as phenomena of cultural meaning making. Using

qualitative methods pioneered by the Chicago School to undertake the open-ended,

interpretive analysis of complex social relations, these scholars explore the relationship of

communication to the development of culture, through investigations into such topics as

symbolic interaction (Blumer, 1969) and cultivation (Gerbner, 1967). In the present day,

these interpretive traditions and techniques have been co-opted into the service of

marketing research by Accudata and other firms to investigate audience loyalty to

particular communication channels and programs. However, broadcasters have rarely

exhibited an interest in applying these traditions to more fundamental questions related to

the efficacy of communication systems.

The third tradition, characterized by the scholarship of Adorno, Williams, and

Smythe, builds on the keystones of ethics and social philosophy; and political, economic,

and social criticism. Originating in schools of European literary and cultural scholarship,

the body of critical theory focuses on mechanisms of social and cultural control, through

critical examinations of the ideology of capitalism and the hidden assumptions of liberal

pluralism. Grounded in socialism or Marxism, the critical approach to mass

communication relies on interpretive and historical methods to delineate and explain

manifestations of power and resistance across the contested landscape of social reality.

All but absent from contemporary industrial research, the critical perspective continues in

the present day through the academy, broadly considering aspects of the control,

production, distribution, reception, and use of mass media.

McQuail subdivides the body of critical theory between “culturalist” and

“materialist” perspectives.

lxxii

Within the culturalist approach, McQuail identifies those

theories that give primary attention to “the subjective reception of media messages as

influenced by the immediate personal environment,” and “the influence of social factors

on media production and reception and the functions of media and social life.”

lxxiii

The

cultural studies approach is characterized by audience-centered examinations of the

content and reception of media messages. In contrast, within the materialist perspective,

McQuail identifies those theories that give primary attention to “the structural and

technological aspects of the media,” and “the political-economic and material conditions

of the society.”

lxxiv

The political economy approach is characterized by studies of the

structures and technologies of the media of mass communication, with particular

attention on markets, ownership, and the means of production.

A substantial body of critical cultural studies scholarship emerged from the

United Kingdom during the post-World War II era, asserting that the structures and

functions of communication and artifacts of mass media are manifestations of the

ongoing processes of human culture. These scholars, and their successors, locate the

power of meaning making primarily with the members of the audience, who are actively

engaged in the reception, interpretation, and utilization of mediated texts. Williams

(1961) explored the historic development of mass media as a cultural force,

demonstrating that individuals have always folded the content of mass communication

into the fabric of daily life. Similarly, Hoggart (1972) observed the processes of common

language use within local communities to demonstrate how the mass media (and

particularly the British Broadcasting Company) was actually integrated into the reality of

daily life in Britain. Within the Birmingham School, Hall (1980) studied the process of

reception in detail, theorizing that the audience has the capacity to construct preferred,

negotiated, or opposing meaning in media messages. While the body of critical cultural

theory offers powerful insights into the relationship of audiences to media content, such

reception-focused investigations offer less insight into the structures and processes that

make it possible to bring content to the audience, or perhaps more significantly, assure

that audiences are available to receive and influence that content.

Developed concurrently during the postwar era, the scholarship of critical

political economy brings the issues of production and distribution to the forefront, by

focusing on the agencies of mass communications, and their capacity to propel the

processes of meaning making through the establishment, extension, and perpetuation of

power. Built on the foundations of classical political economy and history, the political

economy approach examines the mass media of communication as a function of the

economic base, focusing on the institutions and infrastructures that create and control

mediated content, direct and constrain the choices of the audience, and ultimately exert

power over society and culture.

The political economy of communication

The study of political economy encompasses the broad consideration of the

manifestations, measures, and relationships of power within and across social institutions.

Domhoff describes power as the ability “to realize wishes, to produce the effects you

want to produce. It is one of the basic dimensions of all human experience, whether at

the interpersonal, group, or societal level.”

lxxv

With respect to the mass media, the theory

of political economy provides a framework for understanding power within and among

media institutions, their functions, their relationship to other social institutions, and the

role these media institutions play in shaping and focusing social, political and economic

power. The theory of political economy investigates the power of individuals, agencies,

and institutions to instigate, finalize, or implement decision-making processes that carry

consequences for other individuals, agencies, and institutions, and particularly examines

the role of the state as an agent of political, economic, and social power. These

examinations explore how power influences relationships across social classes and

groups “by determining who successfully initiates, modifies, or vetoes policy

alternatives.”

lxxvi

In the years leading up to World War II, Adorno and the scholars of the Frankfurt

School of Applied Social Research, working within the context of Marx’s theories of

political economy and history, turned their critical attention to the emerging phenomenon

of radio. Drawing on Durkheim's conceptualization of the mass society, and the historic

European traditions of elite arts and culture, Adorno criticized the use of radio technology

for the distribution of products of mass culture, specifically popular music, to a mass

audience, and the inconsiderate intrusion of radio programming into the fabric of

society.

lxxvii

Concerned about the diffusion of the commercially produced music through

markets controlled by private capital and the state, Adorno warned that “light music”

could be “perceived only as background,” leading to “declining taste” and contributing

nothing to the advancement of culture. Adorno articulated the establishment of the

"culture industry," where objects of personal expression and art were recast as packaged

goods to be bought, traded, and sold in commercial markets.

lxxviii

Though Adorno’s

dichotomy of high art versus mass culture now seems old fashioned and antidemocratic,

his critical theory remains relevant for its articulation of the conflict between personal

expression and industries of mass communication.

Echoing Adorno’s insights into the relationship of producers, content, and

audiences, Smythe offered a more specific account of the political economy of mass

communication, focusing on “the structure and policies of these communication agencies

in terms of the policies by which they are organized and operated.”

lxxix

Smythe identified

four key policy areas that recur across cultures: 1) Policies governing the production of

goods and services (“the ‘what goods and services’ and, in part, ‘for whom’

questions”)

lxxx

; 2) policies governing the availability of communication services or

goods, as influenced by intervening factors such as geography or social class; 3) policies

governing the quality of goods and services, such as professional standards and practices,

or aesthetic criteria, and; 4) policies governing the allocation and distribution of goods

and services, and particularly the equality of services available to individuals. Applying

this framework to the U.S., Smythe observed that the early radio industry revealed an

“ambiguous pattern of basic economic control being vested in industrial empires of

electronic equipment manufacturers, while operational control of program and business

policy matters was subject to public regulation.”

lxxxi

In this view, Congress in 1927

created a system of public policies that envisioned widely distributed, easily accessible

broadcast services emerging from profit-making industrial structures capable of exerting

control across the four aspects of production, distribution, access, and quality.

Building on this framework, Smythe subsequently offered a detailed account of

the role assigned to audiences by industrial interests. Examining the relationship of

commercial media enterprises, advertisers, and mass media consumers, Smythe theorized

that the primary product of mass media was the uncompensated labor of audience

members, acquired, marketed, and sold by newspapers, television networks, and other

content providers to advertisers. In Smythe's model, the reception activities of the

audience provide data for mass media companies. Packaged and sold in the advertising

market, audience research carries a high value for suppliers of products and services,

eager to gain insights into consumer perception and differentiate themselves from

competitors. The audience performs two essential economic functions, as a market for

consumer products and services, and a primary product of the mass media industries.

These industries “produce people in audiences who work at learning the theory and

practice of consumership” and “produce public opinion supportive of the strategic and

practical policies of the state.”

lxxxii

Those “strategic and practical policies” include the

regulations that specify the availability, allocation, and socially acceptable use of the

electromagnetic spectrum for radio broadcasting.

Examining the capacity of mass media to influence both public perception and

public policy, Murdock and Golding contended, “it is not sufficient to simply assert that

the mass media are part of the ideological apparatus of the state; it is also necessary to

demonstrate how ideology is produced in concrete practice.”

lxxxiii

In this view, mass

communications are simultaneously integrated into the industrial economic base, and the

ideological superstructure. Criticizing Smythe’s “preoccupation with the relations

between communications and advertising,” Murdock offered the alternative view that the

industries of mass media “are in the business of selling explanations of social order and

structured inequality and packaging hope and aspiration into legitimate bundles. In short,

they work with and through ideology – selling the system.”

lxxxiv

Observing that Smythe

had almost entirely overlooked non-advertising based media, Murdock demonstrated how

noncommercial media, particularly state-operated concerns such as the BBC, “relay the

ideologies that legitimate them.”

lxxxv

With specific regard to the products of mass media,

these ideologies also serve to frame the limits of socially acceptable programming and

presentation.

For Murdock and Golding, the complex relationships of state policies and

industrial structures exist to perpetuate four fundamental characteristics of modern mass

communication: 1) Growth, which sustains the economic vitality of capitalist enterprises;

2) consolidation, or the ability of these enterprises to capture, focus, and expand the

processes of power; 3) commodification, or the ability to constitute mediated messages as

goods for the markets of commerce, and 4) state intervention and control, which

legitimates the previous characteristics.

lxxxvi

Applied to the ideal of an accessible and

democratic system of mass communication, these characteristics provide “the basic

yardstick against which critical political economy measures the performance of existing

systems and formulates alternatives.”

lxxxvii

In addition to the processes of commodification, Mosco’s analysis of the political

economy of communication identified the forces of spatialization and structuration in the

political economy of communication.

lxxxviii

Spatialization expands the notions of

horizontal integration and power consolidation, incorporating concepts of geography and

sociology into political economy to examine “the decline of time-space dependency” and

“focus on the growth of time and space as elastic resources.”

lxxxix

Arguing for a wider

view of concentration, Mosco contends that this “broader form of concentration analysis

shifts attention from the sheer number of conduits into a market, to the diversity of

content provided by whatever number of channels.”

Within this argument, Mosco

discusses the industrial practice of building strategic alliances based on cross ownership

among enterprises with shared goals and objectives, often with the encouragement of

state regulators, and points specifically to the intervention of the state in the creation of

the Radio Corporation of America.

xci

For Mosco, the processes of the state are

“important for creating the form of regulation that governs industry and the social field,

including oppositional forces with a relationship to the industry” [emphasis added].

xcii

Mosco describes structuration as “the process by which structures are constituted

out of human agency, even as they provide the very medium of that constitution.”

xciii

Specifically, structuration is the systematic ability to manifest, influence, and perpetuate

social structures, relationships, and classes through the instruments of the state and the

media. For Mosco, the mechanisms of structuration are specifically historical, arranging

resources in a manner that grants power and privilege to particular groups, especially

along the lines of social class. Mosco points to adjustments of U.S. communications

policy in the 1980s as an example of the power exerted by commercial interests over

noncommercial media:

This [class power] was reflected in noncommercial electronic media as

government funding for public broadcasting eroded, forcing the system to greater

reliance on corporate support that introduced a significant degree of market power

(including the first real advertisements) to what was largely a system whose

program decisions, though regularly contested, nevertheless reflected public

concerns that addressed people as citizens and not just as consumers. With a

greater reliance on corporate and charitable giving, public broadcasting came to

embrace the programming interest of those class constituencies that took up more

of the funding responsibility.

xciv

Through this case, Mosco provides a concrete illustration of Smythe’s

characterization of the allocation of communications resources within the realm of

politics. Garnham identifies this as the problem of “universalism. I mean by this that the

scope of a political decision structure must be coterminous with the scope of the powers

it aims to control.”

xcv

For Garnham, the scale of state and industrial power far exceeds

that of citizens in modern democratic political systems. Arguing that processes of

democracy depend on the participation of informed citizens across all sectors of society,

Garnham asserts that the more appropriate role for mass communication is to act as a

bridge between the spheres of private and public life.

In summary, the scholars of political economy demonstrate how the forces of

commodification, spatialization, and structuration, operating through the agencies of the

state and private capital, constrain the production and distribution of mass

communication. Contrary to neoliberal economic theories, political economy scholars

contend that the there is no ‘invisible hand’ guiding the exchange of goods, services, and

ideas in the free markets of mass communication. Rather, the ability to constitute, direct,

and extend the power of mass communication is held by state and commercial interests,

whose authority and influence constitute “the common sense, taken-for-granted reality in

society.”

xcvi

Taken together, these aspects of the political economy of communication

form a broadly appropriate theoretical framework for considering the complex

interactions of the agencies of community radio, the state, the broadcasting industry, and

the audiences they are intended to serve.

Theories of the community and broadcasting

Writing at the dawn of the popular radio era, Dewey’s broad theory of knowledge

considered human communication to be a key element in the formation and development

of culture and political life. For Dewey, the terms common, communication, and

community shared much more than a Latin root: They were manifestations of the

malleability of human thought, and the complexity of shared meaning. Forming “the

natural bridge between existence and essence,”

xcvii

communication supplies “the tool of

tools,”

xcviii

capable of turning the phenomena of the external world into objects of

knowledge with meaning “which are infinitely more amenable to management, more

permanent, and more accommodating, than events in their first estate.”

xcix

Dewey contends that the nature of reality is fundamentally indeterminate to the

individual. The process and the resolution of meaning making takes place through the

shared practices of communication, which allow human beings to develop a common

understanding of a reality. Only through the act of communication can people make

sense of the world, and create culture: “When the introspectionist thinks he has

withdrawn into a wholly private realm of events disparate in kind from other events,

made out of mental stuff, he is only turning his attention to his own soliloquy.”

For

Dewey, “soliloquy is the product and reflex of converse with others; social

communication is not the effect of soliloquy.”

Dewey locates the process of meaning

making in conversation: “If we had not talked with others, and they with us, we should

never talk to and with ourselves. Because of converse, social give and take, various

organic attitudes become an assemblage of persons engaged in converse, conferring with

one another, exchanging distinctive experiences, listening to one another, over-hearing

unwelcome remarks, accusing and excusing. Through speech,” asserts Dewey, “a person

dramatically identifies himself with potential acts and deeds; he plays many roles, not in

successive stages of life but in a contemporaneously enacted drama. Thus mind

emerges.”

cii

For Dewey, acts of communication are the first and foremost step in the processes

of public participation, community building, and democracy. As in the family and the

neighborhood, Dewey asserts that the foundations of community making reside in face-

to-face intercourse, where the intimacy of exchange leads to shared views and deeply

held feelings of attachment:

A man who has not been seen in the daily relations of life may inspire admiration,

emulation, servile subjugation, fanatical partisanship, hero worship: but not love

and understanding, save as they radiate for the attachments of a near-by union.

Democracy must begin at home, and its home is in the neighborly community.

ciii

Dewey was particularly sanguine about the capacity of spoken language to close

the gaps of human perception and build bridges of common understanding. Unlike

written speech, the continuous and dialogic qualities of conversation allow for the

ongoing and cumulative transmission of knowledge and ideas, delivered directly to the

locus of understanding free from the objectified and mediating interference of the printed

word:

The connections of the ear with vital and outgoing thought and emotion are

immensely closer and more varied than the eye. Vision is the spectator; hearing is

the participator. Publication is partial and the public which results is partially

informed and formed until the meanings it purveys pass from mouth to mouth.

Dewey believed “there is no limit to the liberal expansion and confirmation of limited

personal intellectual endowment which may proceed from the flow of social intelligence

when that circulates by word of mouth from one to another in the communications of the

local community.”

civ

The exchange of spoken thought, Dewey asserted, gives “reality to

public opinion. We lie, as Emerson said, in the lap of an immense intelligence. But that

intelligence is dormant and its communications are broken, inarticulate and faint until it

possess the local community as its medium.”

Dewey’s theories of communication and public experience provided the

philosophical bedrock for the scholars of the Chicago School: Embracing the biological

concept of human ecology, Park and Burgess defined community in terms of territorial

organization and mutually interdependent relationships.

cvi

This simple but elegant

definition embraces all of the qualities asserted by later social theorists, and by social

activists who would attempt to manifest Dewey’s ideals of dialogic communication and

community building through the instrument of radio broadcasting.

Habermas (1991) locates the origin of public participation in the polis of the

Greek city-state, “constituted in discussion (lexis), which could also assume the forms of

consultation and of sitting in the court of law, as well as common action (praxis), be it the

waging of war or competition in athletic games.”

cvii

Participation in the political

activities of the polis was dependent on citizenship, conditioned by the ownership of

property, and the necessity of controlling an autonomous private household (including

slaves, whose labor freed the members of the polis from the requirement to perform

productive labor). The open, unrestricted discourse of citizens in this public sphere

constituted the only discursive form of participation in the processes of civil society, in

contrast with the mechanisms of the state and the marketplace. In the seventeenth and

eighteenth centuries, as the growing power of mercantile capitalism made possible the

accumulation of personal wealth independent of state-sanctioned land grants, the locus of

personal freedom and opinion development shifted from the public sphere to the private

realm of the household and family, establishing an oppositional relationship between the

interests of the state and the interests of citizens. This opposition is crucial to Habermas’

conceptualization of modern public discourse:

Because, on the one hand, the society now confronting the state clearly separated

a private domain from public authority and because, on the other hand, it turned

the reproduction of life into something transcending the confines of private

domestic authority and becoming a subject of public interest, that zone of

continuous administrative contact became ‘critical’ also in the sense that it

provoked the critical judgment of a public making use of its reason.

cviii

Crucial to the constitution of this bourgeois public sphere was the emergence of

an independent press, capable of reporting to citizens on the political affairs of the state

and civil society. But, as the functions of the press evolved from observation and

reporting to commentary and criticism, the private owners of the press themselves

became participants in the political discourse of the public sphere:

As soon as privatized individuals in their capacity as property owners ceased to

communicate merely about their own subjectivity but rather in their capacity as

property owners desired to influence public power in their common interest, the

humanity of the literary public sphere served to increase the effectiveness of the

public sphere in the political realm. The fully developed bourgeois public sphere

was based on the fictitious identity of the two roles assumed by the privatized

individuals who came together to form the public; the role of property owners and

the role of human beings pure and simple.

cix

Concurrently, the communicative abilities of the press objectified the people,

products, and manifestations of political and social life through the processes of reporting

and criticism - publicity. In Habermas’ view, the continuing influence of pervasive

publicity (particularly advertising) has transformed the public sphere from a site of

citizenship to a site of consumerism, particularly in regard to political participation:

Because private enterprises evoke in their customers the idea that in their

consumption decisions they act in their capacity as citizens, the state has to

‘address’ its citizens like consumers. As a result, public authority too competes

for publicity.

Habermas’ theory of the ideal public sphere envisions authentic communication

as the center of a rational-critical discourse, leading to social integration rather than

domination. Commenting on this ideal, Calhoun (1997) asserts, “communication, in this

context means not merely sharing what people already think and or know, but also a

process of potential transformation in which reason is advanced by debate itself.”

cxi

Though he criticizes Habermas for the inconsistencies in his historical representations of

the public sphere,

cxii

and his “tendency to dichotomize public and private,”

cxiii

Calhoun

concludes that Habermas’ strong normative view of “the public” provides a robust and

viable framework for critical study, including the consideration of citizen-centered

broadcasting.

Head, Sterling, Schofield, Spann, and McGregor (1998) assert “to broadcast

means to send out sound and pictures by means of radio waves through space for

reception by the general public.”

cxiv

This neat, textbook definition takes for granted four

fundamental problems of political, economic and social power inherent in the practice of

radio broadcasting: 1) The content of broadcast programming; 2) the nature and

intentions of content producer(s); 3) the nature and intentions of the ‘general’ public, as

radio listeners, and; 4) the relationship of listeners to the processes of content production

and distribution. The theory of the political economy of communication asserts that these

problems are addressed through capitalist structures that recast content and audiences into

commodities in the markets of mass media.

Williams (1975) proposed a different view of radio and television content, as the

byproduct of social communication through broadcasting, providing “a form of unified

social intake.”

cxv

Observing a “deep contradiction” in the dominant industrial model “of

centralized transmission and privatized reception,” Williams asserted that the social

functions of transmission technology had been “largely limited to relay and commentary

activities.”

cxvi

Williams noted:

When there has been such a heavy investment in a particular model of social

communications, there is a restraining complex of financial institutions, of

cultural expectations and of specific technical developments, which though it can

be seen, superficially, as the effect of technology is in fact a social complex of a

new and central kind.

cxvii

Building on Williams’ scholarship, Hamilton (2000) contends that the economies

of communication “are not machines that run themselves: Rather, they are composed of

and put into practice through working human relationships, and it is the mutual

understanding, acceptance, and practice of a specific set of relationships that comprise the

basis of social order. The production, circulation, adoption, and defense of these mutual

understandings can be seen as the basic process of society, of communication.”

cxviii

Claiming that alternative organizational structures might better serve the social

and political needs of citizens in a democracy, Williams called for “public service of a

different kind, controlled democratically by local communities,” and serviced by

independent content producers.

cxix

More broadly, Hamilton argues for “alternative media

[to] enable alternative communication, which together make possible the articulation of a

social order different from and often opposed by the dominant”

cxx

For Hamilton, the

power of state and commercial media institutions is indicative of “a characteristic set of

social relations brought about and maintained through certain kinds of cultural

organizations.”

cxxi

The theoretical approaches to social and political issues in mass communication

identified by Dewey, Williams, Mosco, and other scholars were applied in the field of

radio broadcasting by Lewis Hill (1958). In the years following World War II, Hill set

out to challenge market-based conventions of radio broadcasting, based on the theory that

“the entire operation of an educational or cultural radio station can be supported by its

audience, removing altogether any reliance upon advertising or parent-institutional

support.”

cxxii

Seeking “a method of sustaining communication for its own sake”

(emphasis Hill), Hill’s experiment required “a non-profit, non-commercial base of

operations, abandoning the commodity concept of broadcasting.”

cxxiii

To challenge the

force of commodification, the radio station’s content “was conceived unit by unit, to be

of special interest to a definite minority of the audience, and little or none was oriented to

‘mass’ audience interest.”

cxxiv

Hill regarded this deliberate specialization and

fragmentation of content to be “indispensible [sic] to the working of the theory.”

cxxv

To achieve the desired specialization and appeal to select audiences, Hill provided

content producers with “unusual personal freedom in the selection and creation of

program materials.”

cxxvi

Hill contended that such broad personal discretion insulated

producers and the organization from commodifying influences and market pressures that

“supervened on the imagination and discretion of the persons responsible for

broadcasting.”

cxxvii

“These conditions were felt to be a sine qua non for successful

programming,” and were “also seen as having fundamental importance to the uniqueness

of communication and response which the theory envisioned between the station and the

audience.”

cxxviii

In scholarly terms, Hill sought to overcome the commodifying influences

of the market identified by Smythe and Mosco, by presenting more personal, and

personalized, content through a noncommercial channel.

Lorenzo Milam worked under Hill’s tutelage in the early 1950s. Enthusiastic

about the ability of radio broadcasting to influence the course of public policy, Milam

envisioned a similar station in Washington, D.C., “so that people in power can be

exposed to the alternatives.”

cxxix

Disenchanted by the dynamic of professionally operated

commercial broadcasting, Milam turned to common citizens as “one of the rich antennae

you have in the community” to achieve through radio broadcasting the sort of authentic

dialogue and community building articulated by Dewey half a century earlier.

cxxx

terms of the political economy of mass communication, Milam intended to confront the

force of spatialization by creating locally owned and controlled structures that served the

geographically bounded populations under their signals. Concurrently, Milam sought to

overcome the force of structuration by reaching across social classes to engage citizens,

as both listeners and producers, in new social relationships. Though he saw no particular

need to label this unusual form of radio, he subtitled his book on the subject A handbook

on starting a radio station for the community, and referred consistently in the text to

“community radio.”

Defining community radio

While the concept of a radio station controlled by local citizens emerged as early

as the 1920s (Wurtzler, 2003), the term “community radio” has become shorthand for a

variety of structures, practices, and ideologies related to the organization of

noncommercial broadcasting agencies, and the subsequent content produced and

distributed by these organizations. While these descriptions draw commonly on the

theories of Hill and Milam, scholars seeking to define community radio have emphasized

different qualities and characteristics in their representations.

In his descriptive study of community radio organizations in the U.S., Barlow

asserts, “The most salient characteristics of these radio stations are their noncommercial

status as broadcast outlets, their avowed policy of local community involvement in their

programming, and the democratic organization of their institutional procedures and

practices.”

cxxxi

While Barlow clearly draws on the ideologies of Hill and Milam, his

observations place particular emphasis on internal commitments to grassroots political

movements and processes, claiming, “In addition to community involvement, their

ideology champions progressive politics, alternative cultures, and participatory

democracy.”

cxxxii

Hill did not express this ideology overtly in his theory of listener

sponsored broadcasting. Rather, Hill articulated his political beliefs in the articles of

incorporation of the nonprofit Pacifica Foundation, the institutional basis of Hill’s

experiment in noncommercial radio. Through radio broadcasting, Pacifica committed to

“engage in any activity that shall contribute to a lasting understanding between nations

and between the individuals of all nations, races, creeds and colors; to gather and

disseminate information on the causes of conflict between any and all of such groups; and

through any and all means compatible with the purposes of this corporation to promote

the study of political and economic problems and of the causes of religious, philosophical

and racial antagonism.”

cxxxiii

Where Hill chose the nonconfrontational language of disseminating information

and promoting study to “contribute to a lasting understanding between nations and

between individuals,” Barlow expresses the ideology of community radio in more

forceful terms: “The community radio movement is strategically involved in the struggle

to forge a democratic medium that links together progressive forces in the United

States.”

cxxxiv

In contrast to Hill’s cerebral idealism, Barlow ascribes a more directly

political purpose to community radio.

Fairchild (2000) characterizes community radio through the relationships of

“constituent elements” and a variety of “core tensions.”

cxxxv

Within Habermas’ model

of a public sphere, Fairchild depicts community radio in terms of the constituencies

engaged in the organization, production, and reception of content. Class, race, gender,

and political orientation provide some of the most prominent descriptions of these

constituencies, but they are also described in terms of their relationship to a station, for

example, as critics, contributors, volunteers, producers, managers, or as agencies of the

general public in the form of state regulators. For Fairchild, as these constituencies come

into contact and attempt to work together, the conflicts that emerge describe and

constrain the power structures of community radio. Without articulating a specific

definition of community radio, Fairchild’s assessment engages and expands on the

elements of political ideology articulated by Barlow.

Lewis and Booth (1990), in their examination of community radio structures in

the Americas, Europe, Australia, and Asia, offer a less overtly political view,

emphasizing the engagement of grassroots culture. Asserting that “community is defined

geographically, as well as in terms of interest, language, cultural, or ethnic

groupings,”

cxxxvi

Lewis and Booth demonstrate how community radio tends to serve

audiences that share common identities and interests. These commonalities are made

manifest in the participation of local citizens as organizers and content producers: “While

the commercial and public service models both treat listeners as objects, to be captured

for advertisers or improved and informed, community radio aspires to treat its listeners as

subjects.”

cxxxvii

This representation reflects the listener-centered frame of reference

articulated by Williams.

In summarizing the key features of U.S. community radio, Lewis and Booth

identify five elements that distinguish this form of broadcasting:

• an element of control by the local community, typically in a board of

management.

• A commitment to community access, especially for those normally excluded

from the mass media: women, ethnic groups and people of colour, the elderly

and young people.

• The use of volunteers, supported by a training program.

• A voice in policy for both paid staff and volunteers.

• the definition of purpose to which all can relate.

cxxxviii

Taken together, the preceding insights define community radio as a set of social,

political, and economic practices. Within this frame of reference, Hill emphasizes

noncommercial, nonprofit structures and personal expression. Milam stresses the

participation of a diverse group of private citizens. Barlow asserts democratic political

ideologies and distance from market pressures. Fairchild privileges marginalized,

underrepresented, and dissenting constituencies. Lewis and Booth focus on the shared

values and beliefs of producers and listeners. As demonstrated by these scholars and

theorists, community radio operationalizes Dewey’s “neighborly community” and

Habermas’ public sphere through nonprofit, noncommercial structures that provide

democratic environments for diverse groups of territorially bound, mutually

interdependent citizens to communicate their values and views through the medium of

radio broadcasting for the purpose of developing common understandings, operating at an

ideological distance from the structures, pressures, and interests of capital and the state.

Representing the common interests of more than 250 community radio stations

and related concerns, the National Federation of Community Broadcasters provides an

institutional expression of these qualities within the political and economic structures of

U.S. broadcasting. The NFCB advocates in the arenas of public policy (the state) and

funding (capital) to support principles of diversity (population), localism (territoriality),

and public service (interdependency) on behalf of its membership (nonprofit,

noncommercial structures). These activities provide a direct link between U.S.

community radio structures and the political economy of mass communication.

Political economy and the NFCB

A substantial body of political economy research investigates the ideological

foundations and historical developments of mass media institutions, applying a pro-social

and ethical perspective to the interactions of human enterprise, technology, capital, the

state, and the markets for information commodities.

cxxxix

These analytical and critical

perspectives are equally relevant to understanding the formative history of the NFCB as a

public policy and advocacy organization constituted to promote an agenda of social and

political change. Political economy’s focus on the relationship between markets, mass

media institutions, and the state provides an appropriate frame of reference for evaluating

the efficacy of NFCB’s public policy agenda, and examining the consequences of the

organization’s various initiatives.

The framework of political economy suggests that two forces played a significant

role in shaping the NFCB’s development. The first of these is a consequence of the mass

media marketplace: While the ideology of Hill and Milam asserts that noncommercial

radio’s capacity for authentic communication, dialogue, and community-building avoids

the pressure of commodification, later critics suggest that the NFCB’s policy agenda

moved community radio directly into competition for audiences with public and

commercial broadcasters. This study seeks to determine how the forces of capital,

competition, and “massification” shaped the Federation’s intentions and actions.

The second force emerges from the public policy and regulatory contradictions

that arise when the noncommercial interests of citizens clash with the market driven

interests of mass media producers and consumers (including producers and consumers of

community radio). While free market ideologues have advocated initiatives to dismantle

public oversight of broadcast services in favor of the market’s “invisible hand,”

privileging the interests of owners and consumers of regional and national commercial

media, the NFCB pursued policies that were intended to enhance the role of

geographically bound communities of common citizens in shaping the structure and

content of citizen-centered radio through noncommercial institutions. This study

explores how the intersection of these disparate approaches to mass media public policy

influenced the historical evolution of the NFCB.

From the outset, the founders of the National Federation of Community

Broadcasters set out to “foster the development of public policy at the legislative,

regulatory, and administrative levels,” and “seek an equitable distribution of federal

funds appropriated to noncommercial radio.”

cxl

In doing so, the NFCB began a process

of accruing and wielding political power, on behalf of members who themselves had

generally little power, especially audio artists, counterculture activists, and ethnic

minorities. This process, based in the mechanisms of political economy, provides a

starting point for investigating the NFCB’s formative development.

Research questions

The preceding review demonstrates that there is a significant gap in the existing

literature with respect to the historical relationship of NFCB and community radio in the

United States to the broader political economy of communication. Within this

framework, utilizing the techniques of historical research and analysis, this study

investigates the NFCB between 1975 and 1990, concentrating on the organization’s

formation and development, and its organizational and policy initiatives. The study

engages four research questions:

Q1: What political, economic, and social forces contributed to the establishment of the

NFCB?

The emergence of the NFCB followed a series of dynamic historical

circumstances and events, beginning with the invention of radio in the early 20

century,

and including the entrenchment of the American commercial system of broadcasting in

the 1930s, the post-World War II economic boom, and the turbulent political and social

movements of the 1960s. This question examines the political, economic, and social

conditions that set the stage for development of community radio and presaged the

formation of the NFCB.

Q2: Who were the principal architects of the NFCB, and what were their original

goals and intentions for the organization?

The founders of the NFCB were a unique group of social activists, political

organizers, and artists, each moved by the causes of free expression, community

engagement, and social justice. This question explores the personal and professional

histories of these individuals, and captures their motivations and intentions for starting a

national organization to promote community radio.

Q3: What were the most significant issues faced by the NFCB in the organization’s

formative years, and how were they approached by the organization?

The NFCB quickly faced a host of internal and external issues that consumed the

time and energy of the founders. Within the Federation, the small staff wrestled with

issues of communication, finance, and membership, while the external agenda addressed

a host of regulatory and legal issues, including licensing, program distribution, and

content restrictions. This question examines the relative immediacy and priority of these

issues, and the extent to which these issues influenced the organization’s direction.

Q4: How did the values, goals, and direction of the NFCB change during these

formative years, and how can this history inform contemporary issues in mass media?

While the NFCB generally achieved success with its original initiatives, critics

including Bekken, Fairchild, Sakolsky, and Walker suggest that the Federation failed to

protect the noncommercial interests of citizens and communities from the power and

influence of America’s mass media marketplace. This question explores these criticisms

in the context of the historical evidence, and suggests how this history could provide

insights into contemporary mass media issues, including the emergence of LPFM radio,

contemporary movement reform and democratize mass media, and the advent of new

technologies that place the tools of media content production and distribution directly in

the hands of citizens.

Through these questions, this study will explore the complex interaction of

community radio with the structures and mechanisms of capital and the state that have

dominated the landscape of broadcasting in the U.S. since the 1920s. In the process, the

study reveals aspects of the character, quality, and efficacy of U.S. broadcasting, and the

viability of community radio within the context of “the American System.”

CHAPTER IV

METHODOLOGY

Studies in critical political economy have “traditionally given priority to

understanding social change and historical transformation,” manifested in society as

either “a deepening and extension of fundamental tendencies,” or “the fundamental

rearrangements of social structures and processes.”

cxli

The process of social change takes

place when dominant and generally long-standing patterns of political, economic, or

social reproduction are confronted by phenomena that challenge, disrupt, or transform

prevailing structures and relationships. Similarly, the process of historical transformation

emerges at the intersection of continuities, in the form of “patterns that extend across

time,” and contingencies, or “phenomena that do not form patterns.”

cxlii

These

transformative processes reveal political, economic, and social forces at work in human

events and structures, shaped by the continuities and contingencies of time, space,

ideology, and human behavior. The scholar’s task is to develop a valid interpretation of

human events from the fundamentally continuous and qualitative data of human

perceptions, intentions, actions, and responses, as they were played out in the context of

unique historical circumstances.

This study relies on qualitative, and particularly historical methods, to investigate

the formative development of the NFCB. Historical methods allow for the observation

and interpretation of a wide range of particular, but indivisible data for the purpose of

constructing a summary assessment of historical patterns and outcomes.

cxliii

Beyond the

fundamental journalistic questions of who, what, where, when, why, and how, historical

methods allow scholars to recapture “the spirit of the times surrounding the study, to

comprehend the feelings, persuasions, and emotions that were once real, to grasp how

things happened” and “to comprehend past consciousness.”

cxliv

More specifically,

historical investigations of recent issues, events, and actors can provide access to “the

complexity of social interactions as expressed in daily life, and the meanings the

participants themselves attribute to these actions.”

cxlv

To accomplish these objectives,

this study relies on a combination of in-depth interviewing and document analysis

techniques to achieve an understanding of the origins and evolution of the NFCB.

In-depth interviews

The practice of ethnomethodology reveals evidence of social order, in part,

through accounts collected from the members of social groups or organizations under

investigation. Captured through reflexive conversation, verbal accounts reveal the

ideology, knowledge, skills, and practices that “members know, require, count on, and

make use of,” in order to “produce, accomplish, recognize, or demonstrate rational-

adequacy-for-all-practical-purposes of their procedures and findings.”

cxlvi

Verbal

interactions provide evidence of those phenomena that are considered to be “countable,

storyable, proverbial, comparable, picturable, representable” expressions, actions, or

events.

cxlvii

These indexical phenomena manifest the “ongoing achievement of the

organized activities of everyday life.”

cxlviii

The practices of in-depth interviewing offer an

appropriate method for capturing these accounts and disclosing these indexical

phenomena.

Interviews provide evidence in the form of oral history, captured in the

recollections and interpretations of key individuals from the historical period under

investigation. The oral histories of key individuals offer the opportunity for the

“historical recovery of the remembered but unrecorded past,” by inquiring about past

events, and validating the veracity of information from other sources.

cxlix

Because

interviews are susceptible to the inherent limitations of human memory and personal bias,

they are “particularly well suited to understand the social actor’s experiences and

perspective.”

Informants are selected based on their personal experience and expertise

with regard to the subject of the study, with the expectation that “the actor’s experience

will result in words that can only be uttered by someone who has ‘been there’.”

cli

Several previous studies of journalism agencies, and specifically noncommercial

broadcasting, have relied on in-depth interviews as the primary tool to gather qualitative

or historical evidence from living social actors. Breed (1955) conducted “intensive

interviews” of 120 news professionals in the northeastern U.S. to substantiate processes

of learning and acculturation in newspaper organizations. Intent on capturing the

recollections of more than a score of key figures associated with the establishment the

American public broadcasting system, Harrison (1978) recorded and transcribed a

collection now housed at the National Public Broadcasting Archive at the University of

Maryland. Lasar (2000) conducted interviews with nearly two dozen individuals

associated with the Pacifica Foundation and Pacifica Radio over a two-year period,

allowing the author to capture the recollections of key players from the organization’s

formative years, and offering insight into reams of documentary evidence. To inform

documentary evidence and secondary sources, Walker (2001) interviewed several

prominent community radio activists from the 1970s in conjunction with his broader

study of underground, unlicensed, and low power broadcasting. McCauley (2004)

collected extensive oral histories from many of the founding figures of National Public

Radio to provide the preponderance of the evidence in his study of the formative

development of the nation’s largest network of noncommercial radio stations.

For this study, many of the selected informants were connected to individual

community radio stations associated with the NFCB, and all played key roles in the

founding and development of the Federation during the period under investigation.

These individuals organized and participated in NFCB’s annual conferences and other

meetings, taking part in pivotal debates that shaped the organization’s mission, goals, and

objectives. Some drafted planning documents and communications, wrote and edited

newsletters, and lobbied federal agencies to support initiatives that would benefit

community radio initiatives. Those who worked in stations had direct experience of the

conditions and circumstances that led to the NFCB’s formation, and the ongoing local

pressures that influenced the Federation’s national policy agenda. These informants were

essential to the study to provide insight into the circumstances, processes, and outcomes

that shaped the NFCB during its formative years, and to verify, elaborate on, or call into

question the documentary evidence.

The study also includes interviews with key individuals outside of community

radio to gain a broader view of the NFCB, and to capture external perspectives on the

Federation and its contributions to the development of mass media and society. Some of

these individuals were associated with the federal agencies that were lobbied by the

NFCB, while others left community radio to pursue professional ventures in public or

commercial broadcasting or other industries. These informants responded to the

assertions and insights of those who were most directly engaged in the work of the

NFCB, and provided critical insight into the evidence gathered from other sources.

Though the interviews relied in part on standardized questions, the conversations

also pursued spontaneous lines of thought and inquiry with each individual, for the

purpose of gathering particular memories and reflections that informed other data or

provided insight into the particular subject at hand. Whenever possible, interviews were

conducted in person, though limitations of time, distance, and availability required that

22 of the 41 interviews be conducted via telephone. Initial interviews typically lasted

about one hour, with follow up sessions of 10 to 30 minutes. Interview documentation

consisted of audio recordings captured on minidisk, and full or partial transcriptions of

most of the conversations, supplemented by field notes compiled as soon as practically

possible following each encounter. The University of Oregon Committee for the

Protection of Human Subjects/Institutional Review Board originally approved the

required research protocols for this study in April 2004 (#C1-477-04, Community radio

in the U.S.: History and ethnography; renewed April 2005; approved for dissertation

research, February 2006; renewed March 2006).

Document analysis

As articulated by McCombs and Shaw, agenda-setting theory asserts that an

audience’s perception of the relative importance of issues, events, or participants is

affected by how, and in what order, they are presented in published accounts.

clii

This

ordering, or salience, does not necessarily shape the audience’s opinions, but it does

influence where, how, and in what manner the audience focuses its attention. Closely

related to the theory of agenda setting, the process of framing describes how producers

contextualize references in content, and how an audience uses these references to

similarly assess and interpret content. According to Entman, frames provide the

mechanisms to “define problems, diagnose causes, make moral judgments, [and] suggest

remedies.”

cliii

Key textual elements in the framing process include the use of particular

words, phrases, or references, placement of text in documents, and the manner in which

information is disclosed across a series of documents. Frames help to organize and

clarify communication between content producers and consumers: They do this, in part,

by monopolizing, emphasizing and fragmenting the terms of meaning. For this reason,

McQuail suggests that “particular frames need to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.”

cliv

Beyond the issues, events, and circumstances framed in texts, documents can reveal the

influence the social, economic, political, and social forces. Shoemaker and Reese assert

that documents allow the researcher “to infer things about phenomena that are less open

and visible: the people and organizations that produce the content.”

clv

Documents provide key pieces of historical evidence “because they are the ‘paper

trail’ left in the wake of historical events and processes.”

clvi

Documents record the

ideology, initiatives and products of an organization; track its activities; record the

actions of key people; provide evidence of standards of belief and behavior; and offer

representations of the organization and its participants to internal and external audiences.

Because they record past events, documents provide an opportunity, within the

limitations of reliability and accuracy, to reconstruct events from the past that cannot be

observed directly. Documents provide a fixed source of data that can be easily compared

to data gathered through observation and oral interaction. Perhaps most important to this

study, documents “reflect certain kinds of organizational rationality at work. They often

embody social rules – but not necessarily the reasoning behind the rules – that govern

how members of a social collective should behave.”

clvii

These phenomena are the

historical manifestation of the study’s theoretical framework.

Within the realm of media and communication studies, the framing capabilities of

newspapers have received more attention than newsletters or other forms of advocacy

media. Lomicky (2002) employed content analysis in a historical study of the frontier

Women’s Tribune, a Nebraska-based suffragist newspaper. Categorizing the content of

two constructed volumes, Lomicky’s study demonstrated that the Tribune consistently

framed issues within a feminist ideology that reflected the political and social beliefs of

editor and publisher Clara Bewick Colby. Similarly, Johansen (2001) employed textual

analysis to explore “the first true employee journal in North America.”

clviii

Published by

the Massey Manufacturing Company of Toronto, the Trip Hammer served as a platform

for the owners of a farm implement company to communicate their Chautauqua-inspired

social and moral values to the firm’s employees. Johansen demonstrates how the

publication’s content served as a response to the political, labor, and social upheaval of

late 19

century industrialization and urbanization

In his descriptive study of KPFA, Ragan (1963) relied on documentary evidence

found in the pages of the station’s Folio magazine as the basis for his analysis of the

organization’s mission and initiatives. In addition to consulting issues of Folio, Lasar

examined a wide variety of internal documents found in the Pacifica Archives, especially

the founders’ internal and external correspondence, proposals and reports to funding

agencies, and written communications from listeners. In comparison with Ragan’s

narrow content analysis, Lasar’s broader historical evaluation provides a more

contextualized and substantive account of Pacifica’s importance to the history of mass

media and society in the U.S.

The documents relevant to this study were derived from both primary and

secondary sources. Primary documentary sources consisted of materials that provided

contemporaneous descriptions of issues and events with limited opportunity for

interpretation by the author[s].

clix

In addition to the direct textual evidence, primary

documentary sources provided contextual evidence through their origin, appearance,

location, and circulation. In this study, the primary documents consisted of records and

publications of the NFCB, and other documents from related organizations and

institutions.

The primary sources included the Federation’s articles of incorporation and

operating by-laws; minutes and other records of association meetings and events; the

Federation’s periodic newsletter; memoranda and other correspondence of the

Federation’s executives and staff members; and periodic reports to members, the press,

and constituent groups. Although the discourse within these documents necessarily

reflected the biases of their authors in the representation and interpretation of events and

issues, they provided some of the best and most consistent evidence of the course of

historical events, and for understanding the political, economic, and social evolution of

the NFCB. The vast majority of these documents are currently housed at the offices of

the NFCB in Oakland, California. Additional materials are located in the National Public

Broadcasting Archive in the Hornbake Library at the University of Maryland; and in the

collection of the law firm of Garvey Schubert Barer in Washington D.C.

Other primary sources consisted of private or public documents

contemporaneously published or otherwise distributed by individuals and agencies

related to the NFCB during the period in question. These records consisted of documents

from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and National Public Radio;

correspondence, publications, and other documents originating from the NFCB’s

constituent stations; and documents created by individuals with allied interests in the

social, technological, or institutional development of community radio, including

independent producers and media activists. Government documents, from agencies such

as the U.S. Congress, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Department of

Health, Education, and Welfare (and its descendant agencies), also provided additional

evidence that contributes to the understanding of the NFCB.

Primary sources were considered as qualitative data, and interpreted using

qualitative textual analysis methods detailed by Startt and Sloan, Howell and Prevenier,

and other historians. Authenticity was determined through processes of external

criticism, including author identification, and verification of textual legitimacy.

Interpretation was accomplished through processes of internal criticism, employing

standardized criteria to establish textual genealogy and credibility, assess terminology in

context, ascertain intent and competence, and place the evidence in the overall

chronology of historical events. While these methods could only approximate historical

truth, they provided a clear picture of “how the sources left by the people who then lived

constructed their reality.”

clx

Secondary sources provide restatement, interpretation, and analysis of the

evidence found in primary sources. Secondary sources provide a means for locating

additional primary sources. In addition, though they are not contemporaneous with issues

and events, secondary sources provide descriptions and explanations that enlighten the

current study. Because secondary sources represent “evidence selected by another

person, and perhaps for a purpose other” than the one identified for this study,

clxi

each

was viewed within the context of its original publication, and considered for its particular

contribution to understanding the subject. The secondary sources for this study included

books, academic journals, on line articles, and industry, trade, and consumer periodicals.

Organization and analysis of the data

This study relies on the grounded theory approach to data analysis to “bring order,

structure, and interpretation to the mass of collected data. It is a messy, ambiguous, time-

consuming, creative, and fascinating process” that proceeds in a non-linear fashion by

examining data through many cycles of consideration and reconsideration.

clxii

Employing

mutable analysis structures and comparative methods to reveal patterns and singularities

in qualitative data, grounded theory provides insights into the complex interaction of

circumstances, events, personalities, and relationships that emerge in the process of

constructing historical narrative.

clxiii

Consistent with the grounded theory approach, consideration and reflection on the

data took place in conjunction with the processes of data collection, utilizing Althiede’s

ethnographic content analysis techniques of “reflexive movement between concept

development, sampling, data collection, data coding, data analysis, and

interpretation.”

clxiv

During this initial phase of the research, field notes, interview

recordings, and transcripts were periodically reviewed, and reflections captured in brief

written asides and more extensive summaries and commentaries. Composed during

periods of reflection, these ‘meta-notes’ provided a running account of the character,

motivations, or expressions of individual actors; the meaning of texts; initial indications

of repetitive phenomena or key contingencies; and notable details arising from the

researcher’s experience. These in-progress writings provided a basis for the subsequent

and more formal procedures of categorizing and coding the raw data.

As data collection proceeded, multiple timelines were developed to organize the

sequence of concurrent and consecutive historical events, chart periodic movements and

initiatives in community radio and the NFCB, locate and establish the relationship of key

events, and develop a summative chronology of the historical phenomena in question.

The master chronology became the primary tool for assessing the temporal sequence of

events such as meetings and communications; observing the geographic proximity of

concurrent phenomena; and tracking collateral political, economic, and social

developments that influenced the formation and advancement of the NFCB. The

chronology also provided a mechanism for uncovering inconsistencies and conflicts in

the various historical accounts under consideration.

The first phase of coding focused on establishing a range of data categories. This

involved the reflexive designation of variables that emerged from the primary documents,

interview transcripts, field notes, and accompanying commentaries. These first stage

variables included terms or phrases, categories of common experience, key events or

incidents, collaborations, adversarial relationships, emotional recollections and responses,

and instances of reflection. Relevant data was roughly coded into these first stage

categories, providing the basis for the final, formal categories used to code the project

data.

A final scheme of 18 low-inference and high-inference categories formed the

basis for coding discrete blocks of textual data. Low-inference categories, including

demographics, professional roles, and institutional links offered a quick and generally

recognizable method of organizing topical information. High-inference categories,

including political, economic, and social themes, initiatives, and relationships, emerged

from the process of data collection and consideration, requiring a recursive process to

establish and capture broader patterns of significance.

clxv

This process began during the

data gathering phase of the study, and continued through the secondary coding phase in

an open, inductive, and reflexive manner to work out the specific relationships of

individual phenomena and generalized categories of data.

Over a period of six months, the data was reduced down to manageable blocks,

coded and entered into pertinent categories. The data blocks included indexical

phenomena such as expressions of belief, attitudes, and reaction; key words, phrases, and

statements drawn from the transcripts and text-based evidence; as well as that

information captured directly in low-inference categories. The resulting instruments

were periodically reviewed for evidence of conflict and agreement among the various

sources, and summarized to form the basis for a historical narrative of the NFCB’s

formative period.

Limitations

The most obvious limitation facing this study is one of scope: It was tempting to

conflate the story of the NFCB with the collateral stories of the organization’s constituent

members. In some instances, explanations of historical occurrences were tied to people,

events, and issues that emerged through other organizations. The NFCB’s public policy

positions and initiatives directly reflected the intentions, interests, and needs of the

Federation’s member stations. For example, the evolution of community-based public

radio stations in Alaska contributed directly to the organizational and economic course of

the NFCB in its early years. A full account of this complex web of ideologies, structures,

and actions exceeded the scope of the present research. To the extent that it is possible to

do so, this study focused on the story of the NFCB, with limited explorations of related

phenomena.

Though this study was concerned with issues of noncommercial radio

broadcasting, it did not examine radio programming, audiences, and the broader cultural

impact of community radio in any detail. In part, this reflects the political economy

framework, but it is also a consequence of the subject itself: The NFCB did not engage

in program production, nor did it develop systematic strategies for audience service.

While NFCB facilitated such activities, these concerns were the province of individual

stations. Though the cultural consequences of community radio in the U.S. provide rich

opportunities for research, such considerations were generally beyond the scope of this

project. This study is limited to the historical development of the NFCB as an agency of

public policy, advocacy, and member service.

Another limitation can be found in the nature and degree of access to historical

actors and documents. Due to time and budget limitations, some interviews were

conducted by telephone, and some follow up inquiries were conducted by email. While

such data gathering techniques have become increasingly common, they lack the

spontaneity and nonverbal richness of face-to-face contact with informants. Similarly, an

unknown quantity of documentation has been scattered around the country, presumably

lost or in the possession of individuals or organizations that are no longer connected to

the NFCB. While efforts were made to unearth this evidence, most documents were

derived from institutional sources, including the NFCB and the National Public

Broadcasting Archives at the University of Maryland, or from those individuals and

organizations that are willing to take the time to assist in the search for historical

materials.

Finally, every research exercise must acknowledge the standpoint of the

researcher and the unavoidable limitations of subjectivity. Prior to undertaking scholarly

inquiries into community radio, the researcher undertook a long career as the manager of

an NFCB member station, and developed collegial relationships with some of the

informants. The early portion of this career spanned the period from 1982 to 1990.

While the researcher’s experiences certainly influenced the perception of relevance and

importance in the data, they also provided a basis for interpreting and explaining the

evidence. Acknowledging that “anything we learn about human social life can have an

impact on what we are studying, even to the extent of invalidating what we learned in the

first place,”

clxvi

the researcher relies on the understanding that the efficacy of the research

depended on careful attention to the scope and method of the research power of social

research.

clxvii

Even within these limitations, the relative scarcity of research into the

subject, and the implications for contemporary issues in mass media, invited scholarly

investigation into the formative history of the NFCB.

CHAPTER V

A PREHISTORY OF THE NFCB

As an advocate for community-based noncommercial radio stations, the National

Federation of Community Broadcasters was the first organization of its kind in the United

States. But the social, political, economic, and technological forces that led to the

establishment of the NFCB can be traced back to the opening of the twentieth century

and the earliest days of wireless communication. Thousands of private citizens engaged

wireless as a hobby, building their own radio equipment for the purpose of sending and

receiving signals in their homes. More organized interests valued the technology for its

capacity to carry commercial messages from point to point across long distances. In an

environment dominated by individual achievement and private enterprise, entrepreneurs

and industrialists raced to harness the power of wireless in order to establish and serve

new markets. Few envisioned radio as a technology capable of reaching millions of

listeners.

It would take an epic disaster, a world war, and acts of Congress to rein in the

chaos that characterized these early years, when radio matured from a scientific curiosity

into a national mass medium. Hobbyists, engineers, educators, entrepreneurs, and

industrialists jockeyed, and sometimes clashed head on, to claim their positions in “the

ether.” By the 1930s, the interests of nationwide, advertiser-supported broadcasting

eclipsed those of academics, churches, civil agencies, and common citizens. Civic

programming, noncommercial ‘educational radio,’ and advertising-free broadcasting all

but disappeared from U.S. spectrum, languishing until the twilight of the New Deal.

In the prosperous era following World War II, a combination of social, political,

and economic forces aligned to allow educators to secure access to the broadcast

spectrum. At the same time, a group of wartime pacifists turned to radio as their

instrument to achieve world peace, in the vanguard of counter-cultural movements that

surged beneath America’s pluralistic façade and challenged the nation’s social and

cultural paradigms. Within this fusion of culture, politics, and artistic expression,

community radio found its first iterations in cities and towns across the U.S., including

Berkeley, Seattle, Portland, St. Louis, and Santa Cruz. This chapter summarizes some of

the preceding research into the origins of educational and public broadcasting, and

documents some of the key individuals and initiatives that contributed to the founding of

the NFCB.

Wireless before World War I, 1900-1917

The invention and early development of wireless technology at the beginning of

the 20

century has been thoroughly documented many times over, by scholars including

Archer, Barnouw, and Sterling and Kitross. But revisionist historians such as Walker and

Douglas delineate an alternative narrative of radio’s beginning, populated by the early

enthusiasts, “usually young and male, building their homemade sets in sheds, attics, and

barn lofts with whatever materials were available,”

clxviii

including oatmeal boxes, soda

pop bottles, and tin foil. As the restrained attitudes of the Victorian Age gave way to the

bullish and technocratic views of the Progressive Era, “tinkering with radio (like

tinkering with cars) was one way for some boys and men to manage, and even master, the

emerging contradictions”

clxix

of the age. These “Radio Boys”

clxx

were inspired by the

very public successes of early wireless entrepreneurs, including Guglielmo Marconi,

holder of the first wireless patents, and Lee DeForest, the self-proclaimed “Father of

Radio.”

clxxi

The pioneers were themselves inspired by the earlier scientific and financial

achievements of Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Charles Goodyear, and other

individuals who worked “alone or with a few assistants to make great discoveries,”

clxxii

amassing personal wealth and fame from their inventions and, more fundamentally, from

the patents they held.

In the first years of wireless, patents were the only links between the United

States government and the inventors, engineers, scientists, and amateurs involved in the

development of radio. This arrangement reflected two of the dominant cultural values of

era, ratifying the achievement of private individuals and companies, and demonstrating

the limited role of the civil government in the affairs of private citizens and industry.

clxxiii

But these relationships were not without risk. Lone inventors sometimes proved to be

difficult business partners: Though most historians believe he was the first to transmit

the human voice by radio,

clxxiv

Reginald Fessenden’s inability to compromise with his

financial backers negated his opportunity to profit substantially from his own

inventions.

clxxv

Patent disputes between rival individuals and their related interests

became the province of the courts, where legal and financial concerns often took

precedence over scientific and technical expertise. Though DeForest’s life was

punctuated with claims and counterclaims over patents and licensing arrangements, doubt

remains if he actually understood the science behind his own patents, including his

Audion vacuum tube which made possible the transmission and reception of continuous

wave signals.

clxxvi

In this environment of bare-knuckle competition and winner-take-all

consequences, the achievements of private citizens figured prominently in the wireless

phenomenon. Amateur operators, or hams, strove to improve the power and sensitivity of

their transmission and reception devices, attempting to pull in signals over ever

increasing distances. For these early adoptors, the hobby of long distance monitoring, or

DXing, started with a rudimentary crystal set connected to a crude headphone, typically

fashioned from a Bell telephone receiver.

clxxvii

As hams improved the capabilities of their

homemade equipment and their own technical prowess, they pulled in increasingly

distant signals, carrying the dots and dashes of Morse code. While these messages were

intended as to point-to-point communication between a specific sender and receiver, the

exploding number of hobbyists

clxxviii

valued any signal that came over long distance - the

more distant, the better.

clxxix

The most powerful signals originated from commercial wireless facilities located

on ships at sea and on shore in the United Kingdom and North America, owned and

operated by the Marconi Wireless Company of Great Britain. Competing technologies

arose in other nations, including Germany (Slaby-Arco) and the U.S. (DeForest),

clxxx

leading to interference as multiple operators transmitted overlapping signals. Marconi

refused to communicate with rival systems and services, threatening to monopolize the

industry. Such international problems required international solutions. In 1903, a

meeting of eight nations called for universal communication between wireless systems.

By 1906, 27 nations, including the U.S. agreed to protocols for universal ship-to-ship and

ship-to-shore communication.

clxxxi

Implementation of these protocols depended on the cooperation of each nation’s

government. Convinced by U.S. wireless manufacturers and military authorities that the

treaty would inhibit the development of technologies and systems under the control of

U.S. interests, the Congress declined to ratify the agreement. In its place, Congress

passed the Wireless Ship Act of 1910, duplicating nearly all of the provisions of the 1906

protocol. The act required radio communication equipment and a skilled operator on all

vessels carrying more than 50 passengers traveling more than 200 miles between ports.

In addition, the act required that installed equipment must be capable of exchanging

messages with the systems of other manufacturers. Left out of the act were suggestions

to place the Navy in charge of most aspects of radio communication, prohibit commercial

control, administer radio through the Department of Commerce and Labor, and deploy

government-operated stations in all U.S. territories. “Although none of these suggestions

was formally adopted,” observed Sterling and Kitross, “one could trace them in American

radio regulation for more than two decades.”

clxxxii

Decades later, the notion of

government support for universal service to all U.S. localities would figure prominently

in the passage of the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 and subsequent developments in

community radio.

As a consequence of the international reaction to the Titanic disaster, 29 nations

convened in 1912 to reconsider the 1906 agreement. In response, Congress initially

amended the Wireless Ship Act to require multiple operators, auxiliary power supplies,

and extending these requirements to all vessels carrying more than 50 passengers

(including traffic on the Great Lakes). Within a month, Congress subsequently passed

the Radio Act of 1912, granting authority to the Secretary of Commerce and Labor to test

and license all operators, license all transmission facilities (“stations”), assign

transmission frequencies, and designate hours of operation. Most crucially however,

Barnouw notes that the Secretary “could not refuse a license. Such details would in time

cause difficulties – in fact, chaos.”

clxxxiii

One of the first consequences of federal

oversight was the separation of the radio frequency band, and the assignment of private

amateurs licenses to wavelengths above 360 meters.

clxxxiv

These frequencies were

considered to be undesirable for government or commercial use because of interference

issues.

With the Radio Act of 1912, the essential elements of the political economy of

American broadcasting were set in place – markets for various forms of information (in

addition to Morse Code messages, markets for scientific, technical, commercial, and

political expertise); private ownership and control of the development and manufacture of

technology (DeForest and other independent scientists and inventors, Bell’s American

Telephone and Telegraph, Edison’s General Electric); implementation and distribution by

individuals (hams), private companies (American Marconi, DeForest, and others), and

public agencies (the Department of Agriculture, the armed forces); and regulation by

government authorities (the Department of Commerce, after 1913).

clxxxv

A variety of

national clubs and organizations, including the American Radio Relay League, attempted

to represent the interests of ham operators and educators. But for the most part, the more

powerful and organized forces of capital and the state pushed these to the margins.

War and free enterprise, 1917-1926

In the years between 1912 and 1917, the government continued to grant licenses

under the terms of the 1912 act, issuing patents for a wide variety of radio apparatus to

dozens of private interests. Multiple wireless technologies were controlled by an array of

private companies and individuals who saw little reason to cooperate with each other.

The result was a flurry of patent litigation. The situation came to an abrupt halt on April

7, 1917, immediately following the government’s decision to send U.S. forces to Europe

to fight in World War I. The U.S. Navy took control of all wireless manufacturing,

facilities, and operations to facilitate the efficient development and application of reliable

wireless systems for the war effort. Amateur operations were banned,

clxxxvi

but the

ownership of companies, factories, and distribution remained in private hands. For

Walker, it was “the apotheosis of progressivism, a brief period in which the partnership

between big government and big business blossomed into a full-scale authoritarian

state.”

clxxxvii

America’s involvement in World War I had two fundamental consequences for

the subsequent development of radio in the U.S. First, the U.S. military would draft

thousands of young men into the armed services to be trained as radio operators for the

Navy and Army Signal Corps, creating a vast pool of trained citizens who returned to

industrial, civic, and private life after the war, eager to put their knowledge of wireless to

work. Second, the government required all radio patent holders, including Marconi and

AT&T (holders of patents for vacuum tube technology), Westinghouse and GE (holders

of patents for transmission technology), to cooperate in mandatory cross licensing of their

technologies through a patent pool. All stations, equipment, and content were “for the

first time, under rigid, monopolistic control,” observes Douglas.

clxxxviii

Military control

and management “brought enormous resources – money, manpower, an integrated and

far flung organizational structure – to bear on wireless development.”

clxxxix

Encouraged

by the efficiencies gained under military authority, Secretary of the Navy Josephus

Daniels hoped to maintain government ownership and control of radio communication

after the war. But the Navy “not only suffered from a lack of funds and of trained

operators (after the volunteers left), but faced a strong and growing clamor for return of

government-operated stations to their owners.”

cxc

Patent holders and ham operators were

equally anxious to reclaim ownership of their intellectual and physical property. On the

order of President Woodrow Wilson, the hams returned to the air in October 1919,

followed by the commercial operators in March 1920. But the Navy, under the

leadership of acting Secretary Franklin D. Roosevelt, opposed placing powerful long

distance transmission facilities once again in the control of Marconi’s foreign ownership.

With Roosevelt’s blessing, GE moved to purchase a controlling interest in the American

Marconi company, bringing the assets of the most prominent commercial operator under

American control.

cxci

GE subsequently transferred these assets to a new company – the

Radio Corporation of America.

Though the competition of the pre-war era returned, industrial patent holders

understood the benefits of cooperation that had been achieved through the wartime patent

pool. In June 1920, RCA formalized a new pooling agreement with GE and AT&T.

With the agreement, notes Barnouw, “these companies staked out areas of interest so that

the world of electronic communication, as the conferees viewed it in the early months of

the 1920s, might be developed cooperatively, rather than in competition.”

cxcii

As part of

the arrangement, AT&T received a block of RCA stock. Similarly, RCA entered into a

cross-licensing agreement for the high power transmission technologies controlled by

Westinghouse. Through the pooling agreements, RCA assumed control of more than

2000 patents,

cxciii

and precluded competition from its significant industrial competitors.

Through RCA’s charter, the government was guaranteed a seat on the company’s board

of directors. The business of radio manufacturing and transmission became, in effect, “a

government enforced cartel.”

cxciv

Even as these business interests aligned, amateurs and educators were claiming

the radio spectrum for their own purposes. Weather forecasts could be heard daily on

University of Wisconsin station 9XM.

cxcv

The students of Charles “Doc” Herrold,

operator of the College of Engineering and Wireless in California, returned to the air in

1922, offering voice and music broadcasts for the general public.

cxcvi

Radio

experimenters in California, Montana, and North Carolina were broadcasting live

performances from their homes.

cxcvii

Hiram Percy Maxim, organizer of the American

Radio Relay League of civic-minded amateurs, championed the formation of radio clubs

to facilitate public visibility and political action.

cxcviii

All represented fundamentally

different approaches to the purpose of radio: For educators, radio provided an application

in the fields of physics and electrical engineering, and a tool for agricultural extension

services. For the amateurs, broadcasting was a technology capable of empowering

individuals, and expanding the nature and scope of cultural and civic life.

Though it had many libertarian qualities, the public policy of the early 1920’s

maintained the allegiances to industrial interests and all of the rigid hierarchies that had

been imposed during the Progressive Era and the war.

cxcix

On the one hand, the

Department of Commerce under Secretary Herbert Hoover reasserted the government’s

authority over radio operations, attempting to assign all commercial and amateur

operations to a handful of frequencies. By 1926, the spectrum was clogged with

overlapping signals.

On the other hand, Hoover could hardly keep up with the

explosion of applications for station and operator licenses.

cci

Lacking enforcement

authority, the Secretary’s authority was routinely ignored. The result was chaos:

Interference threatened to choke off every advancement in the emerging markets for radio

communication.

Seeking to avoid outright government regulation of the radio spectrum and the

nascent industry, Hoover convened a series of Federal Radio Conferences between 1922

and 1925. Fifteen government and industry delegates attended the first conference. By

1925, more than 400 delegates attended the Fourth National Radio Conference,

representing station owners, equipment manufacturers, civil authorities, educators,

amateurs, and other interests.

ccii

Hoover attempted to craft the recommendations of these

conferences into a form of voluntary self-regulation. For example, the Secretary sought

to maintain a class of “clear channel” stations that would allow a few high power stations

to reach most of the country.

cciii

One justification for these clear channel stations was to

assure service to isolated rural areas.

cciv

Almost inevitably, these powerful stations became the nation’s premiere

broadcast properties, and several affiliated with RCA’s new national network, the

National Broadcasting Company – NBC.

ccv

As a result, the country’s dominant

manufacturer of transmission and reception equipment was on the path to achieve parallel

dominance in the field of programming and content distribution through a system of ‘toll’

broadcasting. Attempted initially as an experiment by AT&T-owned WEAF in New

York, the practice of making airtime available for purchase rapidly evolved into

advertiser-supported radio within ten years.

But there was no consensus in the 1920s that radio could be a profitable industry.

Though private hams had already been pushed aside, Robert McChesney’s research

reveals that nearly one quarter of license holders in 1925 were colleges and universities.

“Almost as many broadcasters were affiliated with the other types of nonprofit

organizations,” including labor unions, civic organizations, and churches.

ccvi

Commercial

operators generally viewed their stations as vehicles for publicity, rather than profit

centers. The desire to overcome this economic instability in the private sector would play

prominently in the subsequent events that shaped the American system of radio

regulation. The general public had to be convinced that radio was an appropriate medium

for advertising, according to Susan Smulyan: “The early promoters of broadcast

advertising, aware that it was still considered only one financing option among many,

moved to make their strategy less commercial.”

ccvii

Alternatives included schemes for

government financing through taxes on receivers or vacuum tubes.

The turmoil came to a climax in 1926, when the Zenith Radio Corporation

‘jumped’ to an unassigned frequency, ignoring the license restrictions imposed by the

Secretary. Hoover cited the station for violating the terms of its license. The Illinois

Federal District Court ruled in favor of Zenith, finding that the there was “no express

grant of power in the [Radio] Act [of 1912] to the Secretary of Commerce to establish

regulations.”

ccviii

A frequency free-for-all ensued, as operators and stations sparred for

the best positions on the spectrum. Congress had little choice but to turn Hoover’s

guidelines and recommendations into law.

Hegemony, 1927-1934

The Radio Act of 1927 set the course of broadcasting in the U.S. for the next two

decades, though according to Barnouw, there was never a singular or pivotal “moment

when Congress confronted the question: shall we have a nationwide broadcasting system

financed by advertising?”

ccix

Providing the Secretary of Commerce with direct authority

over spectrum management and licenses for stations and operators, the act established a

five-member Federal Radio Commission, appointed by the president, to consider a wide

range of pressing issues. The law allowed the Commission to establish classes of stations

and services; assign frequencies and geographic locations to classes and individual

stations; regulate the manufacturing and use of equipment, create and enforce regulations

to prevent interference; require stations to maintain a variety of operating records; and

gave the FRC the “authority to make special regulations applicable to radio stations

engaged in chain broadcasting.”

ccx

The FRC moved quickly to convert all existing radio licenses to 60-day temporary

authorizations. Concurrently, the FRC staff, largely borrowed from the Navy and the

DOC, set about the complex and controversial task of reallocating the spectrum. Though

the FRC’s rules made no explicit distinction between commercial and noncommercial

stations, the effect of its authority always favored network and commercial interests,

ccxi

especially those stations that were part of the NBC networks.

ccxii

The Commission set high engineering standards, such that many low-budget

(often noncommercial) stations were denied licenses. The commission forced stations

that could not afford to broadcast at least 17 hours per day into awkward and

disadvantageous channel time sharing arrangements, causing confusion and frustration

foe listeners. But most damaging to the noncommercial broadcasters was the

interpretation of the vague Congressional mandate to the Commission to carry out its

duties “as public interest, convenience, or necessity requires.”

ccxiii

Without defining the

phrase, the Commission relied on this language to justify a set of “general principles” that

strongly encouraged technical precision, regular scheduling, and the assessment of an

applicant’s character and financial accountability as part of the licensing process. Most

importantly, the FRC’s General Order 40 declared that radio stations should perform a

general public service by serving the broadest possible audience with a “well rounded

program of entertainment as well as cultural programming.”

ccxiv

Stations that chose to

serve more particular audiences or interests were identified as propaganda stations.

Though the term was not intended to be derogatory, the Commission asserted “there is

not room in the broadcast band for every school of thought, religious, political, social,

and economic, each to have its separate broadcast station, its mouthpiece in the ether.”

ccxv

By embracing these general principles, the FRC established key precedents that

would shape the future of radio and other electronic media in the U.S. Asserting there

was “not room in the broadcast band for every school of thought,” the Commission

embraced a paradigm of spectrum scarcity that significantly strengthened the privileged

individuals and agencies that held licenses to broadcast on public channels. This

privilege was further enhanced by the Commission’s preference for licensing network-

affiliated stations. This assertion would make it difficult for other parties to gain access

to the spectrum. By defining public service in terms of a marketplace serving mass

audiences, the Commission asserted that the interests of consumers in the market were

congruent with those of citizens in a democracy. This assumption would prove false for

those citizens outside the prevailing social, economic, and political strata. The paradigm

of the self-regulating marketplace also allowed the FRC to embrace a self-defining

paradigm of the public interest: Those stations and programs that succeeded in the

market would, by definition, serve “the public interest, convenience, or necessity.” In

effect, the Commission took the position that broad government intervention was

unnecessary to promote the public interest. Large, private companies would fill the void.

Ultimately, according to Walker, “the experts, the managers, the military men, the

politicians, the patent poolers, the advertisers, the networks – together, they disenchanted

radio.”

ccxvi

Dark times, FM, and war, 1935-1945

Under General Order 40, the effects of spectrum reallocation were devastating for

nonprofit, noncommercial, and educational broadcasters. Though hundreds of licenses

were issued to such parties between 1921 and 1934, most expired or were transferred to

commercial operators.

ccxvii

Educational broadcasters had themselves to blame, in part, for

their circumstances. Unable to unify their advocacy efforts, educational radio stations

were represented between 1930 and 1940 by competing organizations, including the

National Advisory Council on Radio in Education [NACRE], the National Committee on

Education by Radio [NCER], and the National Association of Educational Broadcasters

[NAEB]. NACRE sought close cooperation between commercial and educational

broadcasters, while NCER and NAEB lobbied to reserve channels for educational radio.

As the organizations jostled to assert their political positions, their member institutions

saw their frequencies distributed to others through the reallocation process. At the same

time, the powerful commercial interests argued successfully “that educational

broadcasters should stay on the periphery of the industry and use their commercial

counterparts to transmit educational programming.”

ccxviii

Ultimately, the results nearly

eliminated educational radio altogether: By 1937, just 38 educational stations remained,

spread across the country from Massachusetts to Oregon, with concentrations in the

upper Midwest and northeastern states.

ccxix

In 1938, the FCC finally reserved channels for noncommercial use. However, the

transmission frequencies, between 41 to 42 megahertz (Mhz), were far higher than those

on the widely accepted commercial band. One year later, the reserved channels were

shifted to 42 to 43 Mhz, requiring the few educational stations licensed on these

frequencies to move. In addition, the Commission required the licensees to adopt an

entirely different transmission system, moving from the widely accepted technology of

amplitude modulation (AM) to the more technically desirable but little-used technology

of frequency modulation (FM).

ccxx

Invented by scientist and engineer E. Howard

Armstrong and patented in the early 1930s, FM provided a signal that was virtually free

of the annoying static that plagued AM broadcasts. FM also had the capacity to transmit

a broader range of audio frequencies, delivering greater fidelity to the listener.

ccxxi

Armstrong intended to license the technology to RCA, but RCA President David Sarnoff

was unwilling to forego the industry’s substantial investment in the proven AM system

for the promise of FM. In the “the first instance of bureaucratic collusion between the

Radio Corporation of America and the Federal Communications Commission,”

ccxxii

the

FCC constrained Armstrong’s ability to develop FM broadcasting on his own, labeling

Armstrong’s system “utterly impracticable”

ccxxiii

in the words of one of the commission’s

staff engineers. Nevertheless, Armstrong pressed on independently, determined to prove

the value of his invention.

Though RCA was unwilling to work with Armstrong, the company’s engineers

saw the possibilities available through FM transmission, and started to develop their own

applications for the technology. While the relatively low frequencies of audio

information could be carried on the lower portion of the radio spectrum, the transmission

of images – television – required much higher frequencies: The same frequencies

developed by Armstrong for FM radio. By 1938, NBC deployed a mobile television unit

in New York City.

ccxxiv

Sarnoff presented television to the public the following year at

the New York Worlds Fair. As war approached in Europe and Asia, RCA’s technology

was valued as well for its military application – radar. Even as commercial television

came to the air, “the boom was being put in storage,” say Barnouw. “Precious materials

and electronic assembly lines were needed, not for television but for war.”

ccxxv

The FCC

would not reconsider the issue of spectrum allocation and channel reservation until peace

was at hand. In those intervening years, Lewis Hill would refuse military service, endure

exile in a government labor camp, become disillusioned with commercial broadcasting,

and envision a new kind of radio, dedicated to the cause of world peace.

Lewis Hill and listener-sponsored radio

Born in 1919, Lewis Hill was the patrician son of a wealthy Oklahoma oil tycoon.

Precocious, articulate, cerebral, and possessing a mellifluous baritone voice, he “played

musical instruments with little effort and, according to classmates, often was absent from

school yet passed exams easily.”

ccxxvi

As a child, he assembled crystal radio sets, and

showed an aptitude for machines. But to his father Johnson Hill, Lewis was a

disappointment, and hardly suited to the rough and tumble life of the oil business. The

family’s attempt to reform him at a Missouri military academy had precisely the opposite

effect, and Hill “cultivated a lifelong contempt for militarism.”

ccxxvii

Instead, he went

west to Stanford University, where he studied politics and philosophy. Hill was

particularly engaged by Soren Kierkegaard’s constructive individualism, and the notion

that the authentic individual must stand alone against the crowd to express and act on his

principles.

ccxxviii

100

Hill’s elite heritage, temperament, and education led him to the interwar pacifist

movement that swept across the US and Europe in the 1920s and 30s.

ccxxix

Led by

organizations such as the religiously oriented Fellowship of Reconciliation, under the

forceful and charismatic leadership of A.J. Muste, many in the movement connected

political action with a strong sense of spirituality. This combination was especially

appealing to idealists and intellectuals such as Hill. But as the specter of war grew in

Europe and Asia, the threads of American pacifism quickly frayed and unraveled.

ccxxx

Spurred on by Roosevelt, Congress passed the Burke Wadsworth Act in the fall of 1940,

authorizing universal military conscription. Unwilling to compromise his principles, Hill

boycotted military service and registered as a conscientious objector (CO).

ccxxxi

Though the draft law recognized CO status, the government treated those who

refused military service with disdain. COs were routinely arrested, jailed, and isolated in

remote government work camps. Sensing the shifting mood of the era, historic religious

groups such as the Quakers attempted to cooperate with government authorities by

operating the CO facilities. But more radical pacifists inside the camps chafed at the

thought of cooperating with government in any form. In the camps, charismatic leaders

such as David Dellinger cast aside communitarian religious ideals for more practical

forms of resistance, built on the tactics of individual expression and direct action that had

been successfully demonstrated by Mohandas Gandhi.

ccxxxii

Contrary to the

government’s expectations, the camps provided a “near perfect environment for refining

and confirming ideological commitments, spreading their philosophy and testing theories

… The wartime experience of radical pacifists suggests that radicalism not only survived,

101

but gained new followers and an enhanced repertoire of tactics at a time when most

Americans unhesitatingly celebrated the nation’s commitment to war.”

ccxxxiii

For a gifted

writer and public speaker such as Hill, this new approach to pacifism was especially

appealing.

Following his term of enforced government service, Hill relocated to Washington,

D.C., where he found employment as a writer and announcer for the NBC Blue Network

station WINX

ccxxxiv

. Reading the continuous stream of war-related dispatches appalled

Hill, and the experience further strengthened his commitment to the nonviolent resolution

of human conflict. For a time, Hill was active in the Committee for Nonviolent

Revolution, a postwar group dedicated to implementing the Gandhian strategies

advocated by Dellinger and others. Hill soon questioned whether such tactics could lead

to meaningful social change, claiming there was “no ground yet for a non-violent

revolutionary organization. The development of such a group must involve certain key

intellectuals around the country very deeply; and it is self-evident that these people have

no interest in your battle.”

ccxxxv

Instead, Hill moved to back to California to establish a

radio station that would advocate for peace through electronic communication.

In the postwar environment of the San Francisco Bay Area, Hill may have

selected the best possible location for his sociopolitical experiment in broadcasting.

Throughout World War II, booming defense industries had drawn thousands of people to

the area. Propelled in part by a powerful local labor movement, historically conservative

city governments in San Francisco and Oakland receded in the face of New Deal politics,

reacting “to the dislocations of the Great Depression and World War II by coalescing

102

around the liberal vision of the American future. In San Francisco, and across the nation,

laborers and bankers, blacks and whites, Republicans and Democrats adopted liberalism

as an ideology that gave meaning to political activities.”

ccxxxvi

Artists, writers, and

musicians also found a hospitable environment for their efforts in “a working guy’s

town” that was “blue collar, good clean fun. San Franciscans saw themselves as

special… There was a spirit in the town, an innate loyalty to the city.”

ccxxxvii

Change also

came to the campus of the University of California at Berkeley, as thousands of veterans

enrolled following the war. Issel asserts that these groups and movements provided a

large population of people “committed to universal human rights, linked [through] city

government, corporate boardrooms, union headquarters, and social service agencies such

as the YMCA and Stiles Hall, the center of liberal student activism at the University of

California at Berkeley.”

ccxxxviii

In San Francisco, Hill re-established his connections with Roy Kepler and

Richard Moore, whom he had known at the Coleville, California government camp, and

others sympathetic to the cause of postwar pacifism. To this group, Hill introduced the

possibility of a nonprofit organization dedicated to the proposition that the process of

dialogue could lead to the peaceful resolution of human conflicts. In 1946, Hill and his

organization established the Pacifica Foundation to

engage in any activity that shall contribute a lasting understanding between nations

and between individuals of all nations, races, creeds, and colors; to gather and

disseminate information on the causes of conflict between any and all such groups;

and through any and all means available to this society, to promote the study of

political and economic problems, and the causes of religious, philosophical, and racial

antagonisms.

ccxxxix

103

The instrument for disseminating this information and dialogue would be a radio station

unlike any other. Hill’s vision for the station was simple and powerful, according to

Lasar: “First, through dialogue, it would demonstrate the viability of peace in practice.

Second, it would introduce listeners to a challenging ideology in the context of familiar

and pleasurable sounds.”

ccxl

The programming would consist of commentary, and

discussion by those who might contribute to the dialogue, including social critics,

activists, educators, artists, and those involved in society, culture, and politics. Looking

to connect with the burgeoning working class communities in the East Bay, Hill intended

to establish this station as a high power AM facility station based in the Richmond area,

adjacent to the shipyards, refineries, and related industries that employed tens of

thousands of unionized workers. Through the radio station, the founders of Pacifica

intended to sustain a grand coalition of intellectuals and workers, bound in the cause of a

peaceful world through the process of dialogue.

In 1947, Pacifica tendered its first application for permission to construct a

broadcast facility to the FCC. The application soon stalled in the commission’s review

process, running up against a number of obstacles. Consistent with the history of

broadcast regulation in the US, the FCC harbored an entrenched ambivalence towards

noncommercial applicants, supported by the industry’s self-serving characterization of

“propaganda.” Hill attempted to negotiate these challenges in the application by avoiding

the Foundation’s ideological heritage, couching Pacifica’s moral agenda in more

traditional terms of educational broadcasting. To complicate matters further, the

application required Pacifica to offer a business plan to assure initial costs and long-term

104

solvency for the organization and facilities. Pacifica had commitments for start-up

capital from a handful of major donors, but over the long term, Hill proposed that the

station would be supported entirely by voluntary donations from listeners. To date, no

broadcaster had succeeded with such a bold plan. Lacking any precedent, the

commission had no frame of reference for direct listener capitalization. Based on these

concerns, the commission rejected Pacifica’s application. Though the FCC’s

documentation is silent on the issue, it also seems reasonable to believe that Hill’s status

as a draft resister may have played a part in the commission’s consideration.

Pressed by Pacifica’s organizers and founding contributors to get some sort of the

radio station on the air, Hill needed another alternative. He turned to the marginalized

FM band: Pressure from commercial interests in television had pushed the Commission

to reallocate the spectrum for FM radio to 88 to 108 Mhz just two years earlier in 1945.

With FM manufacturers scrambling to adjust to the new spectrum, and few consumers

willing to buy the new receivers, the band was wide open for new ventures. FCC policy

consultant Charles Siepmann, a former employee of the British Broadcasting Company,

argued that FM offered the U.S. a second chance to provide locally produced, high

quality programming, free from commodifying influences of advertising and corporate

control. But this new technology was known only to a select audience of radio

enthusiasts - those who could afford to purchase the new receivers. FM would not reach

the broad, working class audience envisioned for the proposed AM service by Pacifica’s

founders. Nevertheless, Hill convinced the members of the Foundation to refocus their

efforts on the more educated and affluent audience in the Berkeley area that could be

105

served with an FM signal. In September 1947, Pacifica tendered a new application to the

FCC, proposing a 250 watt FM facility in Berkeley. By 1949, Pacifica had its license to

broadcast: KPFA FM offered its first broadcast on April 14, 1949.

ccxli

Though the affluent Berkeley hills likely had more FM receivers per capita than

other parts of the Bay Area, the circumstances of geography, the weak 250 watt signal,

and the overall scarcity of FM radios soon caught up with KPFA. Despite ongoing

appeals to listeners, the station was chronically short of funds. By August, after weeks

without paychecks, most of the staff had quit. For a time, KPFA ceased broadcasting.

Hill lobbied for a more powerful transmitter and canvassed the region for new

subscribers. His efforts were successful, returning KPFA to the air in the summer of

1951.

ccxlii

But Hill knew that KPFA needed a long-term solution to guarantee security

and stability for the station’s finances.

Hill found his opportunity in a proposal to the Fund for Adult Education [FAE], a

program of the Ford Foundation. Recognizing the congruence of Pacifica’s mission with

Ford’s goals to promote peace and democracy, Hill lobbied FAE director C. Scott

Fletcher to invest in KPFA’s experiment in voluntary listener sponsorship to sustain

educational radio. The FAE responded with a grant of $150,000 to Pacifica.

ccxliii

The

funds allowed Pacifica to purchase and install a 10,000 watt transmitter, increasing the

listening area fourfold. But more crucially, the FAE grant allowed KPFA to gain a

measure of stability, freeing the staff from the ongoing drudgery of raising operating

funds. With FAE’s support, KPFA could offer a reliable schedule of music, discussion,

and children’s programs. Programs on topics as diverse as Chinese classical music,

106

American communism, and parenting were regular fare on KPFA, produced by some of

the Bay Area’s most noted artists and intellectuals, including Alan Watts, Ralph

Ginsberg, Caspar Weinberger, and Pauline Kael. In contrast with the dominant AM

programming of the day, KPFA’s “program content was conceived unit by unit, to be of

special interest to a definite minority of the audience.”

ccxliv

In contrast to Pacifica’s

original vision of a vast regional audience, “little or none” of KPFA’s programming “was

oriented to the ‘mass’ audience.”

ccxlv

Turning the Foundation’s original communitarian

mission upside-down, Hill now appealed to the strength and power of the individual:

Freedom to experiment generally, to risk the individualities of new art, to search

for new uses of the medium itself, was also seen as having fundamental

importance to that uniqueness of communication and response which the theory

envisioned between station and audience.

ccxlvi

As the grip of anti-communist rhetoric and conformist behavior tightened on

American society in the early 1950s, KPFA became a haven for activists, artists, and

misfits who shared many of the beliefs and behaviors of the direct action pacifists that

Hill had left behind in the east. KPFA became a showplace for controversial rhetoric and

individual expressions of principle. Hill regularly struggled to keep this volatile

collection of strident communicators and powerful egos focused on KPFA’s broader

service and financial goals. Concurrently, Hill revealed his own elitist tendencies in the

rhetoric he used to promote KPFA’s highbrow programming to Ford and other financial

supporters. The resulting clashes of values and egos were especially hard on the sensitive

and cerebral Hill. He threatened to resign on several occasions. In 1953, he made good

on the threat, only to return when KPFA descended into anarchy. Though KPFA would

survive its turbulent birth, Hill would not live to celebrate the station’s first decade.

107

During all the years of service to the cause, Hill had been troubled by the ever-worsening

pain of spinal arthritis. By 1956, what little medical help was available for the condition

was no longer effective. On August 1, 1957, Hill took his own life. Though Hill had

endured a series of difficulties during his years with Pacifica, those who knew him agreed

that his deteriorating condition was the cause of his suicide. Yet Lasar observes, the

legend of Hill’s downfall would be far more powerful than the tragic reality of his

demise:

To the larger Pacifica community, Hill’s death became a metaphor for the

sacrifice and not infrequent insanity associated with leadership at a community

radio station. This became the master narrative of Hill’s final days.

ccxlvii

Milam

Like Lew Hill, Lorenzo Wilson Milam was the child of a wealthy family. Milam

was born in Jacksonville, Florida in 1933, the son of a successful real estate

speculator.

ccxlviii

Like Hill, Milam was fascinated by radio early in his life. In the late

40s, Milam’s teenage experience coincided with the onset of radio’s transfiguration from

a program to a format medium. As national broadcasters shifted their resources and their

most prominent programs into the new medium of television, local radio stations

searched for new voices and new sounds that might preserve their existing audiences, or

attract new ones. For the first time in the South, listeners began to hear programs

featuring African American announcers, and hear the jazz, blues, and popular “race

records” of the day. The first station that specifically targeted African American

listeners, WDIA in Memphis, went on the air in 1949 (under white ownership).

ccxlix

108

Inspired by the sounds of other cultures, broadcast on AM radio in Georgia and Florida,

Milam cultivated a voracious interest in music, engineering, and language.

Milam shared other key experiences with Hill. In 1951, he entered a prestigious

university. Where Hill went west, Milam remained in the east, enrolling at Yale. At

Yale’s student radio station, Milam got to do a bit of everything – engineering, ad sales,

announcing, and news writing. It was enough experience to land a job at a small

Jacksonville station, WIVY. He gave up on Yale after just one year.

ccl

But within a few

months, he was incapacitated by polio. For the next year and a half, he endured tortuous

treatments in a series of hospitals. Years later, Milam described his experience in

excruciating detail:

After electrocuting me carefully (shoulders, thighs, stomach, back) Miss Bland

stretches the muscles. With her hands she shifts my legs and forces them into certain

positions which are as close to elaborate and exact fainting painfulness as possible.

By true magic, she is able to go to work on the muscles which are already on fire, and

pull hamstrings and extensors and rotators and quadriceps and opponens so they will

not contract. Miss Bland puts me through the tortures of the damned so that my heels

will not touch my buttocks for the rest of my life. O Miss Bland, you are killing me,

telling me all the while it is for my own good. Kill me now so I can live tomorrow.

ccli

Milam eventually found more compassionate caregivers in Warm Springs,

Georgia, and his condition improved enough that he was able to move back to

Jacksonville.

cclii

He returned to college for the next six years, “in order that I might set

myself apart from the foot-dragger with stained pants and rag-top wooden crutches who

pulls himself into the Salvation Army camps of the world.”

ccliii

At the Quaker affiliated

Haverford College in Pennsylvania, Milam worked for the campus radio station, and

learned

109

that war – and the killing of people in general – is Not A Good Thing. I was also

taught that each of us is responsible for helping to bring peace to the world. I was

also taught that each of us is responsible for helping to bring peace to the

world.

ccliv

Milam moved to Berkeley to pursue a master’s degree in English, where he tuned

in to Hill’s KPFA.

cclv

Attracted by the station’s “wonderful mix of music and talk and

drama and high art,” Milam volunteered, and was quickly caught up in the spirit of

pacifist idealism and the maelstrom of KPFA’s internal politics.

cclvi

In the late 1950s, American society was haunted by the shadow of atomic

annihilation. The draft resisters and peace activists of World War II had coalesced

around the anti-nuclear war movement, with a strong presence on college campuses.

Ban-the-bomb rhetoric was especially strong on the Berkeley campus and at KPFA,

where several pacifists “regularly ran programs on the ghastly threat of nuclear

holocaust.”

cclvii

Milam reasoned, “there should be a station like this in Washington, D.C.,

I thought, so that people in power could be exposed to the alternatives.”

cclviii

He was “so

swept up in the vision that in the spring of 1959, I resigned my studies, resigned my

marriage, and took a jet directly to Washington D.C.,” with the intention to build a

noncommercial, listener sponsored station like KPFA in the nation’s capital.

cclix

Milam rented an office on F Street for thirty-five dollars a month and went to

work, personally delivering his application for an FM station to the FCC.

cclx

Backed by a

substantial inheritance, he had no trouble demonstrating that he had the required start-up

capital in hand.

cclxi

Cold War ideology and anti-communist hysteria were at their height

within the federal government: “It seems that fear of the Great Red Beast had swept

through the FCC just about the time I had come to town.”

cclxii

Milam’s unusual

110

application was quickly bogged down in the Commission’s review procedures. The

process was personified by one especially persistent investigator, a “flea-brain by the

name of John Harrington:”

cclxiii

He is head of ‘Internal Security’ at the FCC, and he’s heard all about me allright. He

has heard from unimpeachable sources that Pacifica Foundation, parent of KPFA, in

Berkeley, is teeming with Communists. Since I worked for KPFA briefly, before I

came to Washington, and since I obviously enjoyed it, and since I am trying to start a

similar station, I am probably a Communist Too.

cclxiv

Milam was not Communist, but he was not the typical applicant. He spent a lot of

time hanging around the Commission’s reference room, hobbling around on his crutches,

poring over documents. After a time he noticed, “that FM permits were being granted to

others who had applied at the same time I had. People who wanted to broadcast mood

music, or rock, or fundamentalist religious programming were walking away with

permits; average waiting time, two to three months.”

cclxv

Milam enlisted the assistance of

a communications attorney, then appealed to U.S. Representative Charles Bennett, from

his home district in Florida. Nothing worked. It was clear the FCC had no intention of

granting a construction permit for a station to broadcast “interviews and recordings of

important speeches and documentaries and news programs that will look at all sides of

the issues” in the nation’s capital.

cclxvi

He abandoned his efforts and left the country, but

not before he’d filed an application to broadcast in Seattle on 107.7 FM. In addition, he

retained the services of Michael Bader, partner in the eminent Washington

communications law firm of Haley, Bader and Potts. Andrew Haley had been one of

Commission’s original staff attorneys in 1934, and had since developed an impressive

stable of clients.

cclxvii

Milam reasoned that an application for the least desirable channel,

111

in a city 2800 miles distant from Washington D.C., represented by one of the broadcast

industry’s leading attorneys, might have a better chance.

Eighteen months later, Milam received a letter from Bader. With the change of

administrations, the FCC was under new management:

Soon enough, my lawyer and I were sitting in the office of the assistant of the new

chairman … There was a frequency available in Seattle, Washington. It was

mine, if I signed a loyalty oath that I was not a member of the Communist Party,

and had never belonged to ‘an organization that plotted the overthrow of the

government of the United States’.

cclxviii

Milam considered the implications of the loyalty oath, knowing that “thousands of

professors, union members and professionals” had sacrificed their careers believing “that

our government had no right to ask such a thing of an American citizen.”

cclxix

But on the

advice of an old college friend, Milam relented, realizing that “once you get your radio

station, you can do or say any damn thing you want – especially about a government that

forces good people in a bind like this.”

cclxx

Milam relocated to Seattle, and placed an ad

in Broadcasting magazine for an engineer.

cclxxi

KRAB

Jeremy Lansman was a radio wunderkind from southern California: By the time

he was 12 years old, he’d already been experimenting with telegraph keys, rheostats,

crystal sets, and myriad electronic devices for 5 years. His parents relocated to St. Louis,

then divorced. Lansman dropped out of high school and migrated west to San Francisco,

where he joined the staff of KPFA for a time. Hired as chief engineer for a commercial

station in Truckee, CA, he soon found himself in Hawaii, charged at the age of 18 with

constructing a new radio station. But Lansman was indifferent to the world of

112

commercial radio, and once the project was finished, he quit his job, returned to the

mainland, and subsequently answered Milam’s ad.

cclxxii

Together, Milam and Lansman

pooled their legal, technical, and organizational talents to establish KRAB FM, going on

the air December 12, 1962.

cclxxiii

To some extent, KRAB was inspired by Lew Hill’s mission to promote dialogue

through broadcasting. Like KPFA, KRAB was ostensibly funded by listener donations.

But unlike KPFA, KRAB was not tied to Hill’s pacifist ideology. Rather, Milam found

inspiration in Herbert Hoover’s rhetoric of ubiquitous, democratic radio and “the hopes

of education, enlightenment, and knowledge – being transmitted everywhere.”

cclxxiv

Siepmann, Milam believed that FM provided a second chance for radio to prosecute a

genuine public service mission: “We see radio as a means to the old democratic concept

of the right to dissent: the right to argue, and differ, and be heard… KRAB is beginning

to move towards filling the responsibility abdicated by commercial broadcasters.”

cclxxv

KRAB was unique. The station featured the authentic, unpolished voices of

dozens of volunteer commentators and announcers, motivated by a shared passion for

radio, “one of the rich antennae you have in the community.”

cclxxvi

The volunteers

programmed everything that was not available on commercial radio, from “an hour of

two of Chinese Opera, or Electronic Music, or Gagaku, or Recorder Music, or Music of

Sunda, or Scot’s ballads,”

cclxxvii

to John Birch society member Fredrick B. Exner,

alternating with Frank Krasnowsky of the Socialist Workers Party,

cclxxviii

to panel

discussions of indeterminate length, free from “the tyranny of the clock.”

cclxxix

At times,

listeners might hear extended periods of unintelligible sound occurring away from the

113

microphone, or even silence - “a five or ten minute break in the middle so our

participants can rest, so our audience can rest, and so that we can open the doors and

clear out the smoke (since our one studio has no ventilation).”

cclxxx

Milam called it

Supplementary Radio. Like KPFA, KRAB reflected the character of its founder: Where

KPFA was thoughtful and erudite, KRAB was eclectic and unpretentious. Lacking a

consistent sound, KRAB expressed unity in Milam’s conception of an oasis in a public

sphere de-personalized and commodified by the radio industry, “a single, small voice of

reason in a broadcast band otherwise garish and ugly with commercialism and rank anti-

intellectualism.”

cclxxxi

It was also “more often than not a shambles,” due in part to a labor shortage.

cclxxxii

Though 55 volunteers produced programs, few contributed to the more pedestrian tasks

that could sustain the station’s infrastructure.

cclxxxiii

The KRAB facility suffered from an

“eternally leaky roof,” a “wasted fence and litter enough to convince the average visitor

that perhaps the station does suffer no small poverty:”

cclxxxiv

It is cramped and dirty here at KRAB: our main studio is our office and storeroom,

serves as a library for 2500 records and 196,00 feet of tape; our hot plate and tea pot

make it a kitchen, our books a study, our pillow a bedroom (one of our early rising

commentators came in without knocking and almost stepped on our face.)

Sometimes the papers threaten to choke us.

cclxxxv

More threatening was the chronic shortage of operating capital. In the first months,

KRAB offered “three quiet explications per day,” appealing for contributions. Funds

trickled in slowly, at the rate of one $12 subscription per day. Milam covered the

monthly deficits with his personal funds, and drew no salary.

cclxxxvi

“KRAB for 5 or 6

114

years lived entirely on Lorenzo and what they could raise, and they couldn’t raise shit,”

recalled a staff member.

cclxxxvii

By November 1963, circumstances forced Milam to accept the inevitability of a

more persistent approach. In a 42 hour broadcast marathon, “every half hour, religiously,

sometimes for as long as five minutes, there was a heavy appeal for funds.”

cclxxxviii

Calls

for donations were punctuated with a “reading, from memory, of Finnegan’s Wake… the

last letters [of doomed German soldiers] from Stalingrad…[and] readings to the music of

John Cage.”

cclxxxix

The event raised more than $1,000 and rescued the station from the

financial doldrums. Though pleased with the success of the effort, Milam bemoaned the

corruption of KRAB’s noncommercial ideal: “KRAB was established to traffic in ideas,

not commerce.”

ccxc

For Milam, the state of affairs provided a sorry commentary on

consumer culture:

We find it depressing to think what contemporary techniques of advertising have

done to Americans; even in our own listeners the advertising klaxons have instilled an

automatic blab-off: any appeal for money opens the circuits unless it is repeated

again, and again, and again. People are dying from an over-profusion of words.

ccxci

Despite these misgivings, the marathon revealed KRAB’s power to reach listeners. The

drift “between poverty and prosperity” was “the perfect symbol of the schizophrenic

nature of listener-supported radio.”

ccxcii

Occasional poverty was no match for Milam’s vision. In 1964 a group of

disaffected classical music listeners sought out Milam for guidance on starting a listener-

supported station in Portland, Oregon. When the group was unable to secure the

financing necessary to start a new station or acquire and existing one, Milam agreed to

115

submit an application on behalf of the Jack Straw Memorial Foundation, the nonprofit

licensee of KRAB, in conjunction with Portland Listener Sponsor Radio. Initially, the

small, 10 watt facility would simply rebroadcast KRAB in the Portland area.

ccxciii

Milam

tapped KRAB volunteer David Calhoun to get the new station up and running. Two and

a half years later, the northwest’s second listener-supported station, KBOO, was on the

air. Local programming followed shortly.

ccxciv

Milam’s aspirations went beyond the Northwest, as well. In 1963, he submitted

an application for an available frequency in St. Louis, Missouri. Unknown to Milam,

Jeremy Lansman had submitted a competing application for the same channel, eager to

operate a station in his old hometown. The two pooled their resources, pitting their

energies and expertise against the application of the racially segregated Christian

Fundamental Church. Over the next two years, a fierce competition ensued, capped by

an administrative hearing that awarded the construction permit to the church. But in the

aftermath, Milam, Lansman, and their attorneys demonstrated that the church, in addition

to being a racist organization, had materially misrepresented itself. In the end, the license

went to Milam and Lansman in 1967: KDNA went on the air in St. Louis two years later,

offering an eclectic mix of programs produced by paid staff and volunteers. Some staff

lived in the building.

ccxcv

Though the station sold commercials, “KDNA was very free

form,” recalls former station manager Tom Thomas:

ccxcvi

The station was super engaged. It was a lively part of the community. Even the

fundraisers were fun. The station was a reflection of the community. Politicians

were interviewed on KDNA. Musicians would perform on KDNA, and spread

the word about this kind of radio when they traveled. KDNA was musical, and it

offered many viewpoints. It was not political.

ccxcvii

116

Like Lansman, Milam was ready for a change, too. Stepping down from KRAB

in the summer of 1968, Milam later purchased a commercial station in Los Gatos,

California, on the peninsula south of San Francisco. Milam turned the operation into

commercial free KTAO, following the same formula he had established at KRAB.

ccxcviii

This time, his efforts coincided with the lurching social and political turmoil of the late

1960s. Concurrently, America’s historic educational radio outlets were being

transformed, thanks to the assistance of the federal government.

Public broadcasting

The enterprise that would become public broadcasting in the United States began

in the classrooms and laboratories of the nation’s schools, colleges, and universities,

nearly concurrent with the invention of radio. In radio’s boom years in the 1920s and

1930s, educational broadcasters had nearly been regulated out of existence. But like the

handful of stations that continued to operate into the 1940s, the National Association of

Educational Broadcasters had soldiered on, first lobbying the FCC for reserved spectrum

on the AM band, and then more successfully for the set-aside of 20 FM channels between

88 and 92 megahertz for noncommercial, educational radio. By June 1947, there were 38

educational FM licensees.

ccxcix

The following year, the Commission lowered the

financial barriers to educational FM by permitting the operation of very low cost

noncommercial stations of 10 watts or less. With the subsequent easing of requirements

for individual operator licenses, and enrollments rising in the postwar years, more schools

started their own radio stations.

ccc

Ten years later, the Broadcasting Yearbook counted

286 stations in the reserved FM band.

ccci

But these advancements, like the entire radio

117

industry, were overshadowed by the rapid ascendance of television as a technological,

political, economic, and cultural force.

Bottled up during the war years, television’s explosive growth and penetration

into the consumer market was unprecedented. In 1946, there were 8,000 television

households in the entire United States. By 1954, the number ballooned to 26 million

households, reaching half of the U.S. population.

cccii

Just twelve years later, in October

1966, the number more than doubled to 58.2 million TV households - 94% of American

homes.

ccciii

During the 1948 presidential campaign, the conventions of the two major

political parties were covered primarily by radio. By 1952, Sperber asserts, “the tilt had

gone to TV… a major media event, broadcast coast to coast. For the first time more

Americans were watching than listening in the prime evening hours.”

ccciv

For CBS news

editor Robert Skedgell “the circumstances were all turned around. Radio had become a

rather small part of the television broadcast, like two ships passing in the night.”

cccv

“By

the time of President Kennedy’s assassination,” notes historian David Farber, “television

had emerged as the preeminent medium transmitting the nation’s public life.”

cccvi

Overwhelmed with applications from commercial interests for television

channels, the FCC instituted a freeze on TV licenses in 1948. Over the next three years,

the NAEB lobbied to reserve a portion of the proposed television spectrum for

educational television [ETV], finding an outspoken ally in the commission’s first female

appointee, New York attorney Frieda B Hennock. Hennock’s home was the site of the

first meeting of the Joint Committee on Educational Television [JCET], an ad hoc group

facilitated by the NAEB. Seizing the moral high ground, Hennock argued that the

118

interests of educational broadcasters should not once again be ignored in the regulatory

process. Hennock’s arguments posed little political risk: At worst, if educational

broadcasters failed to use the protected spectrum, the channels would simply lie fallow.

Urged on by Hennock, the FCC ultimately reserved 242 television channels as part of its

Sixth Order and Report in 1952. Simultaneously, the Order lifted the application

freeze.

cccvii

At the same time the FCC was considering the television spectrum issue, the

Detroit-based Ford Foundation was expanding its philanthropic mission, creating two

new programs - the Fund for the Advancement of Education and the Fund for Adult

Education. Under the leadership of former University of Miami president C. Scott

Fletcher, the Funds provided some of the first substantive funding to advance the cause of

ETV, including $90,000 to the JCET to support legal costs associated with the spectrum

reservation effort. The following year, the Fund for Adult Education provided start-up

financing for the Educational Television and Radio Center, the first national distributor

for educational radio and television programs, located first in Ann Arbor, Michigan and

later moved to New York.

cccviii

Fletcher’s interest in educational broadcasting provided a

foundation for Ford’s interest in Lew Hill’s later project at KPFA.

Even with Ford’s support, the sheer cost of television facilities and production

limited the number of stations. Though the FCC increased the number of reserved

channel allocations to 257, by 1960 there were only 49 educational TV stations on the

air.

cccix

Ford’s generosity could only go so far. Members of the NAEB knew they

needed an ongoing source of funding. The most likely source was the federal

119

government. “Television cost so much they had to pay attention to it,” recalled former

NAEB Executive Director William Harley.

cccx

“It had to attract the attention of the

highest authorities within the governing bodies – the state legislatures, the governors, and

so on.”

cccxi

The NAEB found a powerful ally in Senator Lyndon Baines Johnson.

Through his wife, Johnson had owned radio stations in Texas since the 1940s. Johnson

put his knowledge of broadcast media to work in the new postwar politics, employing

scientific polling, public relations techniques, and radio advertising in a successful 1948

campaign.

cccxii

Johnson’s political muscle went to work for educational broadcasting in

1956, following a dinner conversation with Leonard Marks, communications attorney for

Mrs. Johnson’s broadcasting interests and pro bono attorney for the NAEB. Uncertain of

the Ford Foundation’s continuing interest in ETV, Marks persuaded Johnson to spearhead

an effort to provide federal funding for building and upgrading educational broadcasting

facilities.

cccxiii

Over the course of the next 6 years, Marks and others would help the

NAEB shepherd the effort through Congress, under Johnson’s watchful eye. The final

legislation, the Educational Broadcasting Facilities Act of 1962, provided funds to

construct and equip educational television and radio outlets.

With television in the political and cultural spotlight, educational radio remained

stagnant. Other than a 1951 Kellogg grant to support audiotape distribution, “educational

radio was at a loss for major accomplishments during the 1950s.”

cccxiv

The situation

came to a head in 1963, when the NAEB, under pressure from its ETV members,

reorganized into semi-autonomous radio and television units. University of Michigan

radio instructor Jerrold Sandler became the executive director of the National Educational

120

Radio [NER] division.

cccxv

For his counterpart at the division of Educational Television

Stations [ETS], ETV broadcasters successfully lured C. Scott Fletcher over from the

Fund for Adult Education. Predictably, the two divisions started moving in opposite

directions. Where Sandler “was forced to spend most of his energies to keep the division

afloat,” Fletcher went to work through his personal and professional connections to

orchestrate events that led to a $500,000 grant from the Carnegie Corporation.

cccxvi

The

funds underwrote the costs of the Carnegie Commission on Educational Television,

endorsed by President Lyndon Johnson in November, 1965.

Though the work of the Carnegie Commission focused entirely on educational

television, the panel’s deliberations touched on two key policy issues that affected radio

as well. The first concern related to the spatialization of national networks and their

relationship with local broadcast licensees. Aware that centrally directed radio and

television networks dominated commercial broadcasting, the Commission called for a

national system to interconnect stations and distribute programs, with final authority for

scheduling left in the hands of local authorities. The second policy issue concerned the

structuration of any systematic approach to educational broadcasting, and the role of

government in financing such a system. Unlike other nation-states, the United States had

never provided capital to support the production of content, according to Burke:

The notion of governmental financing of mass media was an unpopular political

construct in the United States, on the grounds that sponsorship leads to control. It

was finally agreed, however, without much enthusiasm among Commission

members, that the Congress should be asked to provide support through an excise

tax on television receivers.

cccxvii

121

In its final report, Public television: A program for action, released January 26,

1967, the Carnegie Commission recommended that Congress establish a

nongovernmental, nonprofit corporation to receive and distribute public and private

capital to support local program production, station interconnection, program distribution,

and research for the benefit of individual ETV stations. The new agency would be called

The Corporation for Public Television. President Johnson endorsed the provisions of the

Carnegie report in his subsequent report to Congress on education and health the

following month. Johnson’s recommendations were silent on the issue of financing.

cccxviii

Throughout the Carnegie proceedings, Jerry Sandler had not been idle. Since

1963, the radio division of the NAEB had been working to interconnect several groups of

educational radio stations in the Northeast and upper Midwest through telephone lines.

Faced with all that was occurring in television, Sandler felt strongly that radio needed

some consideration in the Carnegie Commission hearings, but Fletcher and others were

wary of derailing the process, and urged Sandler to wait for another opportunity. Sandler

reacted, “You can’t put it aside for a later time. The future is now. There is no later time.

That argument had been used for years and years and years until the people in

educational radio at the time believed it.”

cccxix

Sandler responded by coordinating a

conference of educational radio broadcasters at the Wingspread Center in Racine, WI in

1966, and subsequently committed his entire budget to a comprehensive report on

educational radio. Published by the NAEB is April, 1967, The hidden medium: A status

report on educational radio in the United States was distributed to members of Congress,

three months after the Carnegie Commission report.

122

The hidden medium sufficiently impressed members of Congress enough that

Sandler was called to testify at the Senate Commerce Committee hearings on the pending

Public Television Act of 1967. With Democrats in control of the executive and

legislative branches of the government, the legislation moved ahead quickly, carried by

the tide of Johnson’s ambitious social agenda and his continuing faith in economic

growth.

cccxx

The bill that finally emerged from Congress, establishing the federally

funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting [CPB], authorized $9 million dollars to fund

operations and programming for public television and radio enterprises. The

Corporation’s mission and design would reflect most of the Carnegie Commission’s

recommendations. Though the President would appoint the CPB Board of Directors, the

private corporation was charged to “assure the maximum freedom of the public

telecommunications entities and systems from interference with, or control of, program

content or other activities.”

cccxxi

On the issue of long range financing, neither the Johnson

administration nor Congress followed through on the excise tax initiative: Financing

would come through the Congressional appropriations process.

Incorporated in 1968, the CPB turned its immediate attention to television. The

office of Radio Activities came into being in June of 1969. In its first year, CPB’s radio

budget was $260,000. One third of the funds were designated to support the NER’s tape

distribution network. The majority of the remaining funds would be distributed to radio

stations that met a set of baseline qualifications: To receive funding from CPB, a station

was required to broadcast eleven months per year, six days per week, for eight hours per

day, with a minimum output power of 250 watts, and be operated by a staff of three

123

employees. Seventy-three of the 437 noncommercial, educational radio stations in the

U.S. – less than 17% - met the criteria, most licensed to the colleges and universities of

the NAEB. With the remaining resources, CPB focused on developing a national

network for these qualifying stations. The network, incorporated on March 3, 1970 and

funded directly by CPB, was named National Public Radio.

cccxxii

The Sixties

As the educational radio broadcasters of NER worked to develop their political

power, a counter-cultural movement was taking place on the doorstep of KPFA. In the

1950s, social protests were not unusual on the University of California campus: Berkeley

had been an intellectual haven for beat poets, artists, peace activists, and radicals since

the late 1940s. In the mid-60s, the nonconformists were joined by the first generation of

students from the postwar baby boom. Some of these young people emerged as student

leaders, including those who had traveled to the Deep South and participated in the

decade-long movement to achieve civil rights for African Americans. Affiliated with

historic dissident groups like the Congress of Racial Equality [CORE], or more recent

organizations such as the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee [SNCC], they

came to Berkeley “with a respect for the power of civil disobedience, a fierce moralism, a

lived love for racial equality, a distaste for bureaucratic highhandedness and euphemism,

[and] a taste for relentless talk at intense mass meetings on the way towards

consensus.”

cccxxiii

When activist Jack Weinberg was arrested in the fall of 1964 for

attempting to recruit civil rights demonstrators on the Berkeley campus, Mario Savio and

others urged students to strike.

“From that moment on, whenever conflicts erupted

124

between the university and the Berkeley left, KPFA subscribers could count on

immediate updates from their station.”

cccxxiv

The Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley was the vanguard of the clamor that

characterized the last half of 1960s: Citizens clashed with civil authorities over the heated

issues of the day - civil rights, economic inequality, environmental degradation, the

Vietnam War, and the military draft.

Catalyzed by protest, new social communities

arose, offering alternatives to the broadly portrayed conventions of postwar American

life. Countercultural movements explored cultural, political, and economic

empowerment for women, ethnic, and social minorities, unconventional approaches to

education and community, and new matters and forms of expression in the arts. For

many of those involved, it seemed there was grand movement towards “self-definition

and self-determination against all forces of management from on high.”

cccxxv

For others,

the agitation threatened the foundations of the American way of life.

Mass media provided a running narrative of the political and social dislocation as

it happened. Dissatisfied with the both the substance and style of coverage that appeared

in widely distributed print and broadcast channels, observers and activists turned to other

forms of communication. Dozens of small newspapers appeared across the country

offering sympathetic reports and representations of every aspect of the movement,

including the Los Angeles Free Press, the East Village Other, and the Berkeley

Barb.

cccxxvi

Having grown to a network of three stations in the Bay Area, Los Angeles,

and New York City, the broadcast counterpart could be heard on Pacifica stations KPFA,

KPFT, and WBAI, respectively.

125

Similar political content might be found where students or their sympathetic

advisors controlled the programming on college FM stations, including WGTB

(Georgetown University, Washington D.C.), WYSO (Antioch University, Ohio) and

WGDR (Goddard College, Vermont).

cccxxvii

More significantly, FM radio became the

showcase for the music of the counterculture, especially extended tracks from long

playing albums that were incompatible with commercial AM radio, which had long relied

on 2 and 3 minute songs.

cccxxviii

Though FM radio’s regulatory issues had been put to rest

in the 1950s, few Americans listened to FM radio in the 1960s, making advertising sales

difficult. Many owners simply simulcast the programming of their profitable AM

stations on FM frequencies, until the practice was curtailed by the FCC’s nonduplication

rules in 1967, and owners were forced to find other programming alternatives.

cccxxix

Absent the competitive pressures of the AM band, programmers working exclusively on

FM had more latitude to experiment with content. Consequently, young listeners who

sought out commercial FM stations, such as KSAN and KMPX in San Francisco, might

be treated to 5 minutes 33 seconds of the Beatles A Day in The Life, or all of Bob Dylan’s

Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands, running over 10 minutes. Adventurous listeners

discovered that such long form music programming was a staple of noncommercial,

listener-supported FM stations such as KRAB and KDNA.

In June 1970, the disparate interests of mainstream and underground media

converged in Plainfield, Vermont at the new media center on the campus of Goddard

College for the First Gathering of the Alternative Media Conference. Organized as a

class project by Goddard master’s student and WBAI veteran Larry Yurdin, the

126

conference was intended to gather “diverse heads together in an attempt to explore the

potential in electric media to turn people on, rather than fucking them over by

anesthetizing them with the standard garbage presented in most television, AM and FM

programming.”

cccxxx

The ambitious invitation list included the icons of the counterculture

-author Ken Kesey, Zen philosopher and KPFA host Alan Watts, KMPX program

director Tom Donahue, and musician Frank Zappa. Those in attendance included

spiritualist Baba Ram Das (formerly Harvard professor Richard Alpert and colleague of

LSD advocate Dr. Timothy Leary), Realist publisher Paul Krassner, radical political

activist Jerry Rubin, and “more than 1500 of the furthest out, most avant garde young

radicals working in radio, television, and the printed media.”

cccxxxi

Pacifica Radio and the

Foundation were well represented.

cccxxxii

Milam brought people from KTAO, as did

Lansman from KDNA. It seemed to Lansman that everyone was there:

Who wasn’t? It was somewhat after Woodstock.

cccxxxiii

I think Woodstock must

have been on people’s minds. Cultural things happen. It was mostly radio

people. The guy who did the Freak Brothers cartoons was there. Larry Yurdin

was the organizer. He later got involved with KFAT. The guy who started KPFT

in Houston, Larry Lee, was there. I have no recollection of meeting him

there.

cccxxxiv

Lansman’s incomplete recollection of the Conference may reflect the general

sense of anarchy that permeated the event. Planned for 1000 participants, the New York

Post reported more than 1700 people at the gathering, observing, “It doesn’t take very

many to make a crowd in an area whose chief industry is gravestones.”

cccxxxv

Another

reports estimated the crowd at over 2000. Members of the Hog Farm collective provided

sandwiches, salads, and lemonade laced with LSD. The audience assaulted the gun-

toting leader of one workshop. “Ceremonial copulation was used at another to

127

demonstrate the uselessness of words,” reported Atlantic Monthly: “It was an alternative

to the straight world’s convention; problems of identity, not profits, occupied most

minds.”

cccxxxvi

“Like a miniature version of the movement itself, those present acted out

the same battles which have been raging within America’s radical subculture,” observed

the Globe:

cccxxxvii

Women vs. men; homosexuals vs. men; hippies vs. revolutionaries; political

people vs. cultural people; blacks vs. whites (not too much of this since there

weren’t many blacks); electronic media vs. printed media; people who continue to

work for commercial enterprises vs. people who’ve dropped out. There was even

a conflict between New York people and non-New Yorkers.

cccxxxviii

In spite of the craziness, the Goddard conference offered the first opportunity for

those involved in underground, alternative, and listener-sponsored radio to communicate

directly with each other: More than 300 broadcasters shared information on all aspects of

their endeavors. An unlicensed broadcaster demonstrated a 10-watt transmitter from the

back of his car. Others discussed dealing with the FCC. “Perhaps most important, a lot

of FM radio people left the conference with a commitment to rethink their

programming.”

cccxxxix

Pacifica offered to establish a network to distribute news, feature,

and documentary programs to interested stations. After Goddard, broadcasters like Milam

and Lansman knew that they were not alone.

Sex and Broadcasting

In the flurry of networking that followed the conference, Milam “got goddamned

sick and tired of writing up single-space five page letters for all those people wanting to

set up alternative, community radio stations.”

cccxl

Instead, he wrote about financing,

licensing, and operating a listener-supported station, generously supplemented with his

128

personal views of the spirit and purpose of radio and the sorry state of commercial

broadcasting, in a how-to manual titled Sex and Broadcasting. Milam intended the title

to scare off aspiring religious broadcasters. Published in June of 1971, the first pocket-

sized edition sold quickly, through The Whole Earth Catalogue, The Village Voice, and

other conduits for counterculture information.

cccxli

A later, larger edition featured the

words “uncensored!” and “unexpurgated!” splashed across a lurid pink cover, and an

orange-tinted portrait of the leering Milam.

As Milam published from California, Pacifica’s tape distribution offer had

become a project of KRAB. Dubbed “The KRAB Nebula,” the service bicycled tapes

around the country to a small group of listener-supported radio stations, from Seattle to

Portland (KBOO), Berkeley (KPFA), Los Gatos (KTAO), Los Angeles (KPFK), St.

Louis (KDNA), and New York (WBAI). Students at Antioch, Grinnell University, and

other schools found Sex and Broadcasting, and those college stations joined the Nebula,

too. The stations traded program guides, the “occasional bitching letter about some tape

going astray,” and exchanged staff “on a random basis.”

cccxlii

But “our experiences are

hardly shared,” lamented Milam. “Our experiments never leave our communities.”

cccxliii

Echoing the Yurdin’s Alternative Media Project, Milam asserted, “The greatest

interchange of energies comes through knowing and liking someone somewhere else who

has access to the tools of their own community.”

cccxliv

Milam proposed a meeting of the

KRAB Nebula stations “for the purposes of a conference between existing and proposed

radio stations.”

cccxlv

129

For three days in July 1973, participants in the tape bicycling network gathered in

Seattle for the KRAB Nebula Media Conference.

cccxlvi

Seventy-five people attended,

representing 18 groups that were either broadcasting, intending to broadcast, or simply

interested in starting a listener-supported station. Milam’s communications attorney

Michael Bader was there, along with Al Kramer for Citizens Communications, a public

interest firm. The discussions were vigorous, characterized by an intense debate between

the lawyers about existing licensees and access to the spectrum.

cccxlvii

Joining the Nebula

members were people from across the U.S. that Milam and the others “had never heard

of: Deadringer from Ft. Wayne, Ind; Agape from Dallas; New Wave from Columbus

[sic], Mo; Nan Rubin’s group from Cincinnati.”

cccxlviii

Like many of the conference participants, Boston native Nan Rubin came to

noncommercial radio in college, while she pursued undergraduate studies at Antioch.

Inspired by Milam’s visit to WYSO, and subsequently by Sex and Broadcasting, after

graduation she and her partner searched for FM frequencies to start a listener-supported

noncommercial station, first in Minneapolis before settling on Cincinnati.

cccxlix

Engaged

in an enterprise that had always been dominated by men, Rubin’s feminist perspective

and persistent energy exemplified the diversity and difference that this group of

independent, community-based, non-institutional organizations brought to the American

system of broadcasting.

Like Rubin, most of the conferees were in their 20s. Seattle native Gray Haertig

started experimenting with electronics as a boy, collecting radio and other electrical parts,

playing around with different combinations and permutations to see how and why things

130

worked. Growing up in Seattle, Haertig listened to KRAB in the early 60s, then was

hired by the station as an announcer while he was still in high school. In addition to

hosting classical music programs, Haertig’s technical skills allowed him to work with the

station’s chief engineer, Ben Dawson. He “quickly saw that that’s where the interesting

stuff was. I started hanging out at Ben’s house, which was ever so much nicer than

hanging out at my mother’s house with my mother.”

cccl

Dawson soon informed Haertig

that he was the new chief engineer at KBOO. Haertig and the other engineers provided

the conferees with technical expertise and information essential to the process of

licensing and constructing a radio station.

From his residence in the Bay Area, Milam chose to travel to the conference by

train. Reasoning that he and his fellow travelers from KTAO would need a place to stay

during the three days of the conference, Milam gave his American Express card to KTAO

volunteer David Freedman and told him to rent “a whole railroad car from Amtrak.”

cccli

Freedman recalls “about 20” people making the trip.

ccclii

The train ride became a rolling

party, passing through “some indefinable beauty of rusting metal, sooty windows, brick

warehouses cracked and sagging.”

cccliii

Though no specific plans grew out of the KRAB

Nebula conference, the event, like the train ride, made a lasting impression on those who

took part.

If David Freedman had aspirations, they were as a poet and a philosopher rather

than a broadcaster. A native of New Orleans, Freedman grew up hearing the city’s

distinctive styles of jazz and rhythm and blues, delivered on the radio by deejays with

names like Poppa Stoppa and Doctor Daddy-o. But he was also adventurous, seeking out

131

distant stations from Texas and New Mexico on his shortwave-compatible AM radio at

home. He was “deep into music”

cccliv

throughout his high school and college years,

before moving to the San Francisco Bay Area for graduate study in French literature at

Stanford in 1967. At Stanford, he encountered a rich intellectual mix that sparked his

interest in more than literature: His professors introduced him to broader French culture,

including the music of 20

century French composers such as Olivier Messiaen. He also

discovered the emerging FM underground radio scene in San Francisco, exposed to the

revolutionary programming on stations such as KSAN and KMPX.

The following year, Freedman received a fellowship to travel to and study in

France, where he discovered the intellectually stimulating, noncommercial programming

available through services such as the BBC and ORTF, the French national service.

Knowing that “radio really had me hooked,”

ccclv

upon his return Freedman hungered for a

similar service or station in the U.S. Back at Stanford, he found that station in KTAO,

just a few miles south of the Stanford campus. The station, and Milam’s vast collection

of music from around the globe, became Freedman’s passion. He spent “7 or 8 hours a

day just listening to all the LPs that he had in his library. I was having a ball. I was in

my last year at Stanford, and I had to make a decision.”

ccclvi

In the end, he found himself

scrawling graffiti in the Stanford Library: “It said, it’s blood I want, not ink, and I

headed out. I was really bitten by radio.”

ccclvii

Freedman recalls a KTAO meeting in Milam’s back yard: “He had us all circled

around the yard – at least 30, 35 people. He said, ‘we’re going to start a new station. It’s

going to be in Santa Cruz.’”

ccclviii

Such pronouncements could be expected from Milam,

132

who with Lansman had embarked on several projects around the U.S. Then, Milam said

something unexpected: “’Freedman’s gonna start it.’”

ccclix

With the promise of a

construction permit to be provided by Milam, engineering support from Dawson, and no

money to live on, Freedman moved to the redwood community of Felton, north of Santa

Cruz, and began raising money.

Freedman’s story of the beginnings of FM station KUSP has all the hallmarks of

other station start-up stories from the early 70s. “I guess I was like number 10,000 of the

people who were circulating around Santa Cruz at the time, pedaling a dream. My hair

was down to my ass at that time, and I wasn’t wearing shoes.”

ccclx

Having totaled his

motorcycle, he hitchhiked back and forth to Santa Cruz every day. “After 6 months, I

had raised all of $35.00.”

ccclxi

When the commercial broadcasters came up for their

triennial license renewal, Freedman coaxed letters of support for the project from them,

along with donations of some vintage World War II broadcasting equipment. He coaxed

money out of a family foundation operated by one of Milam’s friends. The station

eventually went on the air at 10 watts, broadcasting from a pantry in the back of a

restaurant. During his years in Santa Cruz, Freedman never made more that $300 a

month. He got by “living on surplus food.”

ccclxii

In the spring of 1975, Milam told Freedman of another gathering of

noncommercial, listener-supported stations, planned this time for the Midwest. Still

barefoot and scrambling for money, Freedman could not afford to attend. Soon

afterwards, fed up with his hand-to-mouth way of life, he left KUSP to go to work for an

133

audience research firm in Menlo Park. But others, inspired by Sex and Broadcasting,

looked forward to the National Alternative Radio Konvention – NARK 1.

134

CHAPTER VI

FROM IDEA TO ORGANIZATION, 1975 - 1978

While it is tempting to say that the NFCB came from humble beginnings, in fact

the founders of the organization brought a rich mixture of social, cultural, and political

knowledge and experience to the task of noncommercial radio. Building on the informal

grassroots network that coalesced around Milam’s Sex and Broadcasting and the KRAB

Nebula Media Conference, the founders were tied together by more than ideology: They

shared common opportunities and challenges imposed on them by the resource-poor

circumstances of their various enterprises. These connections were further reinforced by

bonds of friendship, kinship, and partnership: Some of the key players in the initial

organization, establishment, and operations of the NFCB shared personal relationships

and relied on each other for support and companionship, as well as effort and expertise,

as they faced the challenges of organizational development, management, and advocacy.

Over a period of nearly 10 years, working on a broad range of strategic policy issues and

practical problems, their sustained and persistent efforts provided non-institutional,

listener-supported radio with a national presence and a collective identity as “community

radio.”

The gang from Grinnell

On Thursday June 18, 1975 the residents of Madison, Wisconsin awoke to cloudy

skies. The daytime temperature was in the 70s, typical for the end of spring in the capital

city of the Badger State. Over the next few days, as spring gave way to summer, the

135

temperature rose steadily into the 90s, a harbinger of the sticky heat and humidity that

would overtake the city in the coming weeks.

ccclxiii

Inside the Freedom House alternative

school, Bill Thomas greeted people from across the country as they arrived in Madison in

response to Lorenzo Milam’s call for “a real national community radio conference.”

ccclxiv

“We are not alone,” proclaimed Milam. “There are us’s all over with our same concerns,

anguishes, triumphs, and aether-bitten personalities.”

ccclxv

Like almost all of the broadcasters who came to Madison, Bill Thomas was in his

20s. Longhaired and wiry, with piercing eyes, he possessed an easy-going manner, a

quick wit, a passion for music, and desire to bring people together in a common purpose.

His first experience in radio came while he was a student, at the new 10-watt campus

station licensed to Grinnell College, KDIC. Offering jazz, blues, and rock music that was

generally unavailable in Iowa at the time, Thomas was part of a staff of young volunteers

who “were vocal advocates for change.”

ccclxvi

Like other college stations, KDIC became

a haven for young people concerned about civil rights, the draft, and the Vietnam War.

To Thomas, it was “a free-for-all.”

ccclxvii

During his summer break in 1969, Thomas continued to polish his radio skills at

KDNA, 20 miles south and across the Mississippi river from his hometown in Alton,

Illinois. KDNA owner Jeremy Lansman “was there all the time,” and Milam was “a

presence” who “appeared from time to time.”

ccclxviii

Inspired by what he’d learned at

KDNA, Thomas started a tape exchange network at Grinnell the following fall,

circulating tapes out of KDIC to Antioch’s WYSO and on to other stations, in a manner

similar to the tape network operated by the NAEB since the 1950s.

136

In 1972, after graduating from college and losing his student deferment, Thomas

was drafted and headed for Vietnam. But as Lew Hill had done during a previous war, he

succeeded in gaining an exemption from military service as a conscientious objector.

Back in St. Louis, he was unable to convince the CO authorities to allow him to perform

his required alternative service at KDNA. Instead, Thomas ended up at a nonprofit

community center serving the city’s low income, largely black population. As part of his

CO service, he started a 10-watt noncommercial radio station at the community center,

serving as the manager of KBDY for a year. In his hours away from KBDY, he worked

for KDNA. Once his CO requirements were fulfilled, he followed his wife, Betsy

Rubenstein, to Urbana, Illinois where she enrolled at the University of Illinois. While she

attended graduate school, he started the process of bringing a listener-supported station to

Champaign-Urbana, and stayed in touch with friends and colleagues at other stations and

startup projects.

One of those friends was Mike O’Connor, Bill’s Grinnell classmate and a former

staff member at KDIC, where he had been “pretty into electronics and recording stuff.”

ccclxix

After college, O’Connor and his girlfriend traveled around the US in a Volkswagen

van, stopping in St. Louis to visit Bill. They stayed a month, living at “a commune, about

a block away from the station [KDNA], where a lot of people who worked at the station

lived.

ccclxx

” When O’Connor’s partner was selected to begin a graduate program at the

University of Wisconsin in the fall of 1973, the couple decided to spend some of the

intervening time with David Freedman in Santa Cruz, assisting him with the startup of

KUSP. Though O’Connor “wasn’t really truly a radio engineer,” he “hung out with folks

137

like Jeremy and the real engineers,” and amassed enough knowledge of equipment

installation, studio wiring, and transmission systems to qualify for the FCC’s First Class

broadcast engineering license.

ccclxxi

In Madison, O’Connor found work at WHA, the University’s historic educational

radio station and among the first to join National Public Radio. On the side, he joined a

nascent effort to start a listener-supported station in Madison. When the project stalled,

he struck out on his own. He formed his own nonprofit organization, Back Porch Radio,

and tendered an application for a construction permit to the FCC. For advice, he relied

on those he knew at other listener-supported stations – Milam, Lansman, and the others

who had crossed his path via KRAB, KDNA, and Sex and Broadcasting. By the spring

of 1975, Madison had its own noncommercial, listener-supported radio station – WORT.

O’Connor served as the manager.

In March 1975, O’Connor joined Thomas and Milam at a gathering of stations in

Chicago, where “twenty five people turned up – from a dozen or so stations and would-be

stations.”

ccclxxii

One person introduced the idea of “a conference among three or four

community, non-institutional groups that are trying to get radio stations on the air.”

ccclxxiii

Someone suggested that the Pacifica stations should be invited, too. A discussion ensued

about possible dates, locations, costs, and topics for such a gathering. O’Connor

suggested that Madison would provide a good location near the center of the country, and

after “a wave of ennui and a shudder of fear swept over the group,” he offered to find an

appropriate venue for the event.

ccclxxiv

Two days after the Chicago meeting, Milam sent a

138

letter to all of the stations he knew who might be interested in such a conference:

Responses were to be sent to Bill Thomas in Urbana.

ccclxxv

At the time of the Chicago meeting, Thomas was trying to revive the KRAB

Nebula. The original arrangement was “a round robin, or loop type set-up,” with each

station responsible for forwarding tapes on to the next.

ccclxxvi

Lacking a central point of

contact, “it would sometimes take tapes more than a year to travel the loop,” and the

system broke down over time.

ccclxxvii

To avoid these issues, Thomas proposed a more

centralized system for “a possible tape exchange:”

ccclxxviii

O’Connor would duplicate

tapes at WHA. Thomas could send them out, though he thought it would be more

advantageous to use a station as the single point of contact, perhaps WYSO or Milam’s

new station in Dallas, KCHU.

With Milam and Thomas working from the same mailing list, it soon became

apparent that the ideas for the Madison conference and “possible tape exchange”

dovetailed together neatly, with Thomas coordinating both efforts. Sometime before the

end of April 1975, Thomas sent out another letter “to everyone on the possible tape

exchange mailing list (the brown one) and the Pacifica stations,” summarizing a number

of proposals for conference fees, food, accommodations, and workshops with titles

including “frequency searches,” “acquiring donated equipment,” “getting community

stuff on the air,” and “getting funds from the gov’t.”

ccclxxix

The letter closed with “notes

and gossip,” including a single sentence about Bill’s brother, the former manager of

KDNA, and his wife: “Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford are moving to Washington

D.C..”

ccclxxx

139

Like Bill Thomas and Mike O’Connor, Tom Thomas was a Grinnell graduate, one

year ahead of his brother. In college, he tried to get an alternative newspaper going on

the Grinnell campus. Taller and slightly more reserved than Bill, Tom was a skilled

writer and speaker, able to capture and articulate ideas with an economy of language. At

Grinnell, Tom met Seattle native Terry Clifford, and the two began a lifelong partnership.

In 1971, the couple set off to cross the country in a 1952 Chevy panel truck, intent on

establishing a news service for alternative newspapers.

ccclxxxi

Stopping in St. Louis to

visit Bill, Tom was impressed by Lansman’s energetic approach to community affairs

and public engagement at KDNA.

In the fall of 1971, Tom and Terry moved to New Jersey, where he took up

graduate studies in the Woodrow Wilson School for Public Policy at Princeton

University. After completing the first year in the Wilson program, Tom opted to take

time off, and the couple returned to St. Louis, where Tom assumed the position of News

Director at KDNA, and later became the station manager. Terry got a job at the station as

well, coordinating the volunteer training program and helping those new to radio to

“invent their own wheels.”

ccclxxxii

As a team, Tom, Terry, and Jeremy Lansman provided a unique set of knowledge,

skills, and abilities to others interested in listener-supported radio. Lansman was a

resourceful and creative engineer, with a decade’s experience preparing FCC

applications. Tom was a powerful writer and speaker, schooled in the policies and

practices of government and public policy agencies. Terry was an exceptional organizer,

140

communicator, and team builder. Together, they were capable of getting start-up projects

through the first, difficult steps of applying for an FCC construction permit.

One of the first projects to come their way was Mike O’Connor’s construction

permit application for Madison, one of a number of applications prepared on a picnic

table by Thomas and Clifford. Lansman contributed to the engineering sections.

Concurrently, with Lansman and Milam preparing to sell KDNA, Tom and Terry

spearheaded an effort to start new radio and television stations in St. Louis under the

auspices of a new nonprofit organization, the Double Helix Corporation. Others on the

KDNA staff were interested in going to other cities and towns to start their own projects.

After Tom, Terry, and Jeremy attended the KRAB Nebula conference, would-be

broadcasters from around the country sought help from St. Louis as well.

By the fall of 1973, Thomas and Clifford were involved in one way or another

with several start-up projects. In some cases, they were “giving just a little bit of help at

the edges of what they were doing.”

ccclxxxiii

In others, they “virtually wrote the

application.”

ccclxxxiv

They spent hours on the phone talking to applicants, or visiting with

those who made the trek to St. Louis to seek their assistance. For “the Milam Sex and

Broadcasting folks,” the “construction permit brain trust in St. Louis” provided a central

point of contact in the effort to bring listener-supported radio to communities across the

country.

ccclxxxv

By the fall of 1974, KDNA had been sold, and Tom and Terry

returned to Princeton, where Tom completed his public policy degree. Brother Bill was

in Urbana, working on his start-up project and trying to revive the KRAB Nebula. Mike

141

O’Connor had WORT up and running in Madison. Across the country, the projects Tom

and Terry had worked on were under way. By the time of the Chicago gathering in the

winter of 1975, Bill “had a strong sense of a larger movement,” and took up the challenge

to bring everyone together in Madison the following summer.

ccclxxxvi

The NARC

In 1957, the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball team packed their bags and abandoned

New York for the sunny skies, exploding population, and promising major league sports

markets of southern California. Across the river from Brooklyn in Jersey City, Rich

McClear was devastated. All of 9 years old, he rebuilt his grandfather’s Silvertone radio

and attached it to a long wire antenna, hoping that he might be able to receive the

Dodgers’ broadcasts from other National League cities. It worked: He was especially

excited when he tuned in the team’s flagship station in Los Angeles, KFI. When he was

11, he was corresponding with professional engineers and subscribing to Broadcasting

magazine. At 17, he left New Jersey for St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, where

he worked for the college’s noncommercial educational radio station, WCAL. During the

summers, he returned to New York, working as an engineer for WOR, one of the

country’s oldest stations and the flagship of the historic Mutual Broadcasting

System.

ccclxxxvii

All Rich McClear ever wanted “was to be in radio.”

ccclxxxviii

Though he was raised on the east coast, McClear had grown up hearing Pacifica

radio on WBAI, the New York FM station that had been given to Pacifica in 1960 by the

wealthy, eccentric industrialist Louis Schweitzer.

ccclxxxix

Pacifica’s blend of cultural and

issue-oriented programming, broadcast without commercial interruption, was unique in

142

the New York area. After receiving his bachelor’s degree, Rich and his wife Susan, the

daughter of a prominent Minnesota politician, started working on a plan to bring

something like Pacifica radio to the rural communities of northern Minnesota. For Rich

and Susie, it would be “a rural version of Pacifica that’s better than Pacifica,” providing

locally focused, noncommercial cultural and informational programming to a population

that had access to few forms of media.

cccxc

Beginning in 1970, Northern Community

Radio produced and distributed programs to Minnesota’s noncommercial, educational

[soon to be public] radio stations. The McClears also started searching for an FM

frequency for a noncommercial FM radio station for Minnesota’s Iron Range.

While visiting friends in Seattle during the summer of 1973, the McClears heard

KRAB and quickly realized there was “someone other than Pacifica doing this.”

cccxci

Calling the station, they reached Terry Clifford, who had come home to Seattle for the

KRAB Nebula Media Conference, and stayed on as part of an informal staff sharing

arrangement that existed between KRAB and KDNA. Though the McClears had missed

the conference, their phone call to KRAB brought the McClears into the network of

Milam, Clifford, Tom Thomas, and the other people working to establish listener-

supported radio stations. The next year, they traveled to St. Louis to discuss their plans

for rural radio on the Iron Range with Tom, Terry, and Jeremy. Somewhere along the

line, their names ended up on Bill Thomas’ mailing list.

With plans for the Northern Community Radio moving ahead, Rich completed a

master’s degree in speech communications and broadcasting at the University of

Minnesota in 1975, just as Bill Thomas was generating his correspondence about the

143

possible tape exchange and the Madison conference. The McClears were in contact with

Mike O’Connor and WORT program director Joan Rubel in Madison, and with Fresh

Air, a start-up group in Minneapolis. Station initiatives were either underway or

broadcasting in Atlanta, Cincinnati, Denver, Pittsburgh, and Columbia, Missouri.

Everyone wanted to get together and talk. Everyone planned to be in Madison in June.

The gathering was named the National Alternative Radio Conference -

NARC

cccxcii

. Mike O’Connor was pleased with the double entendre of the acronym, a

pejorative term in the counterculture for an undercover police officer searching out drug-

related activities. The conference took place over six days, beginning with informal get-

togethers on Tuesday, June 17 and ending with ad-hoc meetings on Sunday, June

23.

cccxciii

Most meetings, workshops, and meals took place at Freedom House, an

alternative school installed in an aging steel Quonset hut on Madison’s Winnebago

Street, three miles east of the University of Wisconsin campus on the peninsula that

separates the city’s most prominent natural features, Lake Mendota and Lake Monona.

O’Connor chose the site for its meeting rooms, support facilities, and the multipurpose

gymnasium. Some conferees camped in sleeping bags on the hardwood floor. Other

slept in the homes or back yards of WORT staffers.

cccxciv

O’Connor arranged to have the

meals catered by one of Madison’s vegetarian restaurants. “The first schism,” according

to Rich McClear, “was between the vegetarians and the carnivores.”

cccxcv

Someone

warned Susie that the couple’s 2-year-old would suffer from a protein deficiency.

cccxcvi

The conference was animated, intense, and characterized by the diversity of

interests present. Those associated with Milam and Lansman stressed their connections

144

with their local communities, and their interest in cultural programming. The Pacifica

stations had a national mission, and were more overtly political. The Midwest stations

existed in the midst of the traditional values of rural America. The west coast stations

were more connected to the counterculture. For years, the various threads of listener-

supported radio had been spun from the fibers of similar stations with similar ideologies

and practices: They were trying to weave those threads together into a fabric of

alternative radio.

In contrast to these differences, there were also similarities. Though they spoke

passionately of the need to create radio for unserved ethnic and racial populations, the

conferees were predominantly white. Many were college graduates, some with advanced

degrees. They were young: most of the people at the NARC were in their 20s or early

30s, at the beginning of their adult lives and careers. At 41, Milam was a senior

citizen.

cccxcvii

Most of all, they shared a common identity of opposition, a sense of who

they were not rather than who they were. In the conference program, Milam articulated

this reticence to label this form of radio they had undertaken:

We didn’t even think of the need to give it a title. I mean it was sort of “Pacifica-

like,” or sort of “educational,” or more exactly “non-commercial, free-forum (even free

form) radio.” Then the Carnegie Commission began to talk about “Public” radio – as

opposed to “instructional” radio and television; and in the same way that the world

created “broadcasting” as a contrast to “narrowcasting” – we had a bag, and we were

expected to sit in it, or maybe even try to fill it.

Milam dismissed the connection of listener-supported radio to the public radio system,

but then went on to reject the more positive label:

But even that won’t do – we can say “public,” but we might be put in bed with the

CPB stations that do 60% net[work] feed, 25% late-romantic-and-big-band jazz, with

announcers that came again out of the Ron Bailie school where you talk at, not to. And

145

we can say “community” and that makes us feel better – at least until the next word

comes along – because that means that we belong to the town and cities from which we

radiate; but still we would rather not be defined, really.

Instead, Milam relied on a laundry list of exceptional qualities to capture the

commonalities of these radio stations:

Except to say that we prefer to have at least 100 volunteers, and a goodly

selection of Puerto Rican, African, and Japanese music; that we usually operate out of the

most dismal shabby buildings (or dumptrucks) imaginable; that we often will have

equipment which should have been retired with Harding, and that the volunteers-staff-on-

the-air-people have a good bit of discretion in bringing the voices of the city into the hole

in the dial called frequency.

cccxcviii

Over four days, the 75 conferees talked in groups large and small, discussing

practical, political, and ideological issues, including “music programming,”

“newspeople,” “dealing with the FCC,” “CPB,” “on-the-air fundraising,” and “a

community communications center.”

cccxcix

Since no textbooks or how-to guides existed

to address this kind of radio, several hours each day were devoted to an effort to create a

training manual that could be used by all stations: A note in the program indicated,

“Terry Clifford wants us to write it here.”

Representing CPB in the midst of all the

activity, Clyde Robinson tried to come to grips with these non-traditional, non-

institutional broadcasters, taking on the McClears and others in “a real hammering

discussion about what is the definition of public radio and why community radio should

be part of it.”

cdi

Lansman wanted the group to “put together a document that we could all

sign. This could then be presented to the agencies that deal with public radio.”

cdii

Where Lansman, Clifford, and Bill Thomas had specific goals, others came to the

NARC to get a better understanding of what they were doing. After graduating from

college, Bruce Theriault was hired by a youth center in the working-class town of Derby,

146

Connecticut, where he was given responsibility for the center’s unlicensed, fully

functioning AM station: “We were operating as if we were a real station. We had people

in the door. We had record service. We would have public affairs shows. We had the

mayors in. We had the police in. The whole thing.”

cdiii

Under the right weather

conditions, the station could be heard 30 miles away in Hartford – where the FCC had a

field office. Theriault was nervous. An attorney associated with the center referred him

to Sex and Broadcasting for information on the licensing process. Months later, the same

attorney referred him to the upcoming gathering in Madison. For Theriault, it was the

first time he’d met anyone who was trying to do the same things with radio.

With the conference drawing to a close on Saturday afternoon, discussion focused

on Lansman’s position paper. The conversations moved to an array of topics – the

training manual, the tape exchange, the need for legal and technical resources. How

could stations gain access to CPB funding? How could stalled applications get through

the FCC? How would the momentum of the conference be sustained, after everyone

returned to their homes and their stations, and went back to their day-to-day tasks? The

questions and concerns that hovered around the entire conference became the focus of the

last conference session, listed as “a big meeting” on the conference schedule.

Bill Thomas, Tom Thomas, and Terry Clifford already knew the answers to some

of these questions. Bill had been developing the infrastructure of the program exchange

since January. Tom and Terry were moving to Washington D.C. to continue the work

they had started in St. Louis, helping noncommercial, non-institutional organizations gain

broadcast licenses and undertake their responsibilities to federal authorities. Bruce

147

Theriault thought it was a fine idea: “What did we know? We wanted Tom and Terry to

go to Washington to represent our needs.”

cdiv

Tom proposed that the conference take

steps to create a nonprofit agency to continue the work undertaken in Madison. He even

had a name for the organization – The League of Stations. In the discussions that

followed, the name did not survive, but the conferees agreed to take the steps necessary

to create a formal association. The group passed the hat and collected about $60.00 so

that Tom and Terry “could at least fill their tank a few times” on the way to

Washington.

cdv

They also passed a resolution calling for representatives of

noncommercial “community/alternative broadcast” stations and groups to meet the

following August for the purpose of drawing up a corporate charter and by-laws for a

“national support organization.”

cdvi

From Columbia to the Capital

“The Constitutional Convention” convened in Columbia, Missouri, on Friday,

August 1, 1975. Like Madison, Columbia was a university town, and home to a listener-

supported radio station, KOPN, base for some of the KDNA staff after the sale of the St.

Louis station. 27 people, representing 18 organizations, convened in the sticky summer

heat “to create a national organization that would represent their interests at a national

level, provide services that could only be achieved on a cooperative basis, and facilitate

an efficient use of their all-too-scarce resources.”

cdvii

“The big room” at KOPN was normally used for live performances, panel

discussions, laying out publications, and other tasks that required space for people to

spread out. KOPN producer Dave Taylor walked “into the station, and here were all

148

these hippies I didn’t know - hippies from out of town. There were all these hippies

looking serious and talking about bylaws.”

cdviii

Taylor’s partner, program director Pat

Watkins, had represented KOPN in Madison, and offered Columbia as a suitable location

for the meeting. As a teenager, Watkins volunteered at KDNA, then moved to Columbia

to attend the University of Missouri, where she wrote for the city’s underground

newspaper. On a return visit to St. Louis, she asked Lansman what it would take to start

a station in Columbia. “He asked if we wanted to start a station like theirs, and I said

something snappy like, no I think we can do a better job.”

cdix

Inspired by the antiwar,

civil rights, and feminist movements, Watkins intended to do “something very, very

political.”

cdx

Where Milam’s adherents embraced cultural programming, Watkins “had a

very political agenda for community radio. I wanted it to be advancing the liberals in this

country. I wanted it to be the voice of the left, pushing the liberals.”

cdxi

For Watkins,

radio was not about “playing sea chanties all the time. It drove me nuts.”

cdxii

As program

director of KOPN, she intended to advance a political agenda through the choices she

made for station’s program schedule, in a manner reminiscent of the Pacifica stations.

Others shared in this more political strain of activism, but for the time being Watkins and

those who shared her views were content to co-exist with Milam’s cultural approach to

noncommercial broadcasting.

Meeting informally on Friday night, “following a reasonably high-grade gossip

session,” the group agreed to dispense with Roberts Rules of Order, make decisions by

consensus, and agreed on agenda.

cdxiii

Terry Clifford was designated as chairperson, and

Mike O’Connor as the official recorder. The following morning, the group identified five

149

areas of concern that the new organization should address. The association should

provide information on federal policy issues; represent the interests of member stations

on those policy issues; facilitate communication between the members; coordinate

member activities; and publicize member activities. A committee took on the task of

drafting these objectives into a statement of purpose. The conferees also agreed “that the

overall direction and control of the organization” would be limited to noncommercial

broadcasters:

cdxiv

Though the interests of commercial broadcasters might overlap with

these objectives from time to time, the association would serve the needs of

noncommercial applicants and licensees, and membership would be limited to

noncommercial agencies.

Saturday afternoon was given over to the process of refining and approving the

association’s Articles of Incorporation. The company would incorporate in Delaware, a

state without residency requirements for incorporators or corporate tax obligations for

non-Delaware businesses. Similar in many respects to the documentation required for

nonprofit broadcast licensees, the Articles framed the legally binding purposes of the

organization, to “assist and advance” the development of noncommercial educational

radio and television services and non-profit organizations “operating or planning to

operate one or more” NCE stations

cdxv

. Affairs of the corporation would be “managed by

the members empowered to vote.”

cdxvi

Terms and conditions of voting and non-voting

membership would be stated in a subsequent by-laws document, with the condition that

“one-third of the members of the corporation empowered to vote may constitute a

quorum.”

cdxvii

As required of all nonprofit corporations, the Articles specified that none

150

of the company’s net income or assets, beyond “reasonable compensation for service

rendered,” could be distributed to the members, directors, or officers, and prohibited the

company from “carrying on of propaganda,” “attempting to influence legislation,” or

intervening in “any political campaign.”

cdxviii

The Articles listed 24 incorporators

including Tom and Bill Thomas, Terry Clifford, Mike O’Connor, Bruce Theriault, and

Pat Watkins, and Ann L. Rubin of Cincinnati.

Following “a pretty good party” and “some pretty corny late night radio on

KOPN,” the tired conferees reconvened for final discussions on Sunday.

cdxix

They chose

a name for the association - the Federation of Community Broadcasters. The descriptive

“National” would be inserted when the Articles were filed in Delaware. The group took

up the topic of the tape exchange, resolving that it should be a function of the new

Federation. Bill Thomas agreed to be the director, with the condition “that the Federation

would not get in the way.”

cdxx

Following up on another topic from Madison, the group

was less certain in their conclusions about an organizational newsletter. At the NARC,

KPFA’s Randy Thom offered to start a magazine style publication, with news and feature

articles on a wide variety of topics of interest to participating stations. But Thom was not

present in Columbia. Instead, he made it clear in a letter to those who were that he would

move ahead with the project on his own. Others expressed the desire for a different sort

of publication “which would deal only with unvarnished information on our friends in the

various commissions and agencies” in Washington D.C..

cdxxi

For the most part, the

discussion ended with more questions than answers, the group resolving only to create a

publication “if action seemed warranted.”

cdxxii

151

While there was no closure on the question of the newsletter, there was broad

agreement on the proposal to establish an office in the nation’s capital under the direction

of Terry Clifford and Tom Thomas. The initiative had been shared in a pre-conference

letter from Thomas:

The purposes of the Washington Office can roughly be separated into three

categories: Information out of Washington to member stations concerning

regulatory, funding, and other national matters; work in Washington on behalf of

stations before the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the FCC, and other

groups and agencies; and ongoing liason [sic] between affiliated stations,

attorneys, agencies, etc.

cdxxiii

The letter, accompanied by a draft of the articles of incorporation and a proposed set of

by-laws, provided the conferees with the first example of Thomas and Clifford’s

organizational, persuasive, and political skills, cultivated since Tom’s days at the Wilson

School. In their approach to the gathering at Columbia, Thomas and Clifford identified

challenges and opportunities inherent in the circumstances, assessed the needs and

interests of the involved parties, and mapped the issues in a manner that directed the

discussion towards outcomes framed by Tom and Terry. Thomas and Clifford would

employ these skills and tactics repeatedly and successfully in the coming years. The

proposal passed unanimously.

For the tape exchange and the Washington office to be viable, there would have to

be a steady stream of income for both operations. Bill Thomas “hoped the exchange

could be self-supporting once it got past the starting costs of $2,000.00 to

$4,000.00.”

cdxxiv

The topic was referred to a broader discussion about Federation

finances. A straw vote revealed what each of the organizations present might be willing

to pay for services on a monthly basis. The largest and most established stations,

152

including WYSO, WPRT, and Pittsburgh’s WYEP, offered $30.00. Theriault’s Stand

Community Radio offered $5.00. The total came to $267.50 per month, for an estimated

annual income of $3210.00. Knowing that other stations and groups not present were

willing to contribute, the estimate might be stretched to $4,800.00. Thomas estimated

that annual expenses would run $12,000.00 to $15,000.00 for the first year, not including

the tape exchange. The way seemed clear: after initial capital investment, the exchange,

the newsletter, and other projects would have to be self-supporting. Implying the past

generosity of Milam and others, the Federation would approach “our in-house angels,

members of the communications bar, and sympathetic persons in the commercial

broadcasting world” for contributions.

cdxxv

Despite the “collective disappointment” with

past approaches to foundations and more traditional philanthropic sources, the group was

hopeful that their pooled resources would improve their chances of success through “the

national and cooperative character of the Federation and the ‘seed money’ aspects of the

grants we would be seeking.”

cdxxvi

Finally, the group suggested a range of joint projects,

based on the tried-and-true techniques of their stations – “joint booking of artists for a

‘national radio benefit tour;’ a national marathon [broadcast]; a national mailing; an

national bake sale.”

cdxxvii

Undeterred by the financial realities, the Federation would move

ahead without a business plan. The company would rely on the collective knowledge,

skills, and abilities of the participants to gather the necessary revenue and pay the bills.

With the present course of action determined, the group turned to the immediate

future. Bill Thomas, Theriault, and four others composed a committee to select a site and

a date for the next NARC. Bill suggested Urbana or Cincinnati as central locations.

153

Jerry Greene from KOTO in Telluride, Colorado, suggested the mountain resort town, to

appeal to people on the west coast who had been unable to travel to Madison. Rhoda

Epstein from WDNA, Miami, suggested hopefully, “if we had money to help people with

transportation, the location of the conference wouldn’t make very much difference.”

cdxxviii

The question was left to the committee.

For the mountain of work that remained to be done, the group established an

interim organizing committee. Mike O’Connor would prepare a report on the Columbia

meeting and distribute it to those on the Milam and Thomas mailing lists. He also agreed

to maintain the company records for the time being. Terry Clifford and Tom Thomas

would establish the Washington office, recruit stations and groups for membership, and

develop a campaign “to publicize our activities to date and our future plans, both to the

general public and to concerned organizations.”

cdxxix

In addition, as the organization’s

newly designated director, Tom would develop a budget, prepare a schedule of

assessments and fees for participating organizations, and “initiate a fundraising campaign

to augment these funds.”

cdxxx

The tasks of drafting the by-laws, circulating the text for

comment and revision, preparing a final document for approval of the incorporators,

developing procedures to elect Federation officers, and conducting the organization’s

first election, were assigned to Ann L. Rubin of Cincinnati.

cdxxxi

Originally from Boston, Nan Rubin came to Antioch College in Yellow Springs,

Ohio to pursue undergraduate studies in sociology and mass communication. Her

interests led her to WYSO, one of the stations in the Grinnell tape network. Reflective of

Antioch’s nontraditional approach to higher education, the staff and producers at WYSO

154

were adapting the Milam-Lansman model of community engagement to the institutional

environment of campus-based radio. Committed to social justice and feminist causes, she

valued radio as a more accessible and immediate instrument for social change and

“instant gratification. Everybody had a radio. It was really cheap, and you could produce

radio by yourself.”

cdxxxii

When Milam came to Yellow Springs to promote Sex and

Broadcasting, Rubin was convinced that “starting a radio station sounded like a fabulous

idea.”

cdxxxiii

She began the search for an available NCE frequency in Minneapolis, then in

Cincinnati. By the time Rubin attended the KRAB Nebula Conference in 1972, she had

an application on file with the FCC. WAIF Community Radio signed almost

simultaneously with WORT, Rubin and O’Connor exchanging numerous phone calls to

inquire “are you on yet? Are you on yet? Are you on yet?”

cdxxxiv

Though she was unable

to attend the NARC, she traveled with her partner Joe Bakan to Columbia for the

organizational meeting. Now, she would become the architect of the new Federation’s

governing structures and practices.

The group turned finally to the statement of purpose, drafted by committee and

discussed over the previous days. The final document opened a forceful expression of

the ideals and aspirations of the new Federation, invoked through the language of the

Communications Act of 1934:

We believe broadcast communications are a vital national resource that must

serve the public interest, convenience, and necessity. The overwhelming majority

of existing broadcasters, both commercial and so-called public, has clearly failed

to meet the obligation.

cdxxxv

155

Drawing on the ideology of Hill and Milam, the statement advocated for direct citizen

participation in the process of making radio, echoing the spirit of John Dewey’s

philosophy of communication as the process and the instrument of democracy:

We believe access of the public to the airwaves should be an essential part of the

broadcasting process. We believe it is important that the full range of opinion in

our communities finds expression through our stations; and that a wide variety of

cultural, racial, political, and social groups should have use of the broadcast

spectrum… We get excited on the air – real people, being angry, happy, scared, or

delighted… We care strongly about the people in our communities… we work for

the growth of vibrant, responsive, human broadcasting.

cdxxxvi

To achieve these aspirations, the organizers agreed “to join together in such a way as to

preserve our independence yet share our resources to meet our common needs,”

cdxxxvii

proposing to:

Foster the development of public policy at the legislative, regulatory and

administrative levels to aid the growth of our stations… seek equitable

distribution of federal funds for noncommercial broadcasting… facilitate the

exchange of program materials… publicize our activities… [and] assist the

organization and expansion of new and innovative broadcast stations throughout

the country.

cdxxxviii

A host of issues remained on the table, including the tape exchange, the newsletter, and

the training manual project, but the time had come to leave Columbia, return to their

cities and towns, and carry on with the business at hand. Terry Clifford, Mike O’Connor,

Nan Rubin, Bruce Theriault, Bill and Tom Thomas, Pat Watkins, and 17 others affixed

their names to the Articles of Incorporation. “And then we picked up our broken bodies,”

wrote O’Connor, “and went to home to bed.”

cdxxxix

Open for business

The Delaware Secretary of State recorded the Articles of Incorporation for the

National Federation of Community Broadcasters, Inc., on September 15, 1975. Terry

156

Clifford and Tom Thomas opened NFCB’s Washington office at 1716 21st Street, less

than a mile from the M Street headquarters of the FCC. The masthead on the

Federation’s first newsletter omitted an important detail from the address. The

Washington office of the NFCB was located in Apartment 3, the home of Terry Clifford

and Tom Thomas. Santa Cruz engineer Don Mussell “slept in that room for a number of

days,” when he came through town to review filings at the Commission.

cdxl

“NFCB was

literally on the second floor of their house,”

cdxli

recalled Mussell. “They seemed very

organized. The phone was ringing.”

cdxlii

On his first visit, Mussell found the FCC staff

unable to locate the documents he had so carefully prepared:

The FCC reference room couldn’t find them. They said, “we’re really busy. We

know it’s in that area. Why don’t you look?” I went back to the reference files.

Nothing was where it was supposed to be. But there was this huge pile of

applications in the corner of the room, all stacked up, almost to my chin. About

half way down I recognized some of the colors for some of the filings I had done.

I did nice color separations on the files in there. Sure enough, there was KAZU’s

file, about 3 feet down the stack. It was about 3 inches thick. I very carefully

pulled it out, and said, “I found the file.” They said, “Oh good, we can file it

correctly when you’re done.” And then I went back to Terry and Tom’s house,

and I looked around, and they were so organized compared to the FCC. I thought,

“this is great.”

cdxliii

Thomas and Clifford immediately put their organizational and persuasive skills to

work raising startup capital from the enlisted and prospective members of the NFCB.

“The principal immediate task before us,” wrote Thomas, “is raising enough funds to

make this project work.”

cdxliv

Optimistically asserting that “any outside support we may

collect is still weeks away,” Thomas used his provisional authority to designate a tiered

scale of membership fees, from $25.00 for those groups not on the air, to $50.00 for

stations with budgets above $10,000.

cdxlv

In addition, Thomas asked members to

157

consider payments of $10.00 to $30.00, leaving the final determination to individual

“dictates of conscience and checkbook.”

cdxlvi

On these terms, 16 groups or stations joined

the Federation, including KOPN, WAIF, WYEP, WORT, WYSO, and Milam’s most

recent endeavor, KCHU, and the Double Helix Corporation of St. Louis, successor to

KDNA.

cdxlvii

From their education in public policy and their experience with

telecommunications administration, Thomas and Clifford understood that the

Federation’s success would depend on building alliances with the established

noncommercial broadcasting authorities, agencies, and advocates in Washington.

Michael Bader was just one of “a number of lawyers in this town who are excited about

what we are doing.”

cdxlviii

Within the staid specialty of telecommunications law, NFCB

and its constituents offered new challenges for Bader and the legal community, and new

opportunities to press public service and spectrum issues before the FCC on behalf of

unserved and underserved citizens. As attorney John Crigler observed: “In some ways,

he [Bader] was the most logical defender, and in some ways it was very anomalous.

Mike was by nature a very straight businessman – sort of Clark Kent-looking – he had

thick glasses and a business suit. But there was this wilder, much more creative side of

Bader that loved the community stations, loved Lorenzo.”

cdxlix

For Tom and Terry, the

“legal eagles” provided an informal support network, “to whom we can refer cases

according to expertise and interest.”

cdl

Thomas and Clifford also worked to build alliances with key individuals and

advocacy agencies engaged in efforts to shape the future of mass media, especially the

158

growing FM radio and cable television sectors. Within weeks of opening the doors at

NFCB, Tom and Terry had the first of many meetings with representatives of the

National Citizens Committee for Broadcasting [NCCB]. Chaired by former FCC

Commissioner Nicholas Johnson, the NCCB monitored FCC proceedings, and advocated

for direct citizen engagement in broadcast and cable media in the pages of its bi-weekly

publication, Access.

cdli

Al Kramer, an attorney in his mid-30s, operated “a one-man

show” called The Citizens Communications Center, filing renewal challenges on behalf

of ethnic minority citizen groups, and petitions on behalf of Quakers and others who had

been refused air time to run antiwar advertising.

cdlii

The Media Access Project, a public

interest law firm, challenged the Commission to implement the Fairness Doctrine in order

to open commercial broadcast outlets to antiwar and civil rights causes.

cdliii

These and

other agencies offered natural affinities and alliances for the political aspirations of the

NFCB.

One particular action before the FCC connected these organizations in common

cause. On December 1, 1974, Milam and Lansman filed a Petition for Rulemaking,

asking the FCC to overturn the rule exemption allowing ownership of multiple NCE

stations by a single licensee in a single market; and to freeze applications by “religious,

‘bible,’ ‘Christian,’ and other sectarian schools colleges, and institutes,” and by

government-controlled groups, for reserved FM and TV channels.

cdliv

Filed in response

to repeated and ongoing conflicts over license applications between small community

groups that aspired to operate single facilities in their cities and towns, and larger, better-

funded religious and institutional interests that operated multiple stations in single or

159

multiple markets, Milam and Lansman asked the Commission to intervene and level the

playing field in favor of smaller, non-institutional broadcasters. Criticizing the lack of

experimentation and controversy in the programming of emerging public radio sector,

they asserted, “Educational broadcasters should not draw the Ivory Towers about

themselves as some sort of sacred cloak which permits them to choke off efforts for new,

diverse, more broadly-based groups.”

cdlv

Taking aim at the expansion of “narrow,

prejudiced, one-sided, blind, and stultifying” religious radio and TV,

cdlvi

they observed,

Religious broadcasters have shown a remarkable, cancer-like growth in the

‘educational’ portions of the FM and TV bands. They control endless monies

from ‘free will’ contributions, thrive on mindless banal programming aimed at

some spiritless, oleaginous God, and show the same spirit as McDonald’s

Hamburger Co. in the efforts to dominate American radio and television.

cdlvii

In contrast, Milam and Lansman offered an alternative conception of public service,

articulating one of the strengths of community radio:

Educational FM is just beginning to grow into the areas that need it the most –

rural and county areas 200 or 500 miles from major population centers. How fine

it would be if these areas could count on an honest community radio, personal,

with full open access and diversity of voices.

cdlviii

Although RM-2493 sought only to limit NCE authorizations to one per authority

in each community, the Milam/Lansman petition precipitated a firestorm in the religious

broadcasting sector, which quickly mobilized in response to what Milam would later

refer to as “The Petition Against God.” “Although the number of formal filings in

response to the petition” was rather small, as documented in the Commission’s

Memorandum Opinion and Order of August 1, 1975, “the filing of the petition has

generated a vast amount of letters to the Commission, likely in excess of 700,000.”

cdlix

Many were form letters “premised on the mistaken view that the petition was filed by

160

Madalyn Murray O’Hare,” the outspoken atheist.

cdlx

The vast majority of these letters

urged the Commission to reject “the proposal to ban all religious programs,” though “no

such proposal was advanced by the petitioners, nor was it raised by the Commission.”

cdlxi

Several agencies filed in support of the petition, including Johnson’s NCCB, the

Pittsburg chapter of the NAACP, and the Alabama Media Project. In addition to the

objections of religious broadcasters, the Commission received opposing comments from

educational broadcasters, including the University of Missouri, and the Corporation for

Public Broadcasting, citing “economies of scale.” While dual licensing might lead to

more varied public service, CPB argued there was “significant diversity in the programs

now being offered by various FM or television combinations and hence no basis for

action.” CPB cited the ability of statewide networks to serve rural audiences, contending

there was “no monopolization of frequencies.”

cdlxii

“Taken in context,” the FCC viewed

the position of Milam and Lansman “as an impermissible proposition, which would

violate our neutrality just as much as if we were to favor religious applicants over secular

ones… The Commission, even if it were disposed to, cannot cater to personal views.”

cdlxiii

Consequently, the petition was denied.

Though the Milam-Lansman petition overstated the case, Commissioners Glen

Robinson and Benjamin Hooks found merit in many of the arguments. “While it may

yet be somewhat premature to speculate about the possibility of competing public

broadcast stations in a single market,” wrote Robinson, “I do not think we ought to

overlook the possibility that it might come to pass.”

cdlxiv

In the years to come, the issue

of concentration of control in noncommercial broadcasting would become one of the

161

central concerns of the NFCB. In 1975, the issue provided a common frame of reference

for Thomas and Clifford and the agents of the media reform movement.

NFCB took its first formal policy position in October 1975, in reply comments to

the FCC filed in response to the Commission’s proposal to extend community

ascertainment requirements to noncommercial broadcasters. Historically, the FCC

required commercial broadcasters to conduct surveys of “community leaders” and “the

general public” to ascertain the problems, needs, and interests in their service areas.

Applicants and licensees were required to offer programming in response to the concerns

identified in the surveys. Reflecting the concerns of the Federation’s members, Thomas

questioned “the general validity of ascertainment,” citing “a lack of evidence that existing

requirements have affected commercial programming.”

cdlxv

NFCB emphasized that

“noncommercial stations should have no less of an obligation for public service than their

commercial counterparts.”

cdlxvi

In addition, where the FCC proposed to exempt 10 watt

Class D and small market stations from the requirement, NFCB claimed that all

broadcasters “must either demonstrate full utilization of their frequency in the public

interest or relinquish their place on the dial.”

cdlxvii

The comments offered the first iteration

of the Federation position on spectrum efficiency: Because they occupied the public

spectrum, Class D stations should receive no special consideration from the FCC. The

following spring, the Commission put the ascertainment rules in place, including the

exemption.

By mid-November, Nan Rubin completed the first draft of the Federation by-laws

and sent them on to Washington to be circulated to the Columbia incorporators and the

162

other stations or groups that had contributed financially since August. The draft reflected

all of the organizers’ commitments to egalitarianism, noncommercial enterprise, local

control, and participatory democracy. The NFCB would be an alliance of nonprofit

organizations, with membership limited to those either operating a broadcast station,

organized to build one, or in the application process. Each member organization,

designated as a Participant, would have a single vote in the Federation’s affairs, and be

represented by two delegates. The process for selecting delegates would be left to each

participant’s local procedure. New members required nomination by an existing

participant, and approval by a majority of the whole. Meetings would be held at least

once per year. Most significantly, the participant members would govern the affairs of

the NFCB directly, “including all the powers normally associated with the board of

directors, including accepting participants, setting policy, hiring staff, electing officers,

and setting budgets.”

cdlxviii

All of these powers, with the exception of participant

removal, would be delegated to a steering committee of at least six, consisting of a

chairperson, secretary, treasurer, two or more at-large members, and the Executive

Director – Tom Thomas. Only the chairperson would be required to be a participant

member delegate.

cdlxix

Rubin asked the organizers to provide comments on the draft by

mail. A revised draft would be submitted for approval at a subsequent meeting.

In Urbana, Bill Thomas continued to work on the Possible Tape Exchange [PTE],

receiving programs from participating stations, publishing periodic program listings,

duplicating programs, and shipping over 350 tapes by the end of 1975. The PTE

continued to rely on the facilities at WHA in Madison: The high-speed duplicators

163

Jeremy Lansman had volunteered to build had not materialized. The 1975 PTE catalog

was indicative of the minimal state of operations, unevenly duplicated in the unique

purple print of a Ditto machine, showing Bill’s hand-written corrections and notes, the

first page revealing that he was “in such a hurry to get this off that I almost forgot some

of the tapes.”

cdlxx

“Lack of operating capital,” wrote Tom Thomas, “has also made work

difficult.”

cdlxxi

Bill donated his time to the PTE, living on his savings. Acknowledging

that the exchange required a larger, more diverse market, the brothers looked

optimistically to the near future, when “the supply of and demand for programs will

undoubtedly increase as new stations take to the air.”

cdlxxii

In an informal report to the members at the end of the year, Thomas summarized

the activities of the new company over the past five months. Nineteen organizations had

joined NFCB. The unaudited end-of-year financial statement showed an operating

surplus of $1,300.00, noting “both the national office and the tape exchange were forced

to operate on bare bones budgets with resources clearly not adequate for the work that

needed to be done,” though “the situation was, of course, not unexpected.” The numbers

imply that Thomas and Clifford relied on personal resources to make up the difference

between their meager salaries and their living expenses. NFCB achieved “the most

immediate results” in direct service to local members, preparing applications for facilities

grants from the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare [HEW], assisting with

frequency searches, advocating for a new TV station in St. Louis, monitoring

Commission filings, and “attempting to answer all manner of questions on rules,

regulations, grant programs, and an occasional query on the meaning of life.” Beyond

164

engagements with the FCC, however, efforts to enter the policymaking process at the

legislative and agency levels had been limited. “Decisions in most of these organizations

are largely an internal matter,” observed Thomas. “There is also a need to develop

specific policy recommendations… based on solid research.” To gain traction in the

environment of the Congress, the CPB, and HEW, NFCB’s initiatives would need to be

“carefully drafted to take account of the institutional environment in which they will be

considered.” Thomas called for patience and pragmatism: “Our strategies for an effect

on public policy at both the legislative and administrative levels must be long-term

ones.”

cdlxxiii

Looking back to Madison and Columbia at the end of 1975, Tom Thomas was

“satisfied and proud” of NFCB’s initial accomplishments. Looking ahead, he was

“confident that we are building a movement that will have a powerful and important

effect on the way people in this country live and work and speak to one another.”

cdlxxiv

Demonstrating his ability to summarize complex issues in straightforward, persuasive

prose, Thomas summed up the NFCB’s emerging position in the field of public

telecommunications policy: “In a field dominated by trade associations on the one hand

and public interest groups on the other, the Federation works for a synthesis that filters

idealistic concerns through the practical experiences of groups actually working to

implement such concerns at the local level.”

cdlxxv

Participants, policy advocates, and public radio

The prospective members of the NFCB gathered in Cincinnati at the end of

February, 1976 to review and approve the organization’s proposed structure and by-laws.

165

In addition, the conference agenda included the site for NARC 2, a proposed budget of

$118,610 for the coming year

cdlxxvi

, and a variety of special projects including “joint

programming efforts…the proposed community radio training manual, information

directories on a variety of topics, personnel exchanges, and joint fundraising

campaigns.”

cdlxxvii

Coordinated by Nan Rubin and the staff at WAIF, the meetings took

place at the Bush Community Center in the Queen City’s historic Walnut Hills

neighborhood.

Working from the by-laws document previously accepted by the incorporators

through the mail, the conferees approved 24 stations and community broadcast

organizations as charter participants in the Federation. The newly empowered delegates

immediately confronted a host of issues. Though some expressed concerns about

accessibility of the remote mountain location and the attendant costs for transportation,

the delegates agreed to hold NARC 2 in Telluride. The group then turned to the complex

and sensitive issue of representation. In a direct challenge to Pacifica’s five stations

licensed to a single, national organization, Rich McClear argued successfully that

participant membership should be limited to locally-controlled organizations.

Articulating their frustrations, ideals, and aspirations, Rubin and other advocates for the

interests of women and ethnic minorities pressed for measures to assure representation

and participation of women and minorities in all activities on the Federation and its

member stations, in response to the predominant presence of white men across

broadcasting generally and in community radio in particular. In response, the delegates

amended the new by-laws to require the consideration of women and minorities in the

166

evaluation of applications for participant status. Another amendment required that one of

the two delegates from each participant member be a woman or a member of an ethnic

minority. The Washington office was directed to make contact with national

organizations advocating for the interests of women and minorities at the national level.

On the local level, each participant was directed to prepare a report on “the role of

women and minorities in their own management and operations, together with a

description of any steps they are taking to change the level of such involvement.”

cdlxxviii

The reports would be discussed in Telluride. Through this series of sweeping decisions,

the delegates set the Federation and its members apart from every other interest in NCE

broadcasting, as an advocate for women and ethnic minorities.

Noting “the serious inadequacy of support so far,” the delegates approved an

“austerity budget” of $15,420.00, drawn primarily from monthly membership fees of

$5.00 to $50.00, depending on the member organization’s annual budget. Estimating that

the monthly fees would bring in $7,000 to $8,000, the delegates approved “a national

marathon/benefit weekend” tentatively scheduled for the following April, with each

member assuming responsibility for a share of the national goal. Covering only a

fraction of the Executive’s proposal, the delegates acknowledged that the adopted budget

represented “something of an investment in outside funding,” optimistically looking

ahead to “major grants or gifts” in the Federation’s future to support the company’s long

term projects.

cdlxxix

The delegates took no action towards these proposed grants and gifts,

leaving any initiatives in the hands of Thomas and Clifford.

167

Discussions of public policy focused on “efforts that can result in more adequate

funding for local stations.”

cdlxxx

Considerable attention focused on the main sources of

federal funds for noncommercial radio, the HEW Educational Broadcasting Facilities

Programs and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The delegates discussed

proposals for special funding for rural radio and programming projects, and went on

record with a declaration “that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting lower its

minimum requirement for community service grants [CSGs] and include the in-kind

donations of qualified volunteer time in determining station qualification.”

cdlxxxi

The

NFCB Steering Committee was charged to develop “more specific directions” in the

policy field. The interim committee, chaired by Rubin, would serve until the conference

in Telluride.

In the weeks following the Cincinnati members meeting, the Washington office

took the initiative to engage the issues identified by the delegates. In March, Thomas

attended the Public Radio Conference in Washington, the annual gathering of National

Public Radio and its affiliate stations, represented by the Association of Public Radio

Stations [APRS]. At one of the business sessions, a committee of the APRS Board of

Directors advanced a proposal that any new money awarded to the public radio “system”

in the future through CPB would be designated for a matching grants pool, rather than

larger base grants to all qualified stations. These funds would be awarded on a matching

basis, as a percentage of the individual station’s nonfederal financial support [NFFS].

The intention was clear: The largest stations, capable of generating higher nonfederal

revenues, would receive larger matching grants. Base grants would remain static. The

168

committee asserted that the plan offered an incentive for economic growth.

Representatives of smaller stations countered that growth would be difficult without

additional assistance from CPB.

Sensing an opportunity to advance NFCB’s position on the issue of CPB grants,

Thomas offered three proposals to modify the plan. Thomas argued that CPB should

create a pool of funds to help “poorer” noncommercial station move towards CSG

qualification; offer protections to allow these poorer stations to maintain qualification;

and provide incentive funds available only to the poorest third of CPB stations to assist

with special projects. “In a long and stormy session that focused on these proposals,”

wrote Thomas, “ the APRS committee rejected them all.”

cdlxxxii

But the effort was

effective in other respects: Thomas had demonstrated that there was opposition to the

APRS plan within “the system.” APRS could not claim it had industry-wide approval on

the issue. The outcome offered the chance that Thomas’ proposals might be reconsidered

at a future meeting of the CPB Board of Directors, the group with the final authority to

determine the structure and function of all CPB grant programs.

At the same conference, public radio took up NPR’s proposal to interconnect

member stations and distribute programming through a satellite system that would be

owned and operated by NPR. Though the Possible Tape Exchange was up and running,

and the costs and complexity of satellite distribution seemed untenable for the new

organization, one of the NFCB’s more technically knowledgeable members cautioned,

“the Federation should refrain from further exploration of satellite interconnection on

technical or financial grounds alone.”

cdlxxxiii

Any satellite system would benefit from the

169

interconnection of more stations, with costs spread across more affiliates. Satellites also

offered the possibility of live station interconnections. For this reason, Pacifica was

considering a system of its own. Speculating that some “least common denominator”

might be found, Thomas looked forward to discussing the issue in Telluride.

cdlxxxiv

Other issues were percolating at the FCC. In response to comments filed by the

Corporation for Public Broadcasting, in March 1975 the Commission issued a notice

pursuant to Docket 20735, proposing a broad range of changes for the assignment and

operation of NCE stations. Focusing on more efficient allocation of the spectrum, the

Commission contemplated proposals to open a new channel 200 at 87.9 mHz for NCE

assignments; require NCE stations to operate at least 36 hours per week, and at least 72

hours per week to claim exclusive use of their assigned channels; remove adjacent

channel protections from 10 watt Class D stations; relocate Class D stations to other FM

channels to allow authorization of new, more powerful stations or power increases for

existing stations. The changes were needed to correct the “gross inefficiencies” that had

accrued in the past, as the FCC handled noncommercial assignments on a case-by-case

basis. Licensees of television stations assigned to channel 6, directly adjacent to the low

end of the FM band, had a particular interest in the proceeding. Asserting “there is a

substantial opportunity here for the expansion and development of community radio in

cities across the country,” Thomas pledged that NFCB would take an active role in the

proceedings.

cdlxxxv

While Tom was engaging the policy issues, Terry Clifford was working on some

of the special projects that had been identified in the past months. In conjunction with

170

CPB staff, Clifford authored a manual of using non-cash gifts for matching grants,

“which we hope will be only the first of many publications with specific practical

information on station operations.”

cdlxxxvi

In addition to her service to NFCB, Terry was

engaged in studies at Georgetown University, limiting her availability to some targeted

initiatives, including the ongoing search for outside funding. A proposal was under

consideration at the Rockefeller Family Fund. Tom looked forward to final consideration

by the Fund’s board of directors in June.

More immediate gratification came from the Markle Foundation, another New

York-based philanthropy with a special interest in communications and public policy. In

response to NFCB’s request to underwrite costs associated with comments on the Docket

20735 proceeding, Markle granted $7,000 to the Federation to engage a panel of

technical and legal experts. The grant allowed NFCB to engage the services of several

attorneys at the Citizens Communications Center, and convene a meeting in Washington

in late March 1976 to consider a preliminary position on the FCC proceedings. In the

midst of competing propositions from larger and more powerful interests, including CPB,

NPR, and channel 6 TV stations represented by the Association for Maximum Service

Television, NFCB saw the rulemaking as the best chance to put forward the Federation’s

vision of radio. “Our concept of radio has to be new,” wrote Lorenzo Milam, who

attended the gathering in Washington. “It is no longer enough to think of ‘the public

served’ or ‘listeners’ – we have to think of participants, and communities of minorities

and volunteers – and constant electronic input.”

cdlxxxvii

“For those of us who have

searched in vain for spectrum space in major markets, seen channels nibbled away by a

171

hundred high school 10 watters and wasted away by uninspired instruction,” wrote

Thomas, “the rulemaking loomed as a Golden Opportunity.”

cdlxxxviii

Spring was in full bloom. The presidential election cycle was underway. The

new NFCB was engaged in a vigorous policy agenda, and the hoped-for outside support

had materialized. On the other hand, some of the other projects had seen little or no

progress. The training manual was on hold. April had come and gone, without the

national marathon intended to shore up the “austerity budget.” An unaudited financial

statement issued by Thomas on May 31 showed assets of $10,175.24, liabilities of

$9,398.79, and a positive balance of $7,881.56. Of course, the balance included the

$7,000 award from Markle, and $1,155.36 in loans to the PTE “made by private

individuals on a non-secured basis.”

cdlxxxix

NFCB’s financial margin remained razor thin.

The budget would be one of many topics taken up in Telluride.

“When last we met, NFCB was only an idea,” stated the NARC 2 program. The

guide to NARC 1 opened with: The Uncommon Carrier,” a rambling, seven page essay

by Lorenzo Milam.

cdxc

In contrast, NARC 2 dispensed with the opening pleasantries in a

single-spaced half page, then moved immediately to the tasks at hand: Capital letters at

the top of page 3 shouted unmistakable instructions to the conferee: “HOW TO USE

THIS CONFERENCE.” “WE ALSO HAVE the business of continuing to build our

organization,” exclaimed the following page.

cdxci

There would be time for socializing,

but the second National Alternative Radio Conference was much larger and more

businesslike in every respect.

172

Centered on the Telluride Community Center, the second NARC included nearly

60 workshops, almost three times the number that had occurred in Madison the year

before. NARC 2 doubled the length of the gathering to four days. In addition to NFCB’s

24 participant members, the program listed another 37 community stations, broadcast

organizations, and local groups, ranging from KRBD, Ketchikan, Alaska, in the far

northwest to Green County Development of Eutaw, Alabama in the southeast. All five

Pacifica stations appeared on the list, including the recently licensed WPFW in

Washington, D.C., the final manifestation of the aspirations of Lew Hill and Lorenzo

Milam to bring a more humane form of mass media to nation’s capital. The program

reflected greater diversity in the interests and needs of those in attendance, with session

titles such as “Third World Involvement in Community Radio,” “Women in Community

Radio,” “Fiscal Control and Budget,” and “Access – Who Gets On?”

cdxcii

At NARC 1,

most of the attendees had been acquainted in advance. In terms of ethnicity, social class,

economic status, education, and geography, NARC 2 was more diverse, and the

differences would figure prominently in some of the gathering’s significant outcomes.

Though the participant members of NFCB took issue with many of the policies

and practices of the public broadcasting establishment, “the system” could not ignore the

Federation. The Pacifica stations were large enough to receive CPB support. The

NFCB’s larger participants, such as WYEP, wanted to move towards qualification.

NFCB stations in rural areas, such as KAXE (Rich and Suzi McClear’s station in the Iron

Range), wanted to broadcast NPR programming to audiences that could not receive an

established NPR signal. Somewhat incongruously, NPR Director of Radio Thomas

173

Warnock and CPB program officer Clyde Robinson came from Washington to explain

the particulars of “the system” to the hippies, activists, and radicals at the

conference.

cdxciii

Adapting to the more relaxed atmosphere of the mountain resort,

Robinson dressed in a safari suit. The Federation’s team of “Legal Eagles” dressed down

as well. Jeans and t-shirts were standard attire.

cdxciv

While most of the workshops moved forward smoothly, some of the business

meetings turned into contentious, and sometimes angry discussions. Susie McClear got

into a shouting match with a representative of KBOO over issues of racial diversity and

representation.

cdxcv

Mike O’Connor got into an argument about quotas, as WORT

program director Joan Rubel recounted the Jewish experience of the Holocaust.

cdxcvi

argument over the use of the terms person of color and third-world person caused Pat

Watkins to become so angry that she left the conference in frustration. “All the sudden in

the middle of the night,” recalled neighboring camper Rich McClear, “there’s Patty

Watkins putting everything into a bag and getting out of there.”

cdxcvii

O’Connor

remembered “some very difficult conversations during the plenary sessions at Telluride

that really divided the group. This was not light stuff – heavy duty stuff. We were not

prepared as an organization to handle it.”

cdxcviii

In the aftermath, O’Connnor drove back

to the Midwest with “a black guy, very articulate,” though O’Connor could not recall his

name. “He was raising all kinds of uncomfortable issues about the composition of the

board and the composition of the organizing group. It was all these white guys –

Lorenzo, Jeremy – white bread.”

cdxcix

174

At NARC 1, the conferees shared common connections through Milam, Lansman,

Thomas, and Clifford. At NARC 2, “we learned we still have much to learn about how to

function as a national organization,” wrote Thomas in the NFCB Newsletter.

“There is

still a long path to travel toward full participation of the disenfranchised in our respective

stations. Resolving the internal issues would require “more than spending a few days

together.”

As a first step, the delegates agreed to allow each participant member to

establish a local screening committee to determine how to comply with “the Cincinnati

resolution.” More immediately, the participants elected a new group of Steering

Committee members and officers to full year terms. Some of the faces were familiar:

Rubin was re-elected as chairperson. Theriault moved into the secretary’s position.

O’Connor continued in an at-large role. But there were also several new faces, including

Ellin O’Leary from Pacifica’s Washington bureau, Nje Sumchi from KPOO “Poor

Peoples’ Radio” in San Francisco, and KPFA public affairs director Don Foster, who

would go on to establish WBAI’s Third World department in later years. “Passionately, if

haltingly,” wrote Thomas, the NFCB would become a more diverse organization as it set

about “changing the way the nation speaks to itself.”

dii

Down to business

In the months after Telluride, the ongoing efforts of Thomas and Clifford to

obtain outside funding again brought results, as Rockefeller awarded $9,850 for the

Washington and Urbana offices. $1,850 was earmarked for equipment purchases for the

Possible Tape Exchange. The balance paid for a series of publications on “practical

information for station operation,”

diii

including the NFCB Legal Handbook, a concise

175

guide to FCC rules, regulations, and required operating practices for NCE radio authored

by Thomas and Clifford, and SourceTap, a directory of sources for nationally syndicated

programming compiled and edited by Suzi McClear. By October, five new groups had

come forward with intentions to join the Federation.

In spite of these positive developments, the financial status of the organization

remained tenuous. For several years, the nation had been in the grip of a powerful cycle

of economic inflation. The sluggishness trickled down to the NFCB’s local stations.

“For a time,” wrote Thomas, “the NFCB National Office had all the atmosphere of an

intensive care ward, as station after station reported alarming readings on the vital

signs.”

div

Fundraisers were coming up short, staff members laid off, and expenses

trimmed. Member payments to NFCB slowed to a trickle, though members continued to

ask for services. Thomas and Clifford compensated as best they could, “by focusing on

several foundation grant supported activities while waiting out the drought.”

The

Newsletter became a monthly publication.

A regional gathering of NFCB stations in Madison, held in mid-September, 1976

included a lively discussion of the planned national marathon, and other fundraising

possibilities. Thomas reframed the issue in a more troubling context: With participant

members unable to meet their local expenses, “self taxation to pay our NFCB dues has

been difficult at best, and nonexistent at worst.”

dvi

The efforts of the Washington office

to secure outside money had broad implications for the future relationship between the

organization and its affiliates, but no one could see a clear path forward. The issue was

deferred to Nan Rubin and the Steering Committee, “being responsible for present

176

policies,” to “consider carefully this area of financial planning.”

dvii

“No consensus was

reached,” Rubin reflected, “we were only beginning to ask questions.”

dviii

Through all the financial pressures, NFCB continued to make progress on other

fronts. The tape exchange provided regular mailings to “5 or 6 hundred addresses,”

including all participant member stations and the newly authorized group of nonvoting

associate stations, many licensed to colleges and universities. KPFA offered to provide a

weekly half hour of less time sensitive news stories for distribution, but the material

never arrived.

dix

A few stations contributed programs, but most neither contributed nor

ordered tapes. The service relied “mainly on tapes from the old KDNA archives.”

conjunction with Pacifica, NFCB met with representatives of the National Aeronautics

and Space Administration [NASA] to discuss the possibility of using the recently

launched Communications Technology Satellite [CTS] for high-speed program

distribution, live coverage, and two-way communication between NFCB and Pacifica

stations. Tom Thomas “ventured a ‘ball park’ figure of $200,000 to $300,000 for the

installation of the earth station equipment.”

dxi

Backed by Bader and their colleagues in the legal community, Thomas and

Clifford submitted comments to the Commission in support of a petition for rulemaking

by a coalition of 66 citizen groups to expand and enhance the requirements for licensees

to broadcast pro bono public service announcements.

dxii

Asserting that “a unified

classification scheme would make it easier to compare station performance between the

commercial and noncommercial services,” the Federation proposed that requirements for

recording and reporting program information by NCE stations be brought in line with

177

those of commercial broadcasters in Docket 20898.

dxiii

On behalf of the hundreds of

volunteers in community radio who did not need or “want to learn about remote base

current ammeters,” Thomas encouraged FCC to remove testing requirements for the

routine duties of day-to-day broadcast operators, and endorsed a proposal that station

program logs should be available for public inspection. On the other hand, NFCB argued

against a proposal to licensees to make all written correspondence available, noting that

“most correspondence at listener-supported noncommercial stations concerns

contributions to the station, and that donors were entitled to some measure of

confidentiality.”

dxiv

As NFCB entered into its third calendar year of operation in 1977, the Federation

submitted its most far reaching and significant filing to date in the matter of Docket

20735, CPB’s petition to reorganize the NCE FM band. “It was clear from the scope of

the issues,” wrote Thomas, “that the Commission was planning to take its first

comprehensive look at noncommercial FM since the service was established.”

dxv

The

grant from the Markle Foundation allowed Thomas and Clifford to approach Docket

20735 as a large-scale research assignment, involving more than two dozen associates

including public interest attorneys, engineers, and station managers. Finding there were

“only a handful of FCC decisions concerning noncommercial radio from which to extract

useful precedents,” and that the data that was available concerning NCE stations was

“generally scattered and out of date,” Tom and Terry approached the filing “from

scratch,” beginning in April 1976.

dxvi

178

In Docket 20735, the NFCB argued in favor of the Commission’s proposal to

open Channel 200 [89.7 mHz] for new authorizations. But the Federation’s filing

significantly expanded the scope of the issues. NFCB called for the relaxation of

protections on third adjacent channel interference and a reduction in channel spacing to

provide greater access to the radio spectrum.

dxvii

In addition, Thomas and Clifford

asserted, “technical changes alone would be inadequate to provide for future needs.”

dxviii

Making the case that any standards should “insure that existing stations are used wisely

and effectively,” and “set priorities among the services provided by noncommercial

stations to guide the distribution of facilities when there are not enough channels to meet

the demand for them,” NFCB argued for a broad reconsideration of the Commission’s

approach to NCE radio. The Federation’s case relied on four policy initiatives:

• NCE broadcasters should serve the needs of their communities of license, rather

than “in house” purposes such as training students;

• NCE channel allotments should prioritize high power signals capable of reaching

audiences large enough to ensure adequate community support; low power

allotments typically used for student training and other limited services should

receive secondary consideration.

• NCE assignments should prioritize a diversity of services, reflecting the full

range of culture and opinion in the nation’s communities;

• The NCE band should include provisions for low power, secondary services,

such as student training and instructional services, on a space-available basis.

dxix

179

In the succeeding years, Docket 20735 proved to the “golden opportunity” foreseen

by Thomas and Clifford. The proceeding was “the pivotal moment of NFCB’s creation,”

for Nan Rubin. “This is why NFCB was created.”

dxx

In terms of issues and proposals,

Thomas and Clifford engaged many of the ideas Milam and Lansman had attempted to

broach unsuccessfully in the Petition Against God, including localism, concentration of

ownership, and best uses of the spectrum. However, where the appeal of Milam and

Lansman relied on their ideals, passions, and discontents, Thomas and Clifford

articulated positions in a manner far more appropriate to the bureaucratic and political

cultures of the Commission and the Washington establishment. Milam and Lansman

were outrageous and uncompromising. In contrast, Thomas and Clifford were reasonable

and pragmatic, their policy positions backed up by solid research and key constituencies.

Milam and Lansman lashed out at “fundamentalist religious ‘schools’ who would block

off frequencies, and continue to show scorn for open access and minority employment

and programming much as they have in the past.”

dxxi

NFCB asserted, “the pattern of

station development may not reflect a community’s need for service, or the comparative

needs for service among several communities.”

dxxii

The FCC could not dismiss these

positions without ignoring some of the citizen interests the agency was mandated to

consider. These upstart community radio stations didn’t necessarily provide the kind of

service CPB intended, but they reached into geographic and cultural communities that

were not served by other NCE radio services. Some received no service of any kind.

The staff and policy makers at the FCC, CPB, and other agencies now had good reasons

to consider the Federation’s positions. Beginning in 1977, Docket 20735 “put NFCB on

180

the map as a major policy player,” recalled Rubin. It was “a defining event in the life of

NFCB.”

dxxiii

As winter turned to spring and summer, the Federation looked forward to the next

annual conference in Minneapolis. The Alternative Radio label was dropped: In 1977,

the participants would gather for “serious planning and work” at the NFCB National

Conference.

dxxiv

Activities related to satellite services moved ahead slowly, while the

renamed Possible Tape Exchange and Radio Program Service reached “stable-stage,”

with a steady if small market of customers and growing lists of orders. The problem was,

many of the customers were not NFCB stations. “Although the idea of our programs

going out to noncommercial stations all over the country is appealing,” Bill Thomas felt

the exchange needed to be “of value to NFCB stations. Right now, we’re not sure how

much you really want or need it.”

dxxv

Meeting in Urbana in February, the participants

formed a committee to work with Tom and Terry on the organization’s budget, revenue,

and financial planning issues. Twelve new participants came on board at the Urbana

meeting, including KTOO in Juneau, Alaska, under the management of Bruce Theriault.

The total participant membership stood at 39.

dxxvi

Revenues had stabilized to the point

where the Washington office was moved out of Tom and Terry’s spare bedroom to

modest quarters on Massachusetts Avenue.

dxxvii

In the broader arena of public policy and public broadcasting, CPB came forward

with a plan to share the capacity of the planned multi-channel public television satellite

system with public and community radio, though no solid commitments were

forthcoming.

dxxviii

The FCC issued an inquiry into the fundraising practices in NCE

181

broadcasters, with a particular interest in the methods used by public television, and

granted two licenses to the Moody Bible Institute for new stations. Citing First

Amendment concerns, the Moody decision showed a shift away from the Commission’s

long-standing practice of restricting NCE licenses for religious broadcasting to

schools.

dxxix

As promised 10 years earlier, the Carnegie Corporation committed $1

million to a new Commission on the Future of Public Broadcasting, known as Carnegie

II. An “options paper” went to the staff and members of the House Communications

Subcommittee, examining such issues as the relationship between CPB and Congress, the

division of CPB funds between TV and radio, and the influence of licensees on the nature

and variety of stations services. Thomas expected Carnegie II to take at least a year, and

provide many opportunities for NFCB to contribute to the outcomes at Carnegie

Commission and in Congress.

dxxx

When the members gathered in Minneapolis in Mid-August, they found a bound,

24 page Annual Report from Thomas and Clifford, summarizing every aspect of the

NFCB. In the past, reports to the members had exhibited a homemade look and feel. The

1977 report represented a more professional image of the NFCB. It was typeset, with a

table of contents and more extensive explanations of the Federation’s mission,

composition, goals, and activities. The report began with a problem statement:

American broadcasting fails to reflect the diversity of the American people….

Commercial broadcasting, driven largely by profit incentives and advertising

objectives, pursues a bland uniformity… Public broadcasting is mostly concerned

on the narrow concerns of academic institutions… The potential of the broadcast

media – to address the issues of the day, to expose a whole world of culture, to

celebrate and critique the grand and mundane variations of everyday life has been

scarcely realized.

dxxxi

182

The document asserted, “The community broadcaster’s sole purpose is serving the

listener,” offering “no one format,” but “a wide array of programming.”

dxxxii

The stations

of the NFCB intended to fill all the niches in their local communities, offering music,

opinion, news, drama, art, and “experiments in the full range of creative broadcasting” to

“provide a service that is truly ‘in the public interest.’”

dxxxiii

The 1977 Annual Report detailed the Federation’s membership and governance,

and the organization’s initiatives in program distribution, publications, consultations with

member organizations, representation, policy development, and advocacy. The final

pages offered a series of unaudited financial statements, revealing ongoing “serious

problems” with revenues and expenses. The Rockefeller grant represented nearly one

third of the company’s total income of $30,839. Activities of the Tape Exchange brought

in another third. Member dues, originally intended to provide the financial backbone for

the entire organization, were the smallest pool of revenue. Revenues were increasing, but

not at a pace that could keep up with inflationary pressures. The fund balance deficit

topped $10,000. To meet monthly expenses, the employees deferred salary payments to

the unspecified future: NFCB owed almost $14,000 to Tom Thomas, Terry Clifford, Bill

Thomas, and Betsy Rubenstein, Bill’s spouse and co-worker.

dxxxiv

Short-term relief from the ongoing financial exigency arrived within a few weeks,

with an infusion of $13,500 from the Rockefeller Family Fund. The grant was designated

for a second round of publications, including the long dormant training manual project

and a second edition of the Legal Handbook.

dxxxv

More immediately, the grant solved the

company’s ongoing cash flow problems. During the same time period, Thomas joined

183

Carnegie II chair James Killian, David Davis of the Ford Foundation, and some 50 other

witnesses in three days of informal testimony and “roundtable discussions” with the

House Subcommittee on Communications.

dxxxvi

This first appearance before Congress

represented a new focus for NFCB’s advocacy efforts. Recognizing “the substantial

investment of time and resources” required for the preparation and presentation of

Congressional testimony, Thomas had previously relied on more recognizable agencies,

such as the NCCB and the APRS, to represent Federation positions. Now, the activities

associated with Carnegie II cast a wider net around public broadcasting issues, Thomas

felt there was an opportunity to realize “foreseeable returns” from more direct

engagements with Congress. Looking ahead, Thomas asserted, “NFCB intends to take an

active role in that process.”

dxxxvii

184

CHAPTER VII

THE NFCB MATURES, 1978 - 1984

As the decade of the 1970s moved to a close, the National Federation of

Community broadcasters was well positioned to exert its influence on the nascent public

broadcasting industry. In the Federation’s Washington office, Tom Thomas and Terry

Clifford were building a center for policy analysis and development independent of more

entangled institutional interests, including CPB and NPR. At the Radio Program

Exchange in Champaign, Bill Thomas and Betsy Rubenstein served the desires and needs

of a marginal but growing network of community and college stations for affordable,

nationally syndicated programming. Building on these foundations, the Federation would

play an influential role in several facets of public broadcasting policy over the next seven

years. Concurrently, as the NFCB became more influential, key figures from the

organization’s founding period moved on to other endeavors, leaving the remaining

members to wrestle with the challenge of sustaining the NFCB’s early success under new

leadership.

North to Alaska

At the Minneapolis conference, the participants elected a new steering committee.

WORT program director Joan Rubel joined Mike O’Connor, who assumed the

Treasurer’s duties. Nan Rubin continued as a Steering Committee member, but

surrendered the Chairperson’s position to Bruce Theriault.

dxxxviii

Shortly before NARC 2,

Theriault left his position as an organizer and program manager in Connecticut to help

185

Jerry Greene at KOTO with local arrangements for the conference. At the Telluride

gathering, he found out about an opening for a radio station manager at KTOO FM in

Juneau, Alaska. A native easterner, Theriault had grown to love the west as he

hitchhiked across the US after college. The KTOO job provided an opportunity to

expand on his western experiences, and reside closer to a brother who lived in the 49

state. From Telluride, Theriault submitted a resume by mail, and hit the road for the long

drive up through British Columbia on the Alcan Highway.

dxxxix

In transit, Theriault’s only contact with the KTOO hiring process came through a

single call at a pay phone, at a cost of “like, a hundred quarters.”

dxl

He was told the

applications were under review. When he arrived in Anchorage 10 days later, he called

again, and was told he had been selected, despite the lack of an interview or any

knowledge of the station or the community. In retrospect, it seems likely that Theriault’s

background with the NFCB, and his lack of experience with the culture and geography of

Juneau, gave him an edge in the hiring process. His combination of community radio

credentials and a counseling background seemed to be a good fit for KTOO’s licensee,

Capital Community Broadcasting, an organization that was on the path to become one of

the few non-institutional dual licensees for NCE radio and television.

In the 1970s, Alaska offered a uniquely nurturing environment for noncommercial

educational broadcasting. The discovery of large oil deposits in 1968 at Prudhoe Bay led

to an explosion of the state’s economy and tax revenues.

dxli

In fiscal year 1975,

petroleum-related revenue totaled $333.4 million, or 26% of state income. Five years

later, the oil industry accounted for 90% of state revenues - over $2.5 billion. By

186

FY1985, income from oil was nearly 10 times what it had been just a decade earlier,

topping $3.25 billion.

dxlii

Lawmakers were ready and willing to invest the windfall in

projects that would benefit the citizens of the remote communities spread out across the

state’s vast, imposing expanse. Oil money paid for roads, bridges, power generating

facilities, and a host of other contributions to the state’s infrastructure.

While most of Alaska’s population was concentrated in and around the cities of

Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau, residents were spread out in isolated pockets across

the state, from Ketchikan on the southeastern peninsula, to Bethel in the far west, to

Barrow, far above the Arctic Circle. The state encompassed a vast geographic expanse:

Travel from Juneau to the native community of Kotzebue entailed a journey of more than

1650 miles, ending within 300 miles of the border of the Soviet Union. For all practical

purposes, no highways existed north of Fairbanks or west of Anchorage. Transit to most

points in the state involved sled dogs, snowmobiles, or bush pilots. Unless a person lived

in one of the cities, encounters with the media were infrequent, if they occurred at all.

Within the cities, there was almost no live television. National news and entertainment

programs arrived on videotape, flown up from Seattle days or weeks after the original

broadcast. Lacking breadth, coherence, and coordination, the state’s communications

system posed considerable challenges to public authority, welfare, and safety.

Lawmakers viewed telecommunications “kind of like transportation,” recalled Theriault.

“Telecommunications was really important. It was considered critical infrastructure.”

dxliii

Radio was the only medium capable of providing up-to-the-minute information.

187

Recognizing the opportunity afforded by increasing capital, Alaska policy makers

allocated funds to encourage communities across the state to start local radio stations.

Using CPB and NPR as blueprints, lawmakers established the Alaska Public

Broadcasting Commission [APBC] to provide annual operating grants to the state’s NCE

stations, and to the Alaska Public Broadcasting Network [APRN] for the production and

dissemination of statewide news and public affairs programming to the local stations.

Across the state, schools and other locally controlled nonprofit agencies could apply to

the FCC for NCE licenses and construction permits, and to HEW for grants to build the

facilities. Funds from the APBC provided the required local match for the HEW grants.

Once a station was up and running, the state provided sufficient capital to operate at the

levels of coverage, staffing, and hours of operation required to qualify for an annual CSG

from CPB. The criteria for CPB support doubled as the primary conditions for affiliation

with NPR. Though many of the communities of service in Alaska had populations in the

hundreds or low thousands, government support assured the operation of professionally

managed NPR stations throughout the state. The APBC afforded Theriault and the other

managers of Alaska stations the resources required to move beyond the hand-to-mouth

existence of most small NCE radio operations and take a position within the public radio

“system.” But unlike the vast majority of NPR stations in the continental U.S., most of

the Alaska stations were not connected to the sorts of larger institutions most commonly

associated with NPR and CPB. These were small, independent, local, nonprofit

organizations. For Theriault, the NFCB was a natural ally for Alaska’s public radio

188

stations, and as a member of the Steering Committee he was in a position to make

connections between Alaska’s NCE radio stations and the Federation.

1978 was a good year for the NFCB. At the invitation of congressional staff

members, Tom Thomas offered his first in-person testimony before the House

Subcommittee on Communications, in the matter of the Public Broadcasting Finance Act

of 1978. Thomas used the appearance to articulate the Federation’s core issues directly

to Congress, asserting “that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s support structures,

and the community service grant programs in particular, have yet to reflect the needs of

community broadcasters and other stations serving special needs and interests.”

dxliv

May, the FCC issued its first rulings in Docket 20735, closely following the NFCB’s

recommendations to eliminate protections for Class D stations, open channel 200, and

establish minimum hours of service.

dxlv

Having gained the attention of lawmakers, policy

analysts, attorneys, and other interested in noncommercial broadcasting, circulation of the

NFCB Newsletter topped 400.

dxlvi

Orders and submissions to the Program Service were

up, and new grants from the National Endowment for the Arts [NEA] and the

Cooperative Employment and Training Act [CETA] allowed the Illinois office to

purchase equipment, hire staff, and improve marketing efforts. Grants totaling more than

$38,000 accounted for over half of the Federation’s income. The additional revenue

allowed Thomas and Clifford to hire Nan Rubin to assume the duties in the Washington

office related to member services and station relations. The participant member list grew

20%, to 50 stations and organizations. Most of the participants were small, but a few

were large enough to qualify for CPB support, including KAXE and WYSO. Since each

189

participant paid membership dues equaling 1% of annual revenues, the largest stations –

the CPB supported stations – provided the NFCB with the largest share of dues income.

Three of these CPB supported members were located in the state of Alaska.

dxlvii

Under

the leadership of Thomas and Theriault, more would follow.

Down in the valley

Far from Washington or Juneau, Hugo Morales was teaching at Fresno State

University, and working on a plan to build a radio station that could serve farm workers

in California’s San Joaquin Valley. Morales had first-hand experience with both the

medium and the audience: An indigenous Mixteco from a small village in the state of

Oaxaca, Morales and his family immigrated from Mexico to Healdsburg, California,

when he was 9 years old. During his adolescent years, Morales lived in a farm labor

camp, among the families of migrant farm laborers marginalized from the American

mainstream by the threefold challenges of class, ethnicity, and language. In the cultural

isolation and socioeconomic hardship of Healdsburg, he witnessed the efforts of Cesar

Chavez and the United Farm Workers to unionize agricultural workers in California. He

got his first experience in radio at 14, helping his older brother produce one of the few

Spanish-language broadcasts available in the area north of San Francisco. Every Sunday

for four years, Morales fetched coffee, sorted through stacks of Mexican popular music,

and captured feeds from the Associated Press wire for his brother to translate in only a

few minutes into newscasts in Spanish.

dxlviii

After high school, Morales experienced the greatest culture shock of his life in

1968 when he moved east to attend Harvard College. For two years, he did not meet a

190

single Latino undergraduate student in Cambridge, resorting at times to asking random

people on Harvard Square if they spoke Spanish. He finally met his peers during his

junior year in a class on the history of Mexican-American people and Chicano politics.

Like other students of his time, he embraced movements for political and social change,

and the free expression of cultural identity. He helped start a Latino student organization,

and pressured the campus radio station to make time available for Latino programming.

Morales was the first Latino producer to broadcast on Harvard’s WHRB, playing

Chicano rock on Saturday nights, and salsa and merengue every Sunday. As an

undergraduate, he kept an office at the Institute of Politics inside the Kennedy School of

Government. Upon graduating in 1972, he enrolled immediately in the Harvard Law

School.

dxlix

“Law is the fabric of the society’s values, economics, and culture,” he

asserted. “That’s what I wanted to learn.”

He earned a J.D. in 1975, intending “to go

into politics, or use it as a way for organizing workers,” rather than practicing law.

dli

Returning to California, he immediately got involved with union organizing and

the Chicano movement, but found few opportunities to make a living. To make ends

meet, he accepted a temporary appointment on the faculty at Fresno State. Fresno had no

Spanish-language broadcast service, and only one NCE station – KFCF, licensed to the

Fresno Free College Foundation and operated part time as a repeater for KPFA.

dlii

Morales distributed leaflets throughout the university and around Fresno’s Mexican

barrio, recruiting people to help him start a bilingual Spanish-English radio station, along

the lines of the service he had created at Harvard. Eight people responded, joining

Morales to form a nonprofit agency, Radio Bilingue. The new board of directors met

191

initially in a Fresno restaurant. For several years, Radio Bilingue was an all-volunteer

concern, financed by revenues from benefit events, including dances and breakfasts

featuring the traditional Mexican tripe dish, menudo. The events were popular with local

campesinos, but it proved difficult to raise funds from a population that had little money

to give. By Morales’ estimate, Radio Bilingue grossed $200 to $300 every 6 months.

Morales performed all of the legal and administrative work on a volunteer basis, relying

on his temporary assignments at Fresno State for income.

dliii

The NFCB’s 1979 conference took place in August on the campus of The

Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington.

dliv

Prior to the conference, Thomas

and Clifford took the opportunity to visit NFCB members in the west, stopping in Fresno

to meet with staff at Pacifica affiliate KFCF. At the invitation of one of the Bilingue

board members, Tom and Terry took time to meet with Morales.

dlv

The meeting lasted

several hours, as Thomas and Clifford familiarized themselves with every aspect of

Radio Bilingue. Right away Morales recognized, “they obviously had a lot of experience

facing people like myself, in the middle of nowhere doing a project, and not knowing

there were hundreds of others doing the same thing. They were very polite in getting out

of me what was going on – how did we get the application together, the status, the

funding, the vision, all that stuff that they do so skillfully. They were very gracious.

They didn’t embarrass me in any way.”

dlvi

Unable to rely on the income from his

teaching job, Morales was living in his car, and holding the Bilingue files in the trunk at

the time.

192

Within months of his meeting with Thomas and Clifford, Morales headed north to

the NFCB conference, just a few days after Radio Bilingue received the FCC

Construction Permit for NCE FM station KSJV.

dlvii

For Morales, “it was love at first

sight. I really believed in what it stood for. I became quite involved.”

dlviii

Radio

Bilingue’s application for participant status received the approval of the members, one of

two bilingual Spanish/English stations to join the Federation in 1979.

dlix

The members

voted Morales onto the Steering Committee. Bruce Theriault won a third term as the

organization’s chairperson, and Suzi McClear a second as secretary. Also voted to a third

term, Joanie Rubel argued the NFCB “will either take a quantum leap or resign itself to

having the limited effectiveness of a trade organization.”

dlx

The NFCB staff was already focused on a broad agenda to advance the

organization’s ambitious goals. A second CETA grant for $15,000 allowed Bill Thomas

to hire more staff. The appointment of Dennis Kita to oversee marketing for the Program

Exchange allowed Bill to work more collaboratively with producers on funding and

distribution strategies.

dlxi

Orders for programs were increasing rapidly, topping 600

between January and March of 1979.

dlxii

In Washington, Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford appeared twice before the

Carnegie Commission to discuss how community radio could address issues of public

access, participation, and diversity in an expanded, multi-service public radio system.

dlxiii

The Commission’s final report was before Congress, proposing a fundamental overhaul

of the American public broadcasting infrastructure, and significant increases in federal

spending.

dlxiv

Though the House Subcommittee on Communications took up many of the

193

Carnegie recommendations in H.R. 3333, the Commission’s central proposal to replace

CPB with an independent endowment did not survive. The goals of the second

commission may have been too ambitious: Unlike its predecessor, Carnegie II had little

net impact on noncommercial broadcasting in the U.S.

Contrary to Thomas’ observation that 1979 was “not an auspicious year for

federal fiscal expansion on any front,”

dlxv

Congress agreed to proposals to award funds to

CPB for a satellite distribution system for NPR, and assented to NFCB’s

recommendation to mandate a fixed split of CPB grants, directing the agency to award

75% of funds to public television and 25% to public radio.

dlxvi

Having made a strong

impression on the staff and leadership of CPB over the course of the Docket 20735

proceedings and several Congressional hearings, Tom joined the CPB Radio Advisory

Council, where the discussion focused on the new, competitive process that required new

stations to qualify for a limited number of Expansion Grants as prerequisites for receiving

full CSGs. Nan Rubin assisted stations with applications for grants from the newly

authorized National Telecommunications and Information Administration [NTIA], the

successor to the HEW Facilities program reconstituted in the Department of Commerce

with specific Congressional directives to prioritize the extension of NCE services to

unserved localities and populations.

dlxvii

To accommodate the pressures on the

Washington office, the staff moved the Newsletter to a bimonthly publication schedule in

the spring of 1979.

With Rubin handling day-to-day services to members, Thomas and Clifford

increasingly turned their attention to the development of long-term strategies for the

194

Federation’s future. In February 1979, The Charles Stewart Mott Foundation awarded

NFCB $15,000 to conduct “a detailed assessment of station operations, projections of

development patterns in community radio, and an evaluation of resources needed (and

available) to provide a more effective service.”

dlxviii

In the months leading up to the

Olympia conference, Thomas and Clifford issued a series of position papers. “Planning

for community radio” began with an overview of the Federation’s definition of

community radio, the diversity of the membership, and the relationship of NFCB to the

broader system of public broadcasting. Articulating a series of questions that might be

applied to “program production, personnel development, fundraising, volunteer

participation, minority involvement, promotion, management skills, audience research,”

and broadcast facilities, Thomas and Clifford asked members how best to use the limited

resources of the NFCB. Calling for an “an organizational framework for community

broadcasting – certainly at the national level and to some degree at individual stations,”

Thomas and Clifford proposed to convene a process that “should be as open and thorough

as possible, eliciting full participation from our membership and involving outside views

as well.”

dlxix

Part 2 of the planning paper offered more specific questions focusing in

more detail on the issues identified in the first document, including:

• Qualifications for members of a station’s board of directors, selection, and

orientation processes

• Qualifications for staff, selection and training processes.

• Recruitment, training, utilization, management and evaluation of volunteers.

• Participation and day-to-day involvement of minority groups in station affairs.

195

• Approaches to program production and scheduling, facility development,

operations, and maintenance.

• Fiscal growth, fundraising, and money management.

• The relationship of individual NFCB members to their audiences, public

authorities, and the field of public broadcasting.

dlxx

The third position paper took up the issue of radio as a medium of artistic, social and

political culture. In “Minorities and community radio,” Thomas and Clifford took on the

issue that had troubled the Federation since its inception. Since 1975, there had been

progress on several fronts: Pacifica’s WPFW, Radio Bilingue, and other minority owned

and controlled stations were on the air. CETA funds allowed stations to create training

programs and target recruitment efforts to ethnic minorities. CPB offered to support

management positions through the Minority Training Program. The FCC mandated equal

opportunity in recruitment and training for all stations. “The net results, however, have

not been very impressive,” observed Thomas and Clifford. “Some stations have shown no

net increase in minority staff participation over the past few years. Others have added

minority staff, only to find they have engendered a not so subtle race war between

competing station factions.”

dlxxi

Minority members complained of a “white atmosphere.”

Programming focuses on minority audiences was “ghettoized” “in fairly small blocks of

time sandwiched in among offerings clearly directed at a white audience.” Stations

lacked the social orientation and the practical skills to put idealistic commitments to

“serve the unserved audience” into practice. Minority producers were offered

exaggerated promises of their roles in stations where white staff held the final power to

196

make decisions. For more positive outcomes, Thomas and Clifford called for policies to

promote minority ownership, recruitment, and training, and for more clarity and expertise

in the processes of audience identification, program production, and program decision-

making.

dlxxii

In the 1979 position papers, Thomas and Clifford effectively laid down a gauntlet for

the members of the NFCB. Having worked systematically on the issues identified in the

papers over a period of years, they were in the position to offer a broad, critical view of

the most problematic challenges facing community radio stations in the U.S. In the

months after the Olympia conference, they laid these issues before Theriault, Morales,

and the other members of the Steering Committee. To assess the planning issues,

Theriault and Thomas conducted a series of regional meetings supported by the Mott

Foundation Grant. To approach the minority participation issues, Thomas and Clifford

proposed a project to CPB for a series of conferences on minority ownership and program

production. The timing was ideal. CPB was reaching the end of its 1979 fiscal year, and

was under a Congressional mandate to support projects that addressed issues of access,

training, and participation by women and ethnic minorities across the broader public

radio system. While “Minorities and community radio” examined problems specific to

the NFCB, the same issues were even more prevalent at the larger, more traditional,

institutional stations affiliated with NPR. The program officer overseeing the effort,

Daniel del Solar, had previously worked in community radio in New York.

Consequently, CPB awarded the NFCB a grant for $60,000 to organize a conference for

minority producers in public radio, and $20,000 to produce a series of workshops for

197

groups working to establish minority-controlled stations.

dlxxiii

“While the grants

themselves represent but the smallest portion of the federal investment in public radio,”

wrote Thomas, “they signal an important breakthrough in national recognition of NFCB’s

goals and efforts and indicate the accessibility of an important resource pool upon which

NFCB might draw in the 1980s.”

dlxxiv

The pivotal point

“Planning, policy work, fundraising, a lot of travel, staff recruitment, and a

steadily increasing load of station consultations and services” was all the NFCB staff

could handle as the calendar rolled over to 1980.

dlxxv

Leaving Rubenstein in charge of

Kita and the other employees, Bill Thomas left the Program Service in the summer of

1979 to devote his full time efforts to WEFT, the station project he had spearheaded in

Champaign since his arrival in 1975. Program orders and submissions continued to rise,

as producers turned to the NFCB to distribute programs on tape to stations that lacked the

financial or technical capacity to join the new satellite distribution system operated by

NPR.

dlxxvi

The advent of the NPR satellite provided the justification for a proposal to

NTIA for money to plan for the future of the tape distribution service, resulting in a

$50,000 grant from the federal agency to hire additional staff, engage consultants, and

conduct planning meetings.

In addition to Bill Thomas, other key people were on the move in and around the

Federation. The CPB grant allowed Dennis Kita to move to the Washington office as the

Director of Minority Affairs, with primary responsibility for organizing the upcoming

minority workshops. Dave Taylor, a member of the Program Service Advisory

198

Committee, left his position as Operations Director at KOPN to join the Champaign

office as Director of Program Development.

dlxxvii

Increasingly dissatisfied with his

position at KTOO FM as the licensee moved ahead with plans to finance and operate a

public television station, Bruce Theriault resigned the manager’s chair in Juneau to take a

similar position at KRBD in Ketchikan.

dlxxviii

In Minnesota, Rich and Suzi McClear

recognized, “if KAXE were ever going to be a community radio station, it had to be run

by people from Northern Minnesota, not carpetbaggers that came in and built radio

stations.”

dlxxix

Expecting their second child, they were looking for an opportunity to

improve their financial position as well. When the position opened in Juneau, with the

promise of a larger salary and a stable source of public funding, the McClears decided it

was the right time to make a move. Though Rich took the KTOO position in good faith,

almost immediately he began to experience the same frustrations that led to Theriault’s

departure. Seeking a better alternative, McClear lobbied the APBC for funds to start a

station in Sitka. Nine months after moving to Alaska, Rich became the founding

manager of Raven Radio and KCAW FM.

dlxxx

KCAW and KRBD became the fourth and

fifth Alaska stations to join the list of NFCB participants.

dlxxxi

In the interim between Juneau and Ketchikan, Theriault joined Tom Thomas for a

series of regional focus meetings in Chicago, New Orleans, Seattle, Santa Cruz, Boulder,

Colorado and Worcester, Massachusetts, to discuss the organizational, financial, and

programming issues outlined in the previous planning papers. The meetings attracted 90

people, mostly from stations, evenly split between programming and operational staff.

“The meetings were organized into sessions covering overall NFCB finances,” including

199

“source of funds, dues, the constituency of NFCB and self-sufficiency,” reported

Theriault in “Planning for Community Radio (3).

dlxxxii

Attendees also discussed the

activities of the Program Service, and were asked to “vote for the six activities they

thought most important for the NFCB.”

dlxxxiii

If the results of the focus groups were unscientific, they did provide a clear

snapshot of the members’ needs and priorities for Federation services. Hearing about the

nature and complexity of the organization’s finances, the meetings provided many of the

attendees with their first awareness “that the majority of NFCB funds were generated

from outside sources and that our ability to generate funds internally was limited.” While

those present felt the “NFCB should avoid a situation where the source of funds sets the

organization’s priorities,” and that “self-sufficiency for NFCB should not necessarily be

the goal,” the current approach to funding “was viewed as an acceptable financial

structure for the NFCB.”

dlxxxiv

Of the program-related projects, the attendees gave the

highest priority to NFCB’s training activities, the Federation’s function as a resource

bank and clearinghouse for system information, and services related to grant writing and

consultation. Program distribution and consultation services were farther down the list.

In summary, Theriault asserted, NFCB was “being called upon to take an even more

active role in providing information and developing training activities,” while relying on

“diverse external resources” to supply “a significant portion of its funds.”

dlxxxv

Over the previous five years, the NFCB had helped dozens of organizations

acquire licenses, build facilities, and establish broadcast services. These stations

continued to rely on NFCB for a host of services, even as more stations joined the

200

organization. A growing membership placed more demands on the company. To

respond, the company needed to grow. At the same time, the members could not pay the

full cost of the services they expected or needed from the NFCB, and those with the

fewest resources tended to require higher levels of service and attention. The Federation

faced a paradox: Growth did not pay for itself. On the contrary, growth increased the

need for external resources. At a joint meeting in St. Louis, members of the Program

Service, Financial Affairs, and Steering Committees wrestled with the prospects of “a

steady rise in the demand for services supporting station development, significant growth

in program related work, and action to assure community radio will have access to public

funds for public broadcasting.”

dlxxxvi

While it was clear that the NFCB would have to

“expand and improve its staff organization,” no one could articulate a resolution to the

underlying paradox of the organization’s success.

dlxxxvii

The planning process undertaken

in the Mott Foundation project had raised many questions, and provided few answers.

The turnaround on the CPB project was particularly short, challenging NFCB to

bring several factions in public broadcasting together for the first time. For project

coordinator Dennis Kita, “it was all about building constituency,” and thanks to the

previous experience of Thomas, Clifford, Rubin, and others inside and outside

community radio member stations, “the outreach efforts were quite masterful.”

dlxxxviii

Within a few months of the CPB awards, NFCB conducted workshops in June 1980 in

San Antonio, Texas for two Latino-controlled community radio projects; and in

Bismarck, North Dakota for five projects licensed to Native groups in July.

dlxxxix

June

also brought 130 Native, Latino, Asian American, and African-American producers to

201

Boulder, Colorado for the Working Conference for Minority Producers in Public

Radio.

dxc

While some of the attendees were skeptical that anything could come of the

gatherings, others were excited to exchange ideas with colleagues and mentors about new

stations and new approaches to radio programming. Hugo Morales was “a major

presence” at the events, recalled Kita. “It was a great time for such an event, because

many of the communities had undergone coalition-building phases.”

dxci

For producer

Peggy Berryhill, who brought an extensive background in production from Pacifica and

NPR to her role as coordinator of the production skills workshops in Boulder, the event

was a blur, as she dashed from room to room to double check equipment and direct

hands-on training.

dxcii

Sharon Maeda, manager of KRAB, saw reflections of other

successful social movements in NFCB’s capacity to put the rhetoric of diversity into

practice. The minority conferences were “like many of the things that happened in the

civil rights movement,” observed Maeda. “When there’s access to funds, you move

faster.”

dxciii

The summer ended with the 1980 National Conference in Worcester,

Massachusetts. On the occasion of NFCB’s 5

anniversary, Tom Thomas distributed the

final report on the Community Radio Planning Project, and challenged the members to

address the issues of growth and development at the local and national levels. In

response, the members “with a resounding consensus elected to locate the Federation

under one roof as soon as possible,” relocating the Program Service to Washington. The

members also authorized “a special governance project” to address the developing needs

of “the many sub-constituencies within NFCB: rural stations, people of color, the

202

associate members, independent producers, and others.”

dxciv

The efforts were bolstered

by a $29,000 award from NTIA’s Public Telecommunications Facilities Program [PTFP]

to acquire new high speed duplicating machines for the new Program Service facilities in

Washington, and $15,000 from the National Endowment for the Arts to support “services

to producers and stations in program distribution and related activities.”

dxcv

The Program

Service also reached agreement with NPR to offer some NFCB programs through the

network’s satellite system, reaching all NPR member stations and the few NPR/NFCB

affiliates, including the stations in Alaska.

The last half of 1980 brought equally promising developments in the policy arena.

In response to continuing concerns from Tom Thomas and the other members of the

Radio Advisory Council, CPB eliminated the rules requiring stations to obtain

competitively awarded Expansion Grants, returning to the previous system where all

stations satisfying the basic operational criteria qualified automatically for the CSG

program.

dxcvi

The policy change enabled qualifying NFCB stations to collect grants of

over $30,000 each beginning in the fall. For “continuing support of the Federation’s

analysis, planning, and representational work on public policy issues affecting public

radio,” the Markle Foundation awarded a two year, $95,000 grant to NFCB, “to assure

continuity in the organization’s work and make possible the pursuit of longer term

goals.”

dxcvii

Confident that the Federation would continue to see revenue growth, the

Steering Committee adopted a budget of $443,000 for calendar year 1981, anticipating an

additional $250,000 in external support from “various funding proposals to be developed

203

in the coming months.”

dxcviii

What the Steering Committee did not anticipate was a

seismic shift in the nation’s political landscape.

“There is a good deal to be concerned about”

dxcix

Over the first five years of the NFCB’s existence, the political atmosphere

surrounding public broadcasting was reasonably stable. While the presidency had shifted

from Republican to Democratic hands, the office of the executive remained relatively

weak in the aftermath of the Watergate affair and the resignation of Richard Nixon in

1974. Up the road from the White House, Democrats retained a firm control over the

Congress. Many in the House and Senate remained committed to the broad social agenda

advanced during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, including the investment of

public resources in a national system for noncommercial broadcasting. In this

atmosphere, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and National Public Radio had

achieved a measure of stability in the decade between 1970 and 1980. Though the FCC

had become more market-focused under the leadership of Charles Ferris, the Commission

recognized “the dramatic evolution of noncommercial radio over the past decade, from a

limited service functioning principally as an adjunct to higher education to a major

component of U.S. radio broadcasting with substantial public service opportunities.”

Dramatic change came to Washington with the election of conservative

Republican Ronald Reagan to the presidency in 1980. Reagan installed a policy team

committed to lower taxes, limited government, and the deregulation of markets, including

the broadcasting industry. Within weeks of coming to office, Reagan proposed a

rescission of 25% of the funds that had already been appropriated to CPB for the coming

204

fiscal year. In addition, Reagan proposed to reduce or eliminate many of the agencies

that provided collateral support to public broadcasting, including the NEA, NTIA, and

CETA. To oversee the deregulation of the broadcasting industry, Reagan designated

attorney Mark Fowler to chair the FCC. “For Fowler, the regulatory apparatus of the

FCC was ‘the last of the New Deal dinosaurs,’” observed Douglas Kellner, “and

television was ‘just an appliance, like a toaster’ that required no special regulatory

attention.”

dci

Where previous commissions had attempted to articulate normative

standards for the elusive public interest requirements of the Communications Act, Fowler

championed a more practical approach favored by broadcasters. Under Fowler, the

public interest would be equated with profit. Though Nicholas Johnson and others in the

media reform movement asserted that the public interest must “mean more than the same

profit-maximizing behavior that would be produced with no standards whatsoever,”

under Fowler the maxim became “the public interest is what interests the public.”

dcii

In their efforts to represent the individual and collective interests of NFCB

members, Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford had developed strong working relationships

with CPB and the FCC. By comparison, the Federation’s presence before Congress was

more limited. “Outside [of] a small number of Congressional staffers working

specifically in the communications field,” wrote Thomas, “community broadcasters are

simply part of the public broadcasting system, itself a somewhat small area of

Congressional concern.”

dciii

Historically, radio issues had been subordinate to television

issues since the establishment of CPB in 1967. In the new reality of the Reagan era, the

205

interests of community broadcasting were now firmly tied to the more general interests of

public radio and public television.

The first round in the budget battle went to public broadcasters. Led on the radio

side by NPR President Frank Mankiewicz and Vice President for National Affairs Walda

Roseman, public broadcasters convinced the members of the Senate Budget Committee

to reject the proposed rescission and maintain CPB funding at $172 million through fiscal

year 1983. In doing so, the Committee also reaffirmed public broadcasting’s forward

funding, a mechanism put in place during the Nixon administration to insulate public

broadcasting from abrupt shifts in the will of the nation’s political leaders.

dciv

Occupied

with more pressing battles over funding much larger programs, Reagan was content to

defer the cuts to the next biennium, agreeing to reduced authorizations of $130 million

per year for CPB in FY84-86.

dcv

The final outcome provided public broadcasters with

time to anticipate future cuts. More important, it left intact CPB’s “heat shield” function,

providing a separation between current political issues and the day-to-day programming

and operations of public broadcasting services, including community radio stations.

Though NFCB did not occupy a leadership role in the battles over federal

funding, the organization added breadth and credibility to the case for public

broadcasting. As a consequence of the minority conference projects and the other

outreach efforts of the NFCB staff and committees, by 1981 the Federation was a focal

point for many constituencies in public radio, especially those beyond the circle of the

large, institutional licensees affiliated with NPR and the “narrow, moralistic view” of

public radio criticized by FCC Chair Ferris and others.

dcvi

Approaching the 1981

206

conference in Durango, Colorado, NFCB’s Annual Report listed 57 participant members,

including nearly two dozen stations still firmly aligned the counterculture values of the

1960s and 1970s. But the NFCB was now far more diverse than it had been in 1975.

Nineteen licensees operated in remote and rural areas, including southwest Kansas, the

Four Corners region of Arizona and New Mexico, and the mountains of West Virginia.

NFCB represented 17 minority licensees, consisting of five Native, six African-

American, and six Latino groups, operating in rural and urban areas. NFCB had 60

nonvoting associate members, ranging from individual producers, to college stations, to

the Boston NPR station, WGBH. Eighteen NFCB member stations were broadcasting in

California, and 10 in Alaska.

Unlike their counterparts to the south, the Alaska stations enjoyed a more robust

financial outlook. In 1980, the APBC instituted an “Essential Service Level” formula to

guarantee sufficient resources to meet all criteria for continued CPB funding. While

satellite systems were rare at community stations in lower 48 states, 10 NFCB members

in Alaska affiliated with NPR counted downlinks as part of their capitalized equipment.

The legislature also appropriated $165,000 to construct a satellite uplink for distribution

of programming from APRN – the first uplink in the public radio satellite system owned

and operated by an agency other than National Public Radio. At the time, the president

of the board of APRN was Bruce Theriault.

dcvii

Though NFCB could depend on the Alaska members to pay their annual dues in a

timely manner, financial pressures on stations elsewhere, combined with reductions or

termination of CETA and other government programs and more competition for private

207

funding, meant financial difficulties for the NFCB. Over the years, the Federation had

accumulated a rolling deficit of $28,000 in unpaid salaries owed to current and former

staff members. In 1981, expenses associated with the move of the Program Service from

Champaign, relocation to new offices in Washington, renovations of the new space, and

the “budget assault on public broadcasting” added $18,000 to the deficit.

dcviii

New grants

from the Benton Foundation to explore alternative financing for community radio

($15,000), the NEA for the Program Service ($20,000), and CPB for a second minority

producers conference ($20,000) kept day-to-day operations in the black, as the company

borrowed against the grants to meet present expenses, including interest payments on the

debt.

dcix

Melt down

With all sectors of public broadcasting feeling the pressure from Congress and the

Reagan administration to perform more efficiently and effectively, agencies across the

system started to cooperate in new ways. For years, CPB had awarded 100% of its radio

programming funds to NPR. In turn, NPR limited access to its programming to NPR

members, with very few exceptions. Arguing that programs produced and distributed

with the support of public funds should be available to all CPB-supported stations

regardless of network affiliation, in January 1982 NFCB and CPB convinced NPR to

establish new policies making all programs available to all stations, at least on some

limited basis.

dcx

Looking ahead to the reduced funding mandated for 1984, CPB adopted

recommendations from NFCB and NPR to equalize the impact of budget cuts on local

stations by splitting future CSG funds between guaranteed base grants and smaller,

208

graduated incentive grants. In response to a “chorus of objections from stations outside

the CPB system” and independent producers, CPB also agreed to open its training grant

programs to all public broadcasters, regardless of CPB qualification status.

dcxi

Over at

PTFP, NFCB members received more than $1.2 million for facilities planning and

construction for FY 82, including funds to build a 100,000 watt station at Pine Ridge,

South Dakota on the Lakota reservation to provide broadcast services to one of the most

impoverished areas of the U.S.

dcxii

PTFP awarded another $853,000 to NFCB stations in

FY1984.

dcxiii

The situation was very different from the circumstances that brought NFCB to

Washington in 1975. At its founding, most members of the Federation shared Milam’s

view that the agencies in the “public broadcasting system” were adversarial to the

interests of community broadcasting. Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford, joined more

recently by Nan Rubin and Dave Taylor, had worked steadily to change these

relationships, developing key allies inside the system, including Clyde Robinson and

Wayne Roth at CPB, Richard Harland and Mary Dinota at PTFP, and Mike Starling at

NPR Satellite Services. Bringing more than 40 years of combined experience to the

processes of advocacy and negotiation, Thomas, Clifford, Rubin, and Taylor provided

NFCB with a coordinated, effective presence before the principal agencies of public

broadcasting. In spite of the progress, however, some of the major issues that prompted

the founding of the NFCB remained unresolved. CPB’s qualifying criteria (5 full time

staff and an annual budget of $130,000 in nonfederal revenues for FY84) still put the

CSG program out of reach of many NFCB members.

dcxiv

The CSG criteria were a

209

particular hardship for the rural and minority controlled stations that served smaller, less

affluent, and geographically and socially isolated audiences. NPR continued to receive

nearly 100% of CPB funds for public radio programming. NPR managed the satellite

distribution system for the benefit of the network’s CPB-supported member stations.

NPR’s new program access policy still gave NPR members territorial exclusivity for

NPR programs – unless the nonmember seeking access was also supported by the CSG

program. While the new policy addressed the issue of “double payment” from public

stations and CPB for NPR programming, it was “not an adequate solution,” according to

Thomas. “NPR is clearly exploiting its role as the major program producer for public

radio to protect its role as a membership organization.” Thomas saw no reason that

nonmember stations, “who already bear the cost of program distribution through satellite

use fees, should be treated in a different fashion.”

dcxv

Under President Frank Mankiewicz, NPR undertook a series of entrepreneurial

initiatives designed to end the company’s dependence on the federally-appropriated funds

that had come under fire from the Reagan administration. Under the banner “Project

Independence,” Mankiewicz established a variety of fundraising ventures, including a

plan to sell “shares” in NPR programs for $250,000 to companies and corporations, in

return for regular on-air acknowledgements. On the programming side, Mankiewicz

established NPR Plus, a second service consisting of classical music, jazz, and hourly

newscasts planned for 150 to 200 members. Concurrently, the company proposed a for-

profit subsidiary, NPR Ventures, to exploit the unused channel capacity of the satellite

system for services such as paging, high-speed data transmission, and commercial

210

program services such as Muzak. Confident in the success of these ventures,

Mankiewicz boldly asked CPB to reduce its annual support of NPR and make the money

available to stations. Though Mankiewicz and NPR Executive Vice President Tom

Warnock were bullish on Project Independence, some members of the NPR board

remained skeptical and urged caution in the current climate of reduced federal support.

According to McCauley, “Mankiewicz generally brushed these comments aside.”

dcxvi

But it was clear to the staff at NPR that the company was spending money faster than it

could be raised. New equipment was billed to NPR Plus. The network issued credit

cards to reporters and producers, even as it had trouble getting payroll checks to overseas

correspondents.

dcxvii

The wheels came off in the spring of 1983. Initially, Mankiewicz told the NPR

board the company would fall $2.8 million short of the budget for the current fiscal

year.

dcxviii

Less than two months later, the deficit ballooned to $6 million, more than 20%

of the total operating budget. Mankiewicz and Warnock resigned. Member stations

refused a request from the Board to contribute $1.5 million to a fund to bail out the

network and at least one of its two flagship programs, Morning Edition and All Things

Considered. Instead, the station representatives voted unanimously to tell NPR “that the

two news magazines were to be placed ahead of all other programs.” CPB President

Edward Pfister expressed concern, but withheld judgement on the best course of action

until more information was forthcoming from NPR. The board turned to Ron Bornstein,

chief executive of WHA, to guide the company back to stability.

dcxix

211

On the surface, it was easy for the members of NFCB to dismiss the NPR debt

crisis as the ultimate consequence for the network’s culture of arrogance. “Behind the

scenes, we were all kind of, yuck yuck, har har, you have $20 million and go under.

They’re wasting money on this, that, and the other thing,” recalled Dave Taylor.

dcxx

“But

in reality, we all recognized that and discussed that NPR actually going under would be a

terrible thing for all of us, even though we were the poor sister competitor, in some ways.

We didn’t want NPR to go away. That would have been a disaster.”

dcxxi

The crisis was

particularly obvious to the employees of the NFCB staff, who had developed some good

relationships with people at NPR. NPR also represented the single biggest investment in

the public radio system: CPB and PTFP had invested millions of dollars in the

nationwide satellite system that was less than three years old, consisting of the control

center in Washington, D.C., nearly a dozen uplinks scattered across the country, and

scores of downlinks at the participating stations. Taylor observed, “Distribution was

recognized to be a benefit to the entire system, NPR members and nonmembers alike.

They needed more than just the NPR membership to make a go of it and to justify getting

continued funding for it.”

dcxxii

If NPR went under, some other agency would have to

manage the system.

The debt crisis had a direct impact on all of the NFCB members affiliated with

NPR. All of the Alaska stations belonged to NPR, operated downlinks, and paid

substantial dues to the NFCB. All of the Pacifica stations were interconnected through

the satellite. Tiny stations like KVNF in Paonia, Colorado, and other remote corners of

the country relied on the satellite to provide NPR programming under the network’s

212

revised distribution policy. Even stations that weren’t part of the public radio “system”

were beginning to turn to interconnected NPR stations for handoffs of programs not

broadcast on NPR, including those distributed on the satellite by the NFCB Program

Service.

In the debt crisis, Thomas saw the opportunity to reconstruct the national program

service in a manner to benefit the members of the NFCB. Within days of the issue’s

emergence, Thomas proposed the “creation of a program marketplace,” placing the

stations at the front line of the public radio system. Thomas proposed to balance the

“three-sided equation” among “NPR, Station and independent producers, and stations as

consumers of programs – all competing for limited federal dollars.”

dcxxiii

In such a

marketplace, Thomas foresaw the end of NPR’s near monopoly on CPB program

production funds, leading to more opportunities for producers and more diversity in the

programming available to the system. Finally, Thomas urged NPR to focus on the needs

and interests of its member stations, rather than “the corporate requirements of the largest

single entity in public radio.”

dcxxiv

Thomas’ insights offered a pathway to Rich McClear,

Bruce Theriault, and the other NFCB/NPR members as they worked through the

resolution of the network’s problems.

Closer to home, NFCB was undergoing its own financial crisis. In background

papers to the Steering Committee distributed in January 1983, Thomas revealed the scope

of the Federation’s rolling deficit.

dcxxv

Another document outlined continuing issues at

the Program Service, which had simultaneously become much larger, thanks to the

continuing support of the NEA, but continued to struggle to find a sustaining market.

213

The Sound Choice program series, intended to be “the lead marketing vehicle” for the

Program Service, had been “a bust. Sales have been generally dismal.”

dcxxvi

Thomas

proposed either a pullback to a modest core service, an expansion financed by not-yet-

identified resources, or the elimination of the tape service and efforts to undertake “the

fastest route to interconnection for NFCB members without satellite access.”

dcxxvii

In the

midst of these and other revenue-related concerns, Thomas warned the Steering

Committee of signs that current salary levels for NFCB staff were inadequate. “At least

half of the staff is now ‘moonlighting’ to make ends meet,” reported Thomas, though he

provided no additional information in writing about these outside activities.

dcxxviii

In response, the Steering Committee directed Thomas to undertake measures

intended to improve the Federation’s financial position. One of the three positions in the

Program Service was eliminated.

dcxxix

Committee members recommended reducing

Clifford’s position as Vice President to 40%, and limiting her duties to finance and

fundraising. But the Committee recommended other actions in spite of NFCB’s financial

condition, to upgrade the Newsletter, gain outside funding for a new edition of the Legal

Handbook, to continue current representation and advocacy activities and identify outside

funding for a new Director of National Affairs. Other recommendations were equally

optimistic, to increase attendance at the NFCB conference by 50% (with a collateral

increase in revenue from the event), provide salary increases for Thomas, Clifford, and

Taylor, add a full-time Development/Promotion Director and a half-time administrative

assistant, and by the way, “target reduction of the deficit by at least $10,000.”

dcxxx

The

214

following pages included budget projections of $232,050 in expenses against $222,856 in

estimated revenues.

dcxxxi

Once again, an outside funder provided the infusion of cash necessary to see

NFCB through its immediate problems. In June, the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation

awarded $50,000 to the Federation to develop long term financial strategies for

community radio stations, focusing on listener contributions, earned revenues, and

cooperative projects.

dcxxxii

More immediately, the grant allowed NFCB to book

additional revenue and erase the pending deficit for the current fiscal year. Thomas

shared the information with the members at the annual business meeting during the 1983

NFCB conference in Santa Cruz. Members of new Steering Committee, including Diane

Kaplan, Executive Director of the Alaska Public Radio Network, and Hugo Morales, who

assumed the Chairperson position, were especially pleased to receive the news. As the

year came to a close, the Federation received another grant of $75,000 from the Markle

Foundation to continue its policy work.

dcxxxiii

For NPR, the road to financial recovery would be much more complicated. In the

months after Mankiewicz’ resignation, the operating deficit grew to $9.1 million. NPR

was faced with strong opposition to any strategy to shift the bulk of the burden to its

member stations. NPR undertook negotiations with CPB, initially seeking to accelerate

the schedule of CPB funds to the network, but CPB was unwilling to entertain options

that did not include a significant restructuring of the company. In the end, CPB agreed to

supply NPR with an $8.5 million “line of credit,” to be guaranteed by portions of the

members’ CSG payments for the next three years, should NPR prove unable to repay the

215

loan on schedule. In addition, to protect some $2.3 million in facilities and equipment

against any possible future default, NPR agreed to transfer title of its satellite assets to an

independent trust controlled by majority vote of all CPB supported licensees. The new

Satellite Trust would still engage NPR to manage the Public Radio Satellite System

[PRSS], but there would be more voices at the table setting policy on program funding

and distribution issues. It was the first step towards Tom Thomas’ marketplace for public

radio programming.

Distinguished service

“We have been with NFCB far longer than we ever envisioned when we started,”

wrote Tom Thomas in the lead article of the NFCB Newsletter for March, 1984. “The

time has come for us to move on to other challenges and opportunities.”

dcxxxiv

In fact,

neither Tom nor Terry Clifford had a very clear idea of what would come next. For the

present, the couple was expecting their second child, and the prospect of continued

employment with the NFCB offered few encouraging indicators for their personal

financial future. “We simply can’t afford to live on what NFCB can afford to pay me,”

wrote Thomas in a memo to the Steering Committee a month earlier.

dcxxxv

Given the

centrality of their contributions to the establishment, growth, and development of the

NFCB over the previous decade, few could imagine an NFCB without Tom and Terry.

But from their perspective, the time was ripe for a move.

dcxxxvi

The Babcock and Markle

grants provided the Federation with a higher degree of financial stability than the

organization had known for some time. Though Nan Rubin had chosen to leave the

company after the Santa Cruz gathering, former Steering Committee chair Carol

216

Daugherty soon replaced her as the Director of Station Development. Early in the year,

Pat Watkins, former station manager of KOPN and more recently the executive director

of the National Federation of Local Cable Programmers in Washington D.C., came on

board as Director of Training and Outreach, joining her husband, Dave Taylor, in the

NFCB office. With Betsy Rubenstein overseeing publications, Jim Gleeson assisting

Taylor with the Program Service, and a new business manager, the company was fully

staffed. Taylor, Watkins, and Rubenstein provided solid connections to the

organization’s past.

dcxxxvii

The time had come “to hang out our shingle as Thomas and

Clifford and see what happens.”

dcxxxviii

Tom and Terry would step down September 1,

following the 1984 conference.

In the months leading up to the conference, Thomas and Clifford and the rest of

the staff kept up with business as usual. Continuing to monitor the NPR reorganization,

Thomas and Clifford “meticulously researched the various agreements and prepared

background papers for all our members.”

dcxxxix

NFCB sponsored a teleconference over

the satellite system, in which CPB Vice President David Brugger, new NPR President

Doug Bennet, and Thomas presented the positions of their organizations.

dcxl

Debt

retirement was the dominant topic at NPR’s Public Radio Conference in April, attended

by many on the NFCB staff and representatives from the Federation’s NPR affiliates.

dcxli

In April, NFCB joined other public broadcasters in support of a bill offered by

Republican Barry Goldwater to increase funding authorizations for CPB between FY87

and FY89 to $270 million. Sponsors of the bill from both parties agreed “the Reagan

Administration’s budget of $100 million for CPB is inadequate.”

dcxlii

In June, Fowler’s

217

FCC swept away requirements for radio stations to conduct formal ascertainment surveys

and maintain chronological logs of all broadcast programming,

dcxliii

while in the Senate

Oregon Republican Bob Packwood continued to push his Freedom of Expression Act

S.1917 to repeal the Fairness Doctrine. In the House, Republican Tom Tauke and

Democrat Billy Tauzin pushed a bill to eliminate the FCC’s comparative renewal

process. The bill was broadly supported by the commercial broadcasting industry.

dcxliv

Looking forward to their departure, Thomas and Clifford prepared a series of

memos to the Steering Committee, covering everything from a new statement of

organization’s mission and objectives, to management recommendations in the areas of

national affairs, station services, publications, the annual conference, and the Program

Service. In addition, he offered the final financial report for FY 83, a preliminary report

for the first quarter of FY84, and a summary of all current positions and personnel. The

report emphasized the importance of NFCB’s work “which produces immediate, tangible

results for our members and which is clearly beyond the capacity of individual stations to

take on themselves,” including influencing national policy, assistance with national

funding, and consultations in areas where local personnel lacked expertise, especially in

areas of regulation and compliance. Thanks to the recent awards from Babcock and

Markle, Thomas reported progress on reducing the working deficit, and projected a

balanced budget for the coming year. With regard to the approaching management

transition, Thomas urged the Committee to prepare for “a brief period of overlap to get

the new person going, and later as the organization pays out my accrued benefits.” For

218

comparison, Thomas offered Nan Rubin’s draw of 10 weeks salary after departure. “I

will be about the same,” he noted.

dcxlv

In another memo, Thomas outlined recommendations for the process of selecting

a new president.

dcxlvi

Following the recommendations closely, the Steering Committee

agreed to a five member search committee, including two members of the Steering

Committee: Hugo Morales, as chair of the Steering Committee would chair the search,

joined by Diane Kaplan. Committee members nominated more than a dozen people for

the final three positions, including Nan Rubin, Bill Thomas, Rich McClear, and Joan

Rubel. The final choices were left to Morales.

The 1984 NFCB conference in Washington, D.C. was the largest event staged to

date by the Federation, featuring pre-conference sessions focusing on women in

community radio programming and management, and 75 workshops covering a wide

range of topics in financial management, production, engineering, volunteer training, and

legal issues. At the annual members meeting, the members passed nine resolutions

reaffirming the Federation’s commitment to women and minorities, including one urging

CPB to adopt supplemental grants for minority-controlled stations. “Finally, the

membership overwhelmingly passed a resolution of gratitude to Terry Clifford, outgoing

Vice President, and Tom Thomas, outgoing President,” noted the minutes of August 18,

1984.

dcxlvii

In a special ceremony, David Brugger awarded the first CPB Distinguished

Service Award to Thomas and Clifford, whom he described as “the best that public

broadcasting has.”

dcxlviii

Then, on behalf of the Steering Committee and the Presidential

Search Committee, Diane Kaplan announced the selection of Carol Schatz, former

219

manager of Bethel Broadcasting in Bethel, Alaska, as the new President of the National

Federation of Community Broadcasters.

dcxlix

220

CHAPTER VIII

TRANSITION, CRISIS, AND ACCOMPLISHMENT, 1984 - 1990

With the departure of Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford, NFCB was heading into

unknown territory. Since the inception of the organization, the Steering Committee had

been able to rely on the leadership of Thomas and Clifford to guide its deliberations and

decisions. New leadership in the Washington office required a more collaborative

approach to managing the affairs and initiatives of the Federation. As the remaining

founders departed the staff to pursue other opportunities, the NFCB faced financial and

leadership crises that threatened to implode the organization. At this crossroads, key

individuals from the founding period worked with new leaders to resuscitate the

organization, ultimately achieving some of the NFCB’s most important and long-standing

policy objectives.

Once again, Alaska

By the age of 27, Diane Kaplan had already accumulated an impressive resume in

the field of public broadcasting. She gained her first experience as a producer and

program director at the University of Pennsylvania’s student managed and operated NCE

station, WXPN. After she graduated from Penn, the University elected to turn out the

students in the aftermath of a controversy over indecent program content. Hired to

coordinate the station’s marketing efforts, Kaplan became acquainted with the NFCB

when Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford visited WXPN during the transition from student

221

to professional management. In the spring of 1979, she was hired by the University of

California Berkeley as the professional manager of student station KALX, which became

an associate member of NFCB during her tenure. After staying in Berkeley for a little

more than two years, she moved to a position as a program officer for the California

Public Broadcasting Commission [CPBC]. The state equivalent of CPB, the agency

provided grants to California’s CPB-supported public radio stations, and supported

statewide efforts to develop the state’s public broadcasting capabilities.

Under the administration of the state’s progressive Democratic governor, Jerry

Brown, the CPBC provided funds for a minority fellowship program and a minority

telecommunications conference. As one of the people overseeing these efforts, Kaplan

had contact with all of the public television and radio managers in the state, including

Hugo Morales at Radio Bilingue. At the same time, some of the commissioners came

under fire for their connections to California’s emerging cable TV industry. The

commission was “much in the news” and “under attack by the legislature,” recalled

Kaplan. “There was a lot of money” associated with the development of the cable

industry, and “the commission got in the middle of it – almost a scandal around

commissioners who had cable interests trying to influence a report that the commission

did. Things got pretty tense at the commission between the staff, the commissioners, and

the legislature, and the governor’s office.”

dcl

For Kaplan and others on the staff, “it was

a pretty unpleasant place to be.”

dcli

In November of 1982, conservative Republican

George Deukmejian succeeded Brown, and almost immediately proposed to eliminate

funding for the CPBC.

222

Eager for an adventure in another part of the world, Kaplan applied for jobs in

Australia and Alaska in the winter of 1983. In April, she was hired as the new Executive

Director of the APRN, with a mandate from the APRN board of directors to attract more

private funding in the Reagan era of smaller government budgets. Within a week, she

attended her first Public Radio Conference and heard about the NPR budget crisis. At

APRN, Kaplan faced a very different situation than the one at NPR: Where NPR’s

governance structure tended to isolate its board of directors from the member stations, at

APRN the board consisted entirely of Alaska station managers, including Rich McClear

and Bruce Theriault. Unlike the relationship of NPR and CPB, none of the funding for

APRN came directly from the Alaska Public Broadcasting Commission. Instead, the

Commission gave programming grants to the stations, “with the understanding that they

would pass it through to the network,” Kaplan explained.

dclii

As a result, the station

managers on the APRN board controlled all of the network’s funding at the source. To

Kaplan, the conflict of interest was obvious: “It became clear to me that in order to raise

a lot of private money, which is what they hired me to do in terms of building the system,

I needed more juice on my board than station mangers could provide. I needed public

citizens who were just into the mission, and were connected.”

dcliii

Moving strategically, Kaplan convinced the board to hire a consultant to conduct

an assessment of the APRN operation. Turning to the largest and most successful state

network in public radio, Kaplan brought in William Kling, CEO of Minnesota Public

Radio, to conduct the assessment. Since the passage of the Public Broadcasting Act,

Kling had amassed a powerful reputation as an instigator of innovation and controversy,

223

having established American Public Radio as a direct competitor to NPR. Kling’s report

to Kaplan recommended the addition of public members on the board. “Otherwise,”

remarked Kaplan, ”we could forget about raising private money.”

dcliv

The board accepted

the recommendation, opening the way for Kaplan to recruit “public citizens who were

just into the mission, and were connected” to three new seats on the board.

dclv

Kaplan moved quickly to establish ties within the spheres of private industry and

government. In her view, “there were some very obvious corporations to approach for

underwriting, because they had statewide image needs.”

dclvi

Oil industry interests were

especially eager to position themselves as public benefactors to the citizens of the state’s

rugged and pristine environment. Concurrently, she cultivated relationships with the

state’s political leaders, particularly U.S. Senator Ted Stevens, who became an outspoken

advocate for Alaska’s public radio system.

dclvii

“At the 10

anniversary of APRN, he

was the speaker,” recalled Kaplan. “He always would bring an FCC commissioner up

with him to Alaska every summer, and we would host something for them. We had a

close relationship.”

dclviii

With the support of Hugo Morales and other delegates, Kaplan was elected to the

NFCB Steering Committee in July of 1983. Other members elected during the Santa

Cruz conference included Barbara Day from WBAI/Pacifica Radio in New York;

Quentin Hope, who had worked closely with Thomas and Clifford to start a 100,000 watt,

CPB-supported, rural service to southwestern Kansas; and Bill Thomas, now station

manager and program director of WEFT in Champaign, Illinois. The delegates re-elected

Morales to a second term as chairperson. To this group came the responsibility to guide

224

NFCB as it transitioned from the founding leadership of Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford

to new leadership and new challenges. One of those challenges was attracting qualified

candidates for Executive Director position. Morales, Kaplan, and the other members of

the search committee knew “it was very difficult work for very little pay.”

dclix

Through APRN, Kaplan had contact with all of the station managers in the Alaska

system. In the village of Bethel, radio station KYUK served a community of 3500,

consisting primarily of Native Yup’ik Eskimos. Located 600 miles west of Anchorage

and accessible only by air, Bethel was the hub for the Native population spread out across

the remote stretches of the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta. Owned and operated by Bethel

Broadcasting, a local, Native-controlled nonprofit agency, KYUK AM and KYUK TV

provided the only local news services for the region. KYUK TV offered instructional

programming from the local community college and news in English, while KYUK

programmed classical music, local public affairs programs on public health and fisheries

issues, interviews with tribal elders, and news in Yu’pik. Volunteers from the college

read the news on television, and hosted the music programs on radio.

dclx

One of the

college employees who began volunteering at KYUK in 1976 was a transplanted New

Yorker, Carol Schatz.

Schatz was an educator and administrator by profession, not a broadcaster.

Nevertheless, when the general manager position opened at KYUK in 1978, she applied

and won the job on the strength of her management experience. Over the next seven

years, she oversaw a series of significant developments at KYUK TV and radio. In the

first year, she ended a three year operating deficit. With the operation back on a firm

225

financial footing, she oversaw interconnection to the public radio satellite, affiliation with

NPR and APRN, and increases of 150% in the operating and capital budgets over her

five-year term. During her final two years, she served on the long-range planning

committee of the APBC.

dclxi

During her stay in Bethel, she had contact with Kaplan,

McClear, and Theriault through the APRN, but was generally unaware of the NFCB and

the organization’s efforts to reach out to Native stations. “There was a real difference

between the stations in communities like Sitka and Ketchikan, that were largely white,”

she recalled, “and some of the stations like Bethel and Kotzebue that were serving largely

Native Alaskan populations.”

dclxii

She left Alaska in 1983 to travel, thinking she might

eventually look for employment in an area closer to her family in New York.

In the summer of 1984, Schatz received a phone call from Kaplan, asking if she

might be interested in the Executive Director position with NFCB. Schatz’ reputation as

someone who could turn an organization around financially seemed like a good match for

an organization that needed to address its ongoing deficit issues and continue to attract

major donors. Invited to Washington for an interview, the Steering Committee was

impressed by her service as the manager of a minority-controlled public broadcasting

agency, and her track record as “a skillful diplomat, and outstanding administrator, and a

terrific organizer.”

dclxiii

The Committee recommended that she become the second

President of the NFCB, and the selection was confirmed by acclamation of the

membership at the annual business meeting on August 15, 1984.

dclxiv

For her part, Schatz

was pleased to find employment closer to her family on the East Coast, and was

impressed with the organization’s strong commitment to the current member stations. “I

226

had the sense that it was a close knit group of people who knew each other, and weren’t

necessarily reaching out to the community as a whole,” she observed.

dclxv

Under (not so) new management

“We have a dedicated staff with experience and expertise and a Steering

Committee which also provides some continuity from the former administration,” wrote

Schatz in her first Newsletter editorial.

dclxvi

Sensitive to the significance of the biggest

transition in the organization’s history, she pledged to focus on internal review and

planning processes, and meeting the current needs of members. Though he was no longer

an employee, Tom Thomas continued to appear in the office. “At my first staff meeting,

Tom was there and he opened it. I thought, ‘this is interesting. Is he still the president, or

am I?’ He just came. He was so connected to it.”

dclxvii

Though he and Clifford were no

longer physically present most of the time, Schatz could sense the staff’s continuing

loyalty to Thomas. “I knew the transition would be difficult for everybody,” she

reflected. “This was a new organization where I didn’t know anybody. Some of the

people had worked for [Tom], and admired him tremendously, and were not necessarily

ready to let go. We were looking at things differently.”

dclxviii

In her first month on the job, Schatz and the NFCB got good news from Capitol

Hill, when Congress passed and President Reagan signed an omnibus emergency

appropriations bill primarily intended to finance national defense initiatives.

dclxix

Tacked

on to the bill were supplementary appropriations to CPB for FY84 and FY85, restoring a

portion of the funds previously cut by the administration. The CPB Board allocated all of

the FY84 funds to the CSG program. On average, CPB-supported stations saw an

227

increase of $6,407, or 9%, in their CSG payments in October. About $750,000 of these

funds went to NFCB stations. With regard to the FY85 funds, NFCB joined a coalition

of 15 NPR stations in a recommendation to allocate the full amount of $4.6 million to

stations, but NPR management asked CPB provide $958,000 directly to NPR to cover

increased costs in news and administration.

dclxx

In a departure from past history, the CPB

Board elected not to fund the NPR request, choosing instead to create an independent

$1.3 million radio program fund, to be managed directly by CPB. For the first time,

funds for national programming initiatives would not pass through NPR, but would be

available directly to producers.

dclxxi

CPB’s decision to create the Program Fund was indicative of a larger shift in the

balance of power in the public radio system, from NPR to the stations. In the aftermath

of the debt crisis, member stations demanded more accountability from NPR for the

millions of dollars paid in station dues and program fees. With more seats on the

reorganized NPR Board, station managers called on the network to develop a new

business plan that would give stations more flexibility to acquire, program, and pay for

NPR programs. Concurrently, CPB wanted more accountability for the millions of dollars

the agency paid out to support national programming. With the assets of the satellite

system transferred to a trust under the direction of people inside and outside NPR, CPB’s

next logical step was to redirect funding away from the network, and toward stations and

independent producers. The Radio Program Fund represented the first gesture in this new

direction for the public radio system.

228

On other fronts, the news for NFCB was not so good. In October, President

Reagan for the second time vetoed the Goldwater bill to increase the CPB funding

authorization for FY1987-89.

dclxxii

Though Reagan later signed the Labor, Health, and

Human Services Appropriations Act, providing a $200 million appropriation to CPB for

FY87, the impasse over the authorization cast a shadow over the long-term funding for

the agency. Without the forward funding provided in the authorization, CPB continued

to be exposed to the volatility of the appropriations process, where political

disagreements over fairness and balance in public broadcasting carried over frequently in

the debate over annual funding. For now, public broadcasters could only be satisfied that

funding was scheduled to return to a level not seen since 1982.

dclxxiii

Closer to home, NFCB was experiencing significant financial problems. Schatz

was surprised when she had to struggle to meet the payroll. In her first weeks, she

quickly realized, “Here was an organization that was trying to do so many different

things – the training, the membership services, consultation with people, the extensive

newsletter, publishing books, and then the representation. But they had hardly any

money.”

dclxxiv

Member stations were behind on their dues, or didn’t pay at all, but still

received services. Though some members of the Steering Committee were astute about

budgets, the leadership had relied on Thomas and Clifford for financial information for

years. Lacking their guidance, the ambiguities, rules, restrictions, and intricacies

associated with NFCB’s many funding sources were troublesome for Schatz. The

company regularly “borrowed” from grant funds to cover routine expenses not associated

with the specific projects. As they prepared to leave NFCB, Thomas and Clifford drew

229

thousands of dollars in back salary and benefit payments owed to them from the previous

nine years, converting a portion of the organization’s long-term paper deficit into an

immediate cash shortage.

dclxxv

A second year of funding from the Babcock Foundation

provided $40,000 to shore up the finances, but the situation remained precarious.

dclxxvi

Channel 6, and a new plan for public radio

In the closing days of 1984, the FCC imposed a freeze on all applications for new

NCE stations, modifications, and construction permits. Two months earlier, the

commission released new rules designed to address the interference caused by some NCE

FM stations, operating between 88.1 and 89.1 mHz, on the reception of TV stations in the

same vicinity operating on channel 6, between 82 and 88 mHz. Public radio interests,

represented by CPB, NPR, and NFCB, filed a joint petition for reconsideration, arguing

that the new rules restricted the “growth and expansion of public radio by precluding

some public stations from making changes in operation necessary to provide effective

service and others from obtaining sufficient coverage areas to make operations viable.”

dclxxvii

The television interests, represented by the National Association of Broadcasters,

the Association for Maximum Service Television, and several licensee groups, filed their

own joint petition, arguing the recommended FM power levels “allow far more

interference to TV-6 reception than the Commission assumed and take no account of the

number of TV-6 viewers who would be affected.”

dclxxviii

Caught between the opposing

parties, the commission chose to freeze all NCE FM and TV-6 applications until the

situation could be sorted out.

230

While the freeze presented a setback to all NCE interests seeking to establish or

improve their service, the commission’s action put some community radio stations in

double jeopardy. Ordinarily, PTFP required applicants to file necessary applications with

the FCC before the agency would consider any projects to build or improve transmission

facilities. Now, with commission staff estimating the freeze could be in place for up to

six months, it would not be possible to file applications with the FCC in time to meet the

PTFP deadline.

dclxxix

For the undercapitalized stations in the NFCB, any interruptions in

the PTFP program could devastate plans to reach new audiences, or replace aging and

obsolete equipment.

Taking the lead on discussions with the FCC, CPB, and NPR, Pat Watkins was

surprised that the other agencies were not aware of the potential impact of the proposed

regulations. “Frankly, I don’t think any of the people at NPR or CPB realized what it

meant when the first draft of what the FCC came out with was going to mean to radio,”

recalled Watkins. “As soon as I got it, I started playing with the numbers, and I knew

enough engineering to throw a major fit. When NPR and CPB realized that we were

going to fight it – we dragged them into it.”

dclxxx

Working with consulting engineer Doug

Vernier, Watkins estimated that 96% of current NFCB members would be affected by the

new rules, and 35% would be forced off the air unless the FCC agreed to provide those

stations with “grandfathered” status, creating exceptions for existing transmission

systems. Twenty-three percent of the Federation’s minority controlled stations would

have to reduce power by half. Forty-seven percent would be forced off the air. Citing

231

these and other statistics and adverse consequences of the new rules, NFCB filed a

petition for reconsideration with the FCC.

dclxxxi

Even as Watkins worked on the FCC petition, NPR unveiled the first draft of the

new business plan, recommending that “all money which Congress appropriates available

for public radio in FY 1987 and thereafter under the Public Broadcasting Act should go

to licensees and permittees of public radio stations as defined by the Act.”

dclxxxii

In the

past, CPB allocated funds directly to NPR for the production and distribution of national

programming. Under the new proposal, those funds would go to stations, to spend

among any of the vendors in the marketplace of public radio programming, including

NPR, NFCB, Pacifica, and American Public Radio. Alternatively, stations would be free

to pool their resources to create new regional services, leading to “a dramatically altered

program marketplace.”

dclxxxiii

In addition, the business plan proposed to separate NPR

program fees from NPR membership fees. For the first time, an NPR member would pay

one fee to cover NPR programming, representation, development, legal, and corporate

costs. A separate NPR membership fee would be calculated as a percentage of its annual

revenue, just as the NFCB calculated its membership fee. The plan had many

implications for the NFCB: The federal money passing through the hands of the

Federation’s NPR member stations could be used to support new programming ventures,

including the sorts of collaborations between NFCB stations and independent producers

that could be facilitated by the NFCB. With budgets increased by the infusion of federal

funds, dues income from the NFCB/NPR stations would rise. On the other hand, NPR’s

intention to focus on member representation might supplant the need for NFCB to

232

advocate on behalf of its largest stations. Whatever the outcome, the business plan

promised to materially alter the landscape of “the system.” From Dave Taylor’s

perspective, the proposal assured that “it will certainly make this an interesting year in

public radio.”

dclxxxiv

At the CPB Board meeting in April, Schatz voiced the concern of NFCB members

that the business plan would not satisfactorily address the needs for minority and other

specialized audience programming and independent production met by the radio program

fund. In response, CPB added an exception to its general support of the business plan:

Along the lines of the model established by the program fund, CPB intended to continue

to withhold some funds from the public radio system to support the development of

specific programs and initiatives. Schatz also questioned NPR’s practice of “bundling”

its membership and programming fees, which forced NPR members to purchase the

entire schedule of NPR programs, rather than choosing from a menu of individual

programs or program packages.

dclxxxv

At a meeting in May, the NPR Board agreed to

modify the business plan to charge a membership fee for representation and other non-

programming services, and a separate programming fee to cover the costs of

programming services. Without making any commitments, the board also promised to

“keep ‘an open mind’ on unbundling the various program services.”

dclxxxvi

The final

business plan, approved by NPR members at the 1985 Public Radio Conference, included

amendments proposed by the Station Resource Group [SRG], a new agency representing

some of the largest stations in the public radio system. The coalition formed in the

aftermath of the FY84 supplemental appropriation, when this select group of stations and

233

licensees, including KUOW Seattle, WHA Madison, and Minnesota Public Radio, hired

two consultants to assist them with planning for the future of public radio funding. Those

consultants were Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford, now President and Vice President of

the SRG.

dclxxxvii

As the NFCB prepared to return to Madison on the 10

anniversary of NARK 1,

the FCC agreed to accept proposed rule changes on potential FM interference with TV-6

reception offered by NFCB with the support of CPB and NPR, and worked out in

negotiations with the representative of channel 6 interests. While the changes still

offered protection for channel 6, the NFCB proposal based the rules on the actual

population under the conflicting signals, rather than a flat mileage allowance, benefiting

“a number of rural stations for which a geographical limit to interference would be more

stringent than a population limit.”

dclxxxviii

In addition, existing stations would be

grandfathered in unless their proposed changes would increase predicted interference.

The commission agreed to lift the freeze on NCE applications as soon as the new rules

were issued. At the urging of NFCB, PTFP urged the FCC to expedite the rules so the

facilities program could move ahead on grant proposals.

dclxxxix

For Schatz, the decision

was “a big deal, not just for the organization, but for many public radio stations around

the country. For a small organization like NFCB to have aligned ourselves with NPR – I

think we really pushed NPR. It was significant to get the FCC to make policy based on

something that was negotiated in part by NFCB and these other organizations.”

dcxc

The outcome of the channel 6 issue provided a demonstration of the NFCB’s role

as a significant player in noncommercial broadcasting policy. A combination of

234

expertise, independence, and agility had allowed the staff in the Washington office to

craft a solution that served the interests of noncommercial broadcasters, and also

provided the FCC with a rationale to assert its authority over the increasingly audacious

commercial sector. Concurrently, developments at NPR demonstrated that some the

Federation’s approaches to governance and finance were beginning to take root in the

larger public radio system, as the talents and ideas of the organization’s founders were

suffused across more stations and agencies. At its tenth anniversary, the NFCB was

making a difference.

Part of the system

When NFCB gathered in Madison for its tenth conference, it was a vastly

different organization that the one born at the 1

National Alternative Radio Conference.

The Federation now had 65 participant members in 32 states. The membership included

all 5 Pacifica licensees. Eleven NFCB stations were located in California, 8 in Alaska,

and 7 in Colorado. Six were licensed to Latino organizations, and 6 to Native agencies.

More than 25 qualified for Community Service Grants and other support from CPB.

More than a dozen, including all the Alaska stations, were members of NPR. Over the

past decade, the NFCB had made substantial progress on its goals to grow and diversify

the membership, and develop additional resources for community radio.

dcxci

Welcoming

attendees to the 1985 NFCB National Conference, Schatz urged the attendees to come

together to “celebrate our victories and to figure out how to overcome our setbacks.”

dcxcii

The biggest setback remained the state of the company finances. To address the

ongoing cash shortage, Schatz adopted a “bare-bones budget,” looking for any

235

opportunity to cut expenses or raise revenue.

dcxciii

When employees chose to leave,

Schatz eliminated the positions of Director of Station Development (Carol Daugherty)

and Director of Publications (Betsy Rubenstein), reducing the staff to 6.

dcxciv

The

Steering Committee increased the minimum annual dues payment, adopted penalties for

late dues payments, and empowered Schatz to suspend services to those members more

than one year behind in their payments. Past due salaries owed to previous employees

were transferred from operating expenses to a long-term debt repayment note. The size

of the Steering Committee was reduced from 9 to 7, in part to reduce costs associated

with meetings. Contrary to the concerns of Committee members, Schatz elected to forego

a proposed Development Director position. When asked how fundraising projects would

be accomplished, Schatz responded that some activities would be spread among the

remaining staff, “and that she was considering trying to plug into groups like the

Development Exchange (a spin-off of CPB) for some station services and hiring on a

project-by-project basis for things like grantwriting.”

dcxcv

Schatz urged the Steering

Committee to consider moving some NFCB services to a fee-based model.

As Schatz approached her first anniversary as the President of the NFCB, the

culture of the organization was changing. The organization had grown up around

Thomas and Clifford, and shaped to their manner of doing business. Schatz took a more

traditional approach to management. “She didn’t have that gritty rootiness” that

characterized the counterculture elements of community radio, according to Dave Taylor.

“She cut all us gritty, rooty people a lot of slack. But that’s not how she came to it. I

think Tom and Terry, in urging her hire, they wanted somebody with a more stable,

236

institutional background.”

dcxcvi

Policy and planning became a focus for the entire staff.

The affairs of the NFCB became increasingly intertwined with those of the larger public

radio system. Taylor served on the advisory panel for the satellite system, and developed

strong contacts within NPR. Pat Watkins focused on the legal, regulatory and technical

matters relevant to the FCC and PTFP. The Program Service continued, but the market

for programs on tape was slowly disappearing. Taylor “always wanted [the Program

Service] it to pay its own way, and earn its keep. It came close a couple of years, but it

never really did. Our greatest hits would sell 50 copies. It was a dying medium for

distribution.”

dcxcvii

By March of 1986, Taylor left to become the Director of Policy and

Planning at NPR.

dcxcviii

Through the winter and spring of 1986, CPB took the formal steps necessary to

shift its programming funds away from NPR and toward individual stations and

independent producers. In creating the National Program Production and Acquisition

Grant [NPPAG] in January, CPB provided each qualified station with funds to purchase

programs in the emerging public radio marketplace, from NPR, APR, or any other

program provider.

dcxcix

The following May, the CPB Board approved a plan to close

down its Satellite Program Development Fund [SPDF], administered since the program’s

inception in 1980 by NPR, and replace it with the $3.15 million Radio Program Fund, to

be administered directly by CPB.

dcc

The decisions were based, in part, on the

information contained in a study of the radio program marketplace conducted in the fall

of 1985 by Thomas and Clifford, under contract to CPB.

dcci

Schatz attempted to

capitalize on the dynamic atmosphere to reiterate one of the NFCB’s establishing goals,

237

urging CPB to broaden the eligibility criteria for CSG grants to “encompass those

stations which provide the only public radio service to an area,” and to “those stations

controlled or operated by minorities and women.”

dccii

Schatz’ recommendations were not

considered.

With Taylor gone to NPR, the regular NFCB staff was reduced to five.

dcciii

While

the open position freed up additional cash to cover operating expenses, Taylor’s

responsibilities for program and member services could not be absorbed by Schatz,

Watkins, Publications Director Kathy Anderson, and the remaining clerical staff. Casting

about for likely candidates, Watkins and others contacted Bill Thomas about the

possibility of relocating to Washington and returning to NFCB. As it happened, Thomas

was interested in making a professional change from WEFT, and a personal interest in

moving from Champaign to a larger city, to accommodate the professional ambitions of

his partner. As NFCB prepared for its 1986 conference in Bellingham, Washington,

Thomas accepted the position of Director of Member Services.

dcciv

At Bellingham, Schatz tried to reposition the NFCB conference to have a broader

appeal to the public radio system. NPR’s Public Radio Conference [“the PRC”] tended

to focus on the needs of the managers and policymakers in the NPR network. In

response, Schatz recast the NFCB event as “NFCB’s Public Radio Training Conference,”

offering “complete tracks in programming, production, management, fundraising, and

engineering.”

dccv

The event included the Federation’s first RF [Radio Frequency]

Training Seminar, funded by a training grant from CPB.

dccvi

Dave Taylor came in his

new capacity from NPR, as did Marcia Alvar, program director for Seattle NPR affiliate

238

KUOW, and an outspoken advocate of the use of Arbitron ratings and other forms of

audience research in public radio. As part of a panel provocatively titled “Increasing the

audience: Selling your soul?” Alvar discussed the objective of NPR’s Audience Building

Task Force to double the size of the public radio audience in the coming 5 years, and

chastised community stations for prioritizing the values of and desires of their managers,

producers, and volunteers over the needs and interests of their listeners and

communities.

dccvii

At the annual members meeting, the delegates scheduled a future vote

on the recommendation of Schatz and the Steering Committee to transform the committee

into a Board of Directors, and transfer oversight responsibilities from the body of

delegates as a whole to the new board. Asserting that the Federation had become too

large to be governed directly by the members, the Steering Committee argued

successfully that the new structure would provide a smaller governing body to act in a

more timely manner on issues of Federation policy and finance. The members re-elected

Hugo Morales and Diane Kaplan to the Steering Committee, along with Rich McClear

and a relative newcomer to the NFCB, WORT manager David LePage.

dccviii

Meeting in San Francisco in October, the committee set down to the serious

business of prioritizing NFCB’s activities and services. In spite of Schatz’ efforts, the

company continued to hemorrhage money. Members owed tens of thousands of dollars

in back dues. Though NEA pledged $20,000 to support the Program Service, CPB turned

down Schatz’ proposal to hire NFCB to do station advisory work. With competition for

private funding intensified after years of Reagan administration cuts in arts and cultural

programs, grants of the sort Tom Thomas had gathered from private foundations had

239

dried up. A survey of the members showed that most stations depended on the NFCB for

representation, information, and technical assistance. The board doubted that there was

enough money in the budget to provide other services. Bill Thomas suggested the

Program Service might be merged with the Pacifica Program Service, located at the

Pacifica Archive in Los Angeles.

dccix

Rich McClear concurred, though it was very hard

to let go of one of the founding purposes of the NFCB. The Program Service “had been

part of our signature, he reflected, but “we simply didn’t have the resources to have two

program services in community radio.”

dccx

One event overshadowed all others in San Francisco: Carol Schatz tendered her

resignation, effective November 20, 1986. Unlike the departure of Thomas and Clifford,

Schatz’ exit was quick and understated. “Thanks to all of you for your support and

encouragement,” she wrote. “The Steering Committee is taking a realistic look at the

organization and is demonstrating that it will take the actions necessary for NFCB’s

continued development.”

dccxi

“I never totally felt a real part of it, even though I was there

two years,” recalled Schatz. “To some extent, I felt like I wasn’t a real part of this.”

dccxii

Schatz returned to Alaska to begin work on a new television project with her new partner

– Jeremy Lansman, whom she met at a barbecue at the home of Dave Taylor and Pat

Watkins.

dccxiii

With the future of the organization very much in doubt, Kaplan and McClear

urged the committee to identify an interim leader while the search went forward for a

new president. They turned to Bill Thomas, who accepted the position as acting

240

Executive Director of the NFCB. In later years, Thomas reflected that Schatz intended

for him to replace her from the moment he arrived in Washington.

dccxiv

The new team

When David LePage traveled from his native Wisconsin to his first NFCB

conference in Washington, D.C., in the summer of 1984, he was not impressed. Coming

from a background in finance and community development, LePage thought the NFCB

was too “hippie-dippie.”

dccxv

It was unbearably hot in most of the conference facilities at

Mt. Vernon College, which functioned without air conditioning. “What kind of

professional organization would put their members in these kind of conditions?

Everything was unorganized.”

dccxvi

Succeeding Joan Rubel as the station manager at

WORT, LePage was newly employed at one of the largest, most mature, and most

conflicted stations in the NFCB. On one side, the volunteers at WORT expected LePage

to undertake a catechism in the Milam-Lansman-Sex and Broadcasting approach to

community radio.

dccxvii

“It was supposed to be this huge philosophical lesson on

community access,” he recalled. In contrast, LePage’s colleagues and employees in the

office expressed a much more traditional and practical approach to running the station.

“The staff probably didn’t want me to read Sex and Broadcasting. They preferred that I

read the Arbitron ratings. There was a very strong conflict between the direction that

some of the core staff took, between the audience-driven model, versus what many of the

volunteers wanted – the mission.”

dccxviii

As a candidate for his position, LePage offered no background in mass media,

journalism, or broadcasting. Responding to an inquiry into his knowledge of radio, he

241

told the interview committee, “I know how to turn it on.”

dccxix

This lack of experience

did not concern the board of directors for Back Porch Radio, licensee of WORT. On the

contrary, LePage’s professional background in community and economic development

for nonprofit enterprises seemed to be a much better match for the needs of the station.

“WORT had great programming content, and great community support,” according to

LePage. “What they didn’t have was strength within their organizational structure, or

their long-term financing.”

dccxx

The circumstances hit home the first time LePage “met

with the bankers after being hired.”

dccxxi

The organization had purchased and renovated a

building in Madison to house the station. “By the time they were done, the value of the

building was less than the loan amount.”

dccxxii

When LePage asked the bank for an

extension, and interest-only payments, he was turned down. WORT had missed the

previous payment altogether. “A lot of the work that had to be done was organizational

development stuff, personnel stuff, and getting the finances in place.”

dccxxiii

LePage was

hired because he had the skills necessary to bring order to the financial situation at

WORT.

In conjunction with WORT development director Kay Burns, LePage worked to

bring the NFCB conference to Madison in 1985, where he occupied a prominent role as

the representative of the host station, welcoming attendees and hosting many of the

gathering’s social functions. More generally, over the course of the conference WORT

served as a showcase for some of the best practices in community radio, demonstrating

innovative programming, successful underwriting, and strong ties to local groups,

organizations, and civic institutions. At the time, the station was also going through the

242

contentious processes of selecting a program director and a news director. For LePage,

“it was a questioning of which direction the station would go, as well as where the

decision-making was going to lie.”

dccxxiv

As the manager, he consistently asserted “two

things: One, being audience driven; and that the staff and the manager were the decision-

making leads. That didn’t necessarily sit very well with a lot of people.”

dccxxv

While many managers and organizations in the NFCB experimented with

consensus approaches to management, LePage relied on a more traditional approach to

decision-making that focused less on process and more on results. He looked on WORT

as “a mission-driven business.”

dccxxvi

The station existed to serve the local community,

especially those not served by other media. At the same time, “There were huge financial

realities that had to be met. There was a building mortgage. We had to refinance the

entire station.”

dccxxvii

To continue to qualify for the CSG program, WORT maintained a

24/7 broadcast schedule, a full time staff of at least 5, and a budget of more than

$150,000.

dccxxviii

The station was also undergoing a generational change, from Rubel,

Mike O’Connor and the founders, to new leadership. Over two years, LePage filled the

staff with new employees, normalized the finances, and gradually brought the situation

under control. By the summer of 1986, “things at WORT were actually quite stable.

We’d gotten through our refinancing, so the finances were a bit more secure.”

dccxxix

Confident that WORT was on a solid footing, and encouraged by the recruitment efforts

of the NFCB staff, LePage submitted his name for consideration for the Steering

Committee at the Bellingham conference, and was subsequently elected. Soon after,

Schatz told him she was leaving the NFCB.

243

Within days of Schatz’ departure, NFCB issued a packet of memos to its

members, summarizing a series of decisions made by the Steering Committee. Kaplan

announced that Bill Thomas would act as executive director through April 1, 1987.

LePage agreed to assume the duties of Chief Executive Officer through the same date.

Former WORT business manager and CPB financial consultant Mark Fuerst agreed to

assist as needed with the Federation’s financial systems. Morales, McClear, and

committee member Maria de los Angeles Villaverde formed the core of a search

committee to identify the new president. Adding emphasis to the circumstances, the

Steering Committee took the unusual step of scheduling the next meeting of the

membership apart from the NFCB Conference. Instead, the annual meeting was called

for Tuesday, April 28 in Washington D.C., one day prior to the PRC. “If you are

planning just one out-of-town trip this year,” wrote Kaplan, “make it to Washington in

April. We will be enacting new by-laws, implementing a new organizational structure,

and adopting a long-range plan for NFCB.”

dccxxx

In the same packet, Watkins announced

that the “somewhat scaled-down” 1987 Public Radio Training Conference would take

place in Boulder, Colorado in July.

dccxxxi

A memo from Kathy Andersen asked members

to consider the NPR Audience Building Task Force Report, including recommendations

that CPB funding be tied to audience growth, and that stations “adopt the practice of

audience-based budgeting: Each expenditure should be examined in terms of dollars per

listener.”

dccxxxii

While many of the task force recommendations seemed antithetical to the

community radio tradition of serving the unserved, the report also contained language

244

that afforded opportunities for NFCB stations. Recommendations that CPB “study the

costs and benefits of a providing a formatted program service designed to serve minority

groups,” and “target $500,000 of its available funds for creation of a program to assist

local stations in audience development,” spoke directly to the needs of stations serving

rural and minority communities.

dccxxxiii

The report called for more funds to support

training “to improve the skills of local stations program directors and managers, as well

as producers and personnel.”

dccxxxiv

To the degree the it provided a basis for policy

initiatives aimed at developing and distributing more resources to all public and

community radio stations, the members of the Steering Committee and the staff

interpreted the report was a positive development for the NFCB.

As the members prepared to meet in the spring, a string of events in Washington

indicated a shift in the political climate for public broadcasting generally and the NFCB

in particular. Following the 1986 midterm elections, Democrats took control of both

houses of Congress, and designated new chairs for the subcommittees responsible for the

funding authorizations of the FCC, CPB, PTFP, and all other telecommunications

legislation. In the House of Representatives, Edward Markey of Massachusetts assumed

the chair of the Commerce Subcommittee on Telecommunications. On the Senate side,

Daniel Inouye of Hawaii became the chair of the Subcommittee on Communications.

Both men had established records as supporters of public broadcasting legislation.

Though President Reagan’s budget sought once again to reduce funding for CPB and

eliminate PTFP altogether, the makeup of the two subcommittees promised to offer a

strong challenge to the plans of the executive branch. Having overseen the broad

245

deregulation of the broadcasting industry over the previous six years, Mark Fowler

resigned as chair of the FCC.

dccxxxv

At CPB, the board approved management’s proposed

budget of $220.7 million for FY88, including $500,000 targeted at radio audience growth

(as recommended by the Audience Building Task Force), $150,000 to begin the design

phase of a new satellite system for public radio, and $600,000 to develop a series of

“minority production centers” to “help public radio stations develop better minority

programming,”

dccxxxvi

Having taken the lead in the public radio system to establish

Latino, Native, and African-American licensees, and support minority stations and

producers through the minority production and ownership conferences, NFCB was “in a

strong position to be a central resource” to CPB for developing any new minority service

strategies.

dccxxxvii

NFCB emerged from the business meeting of April 27 and 28, 1987 as a

reinvigorated organization. Hugo Morales and Diane Kaplan stepped down after four

years on the Steering Committee, receiving thanks from the members for negotiating the

Federation through two management transitions. The members approved the change in

the governance structure, transforming the Steering Committee into a Board of Directors.

Having completed his appointment as the Federation’s acting Executive Director, Bill

Thomas returned to the board in his capacity as the new director of the recently merged

NFCB/Pacifica Program Service in Los Angeles. The board also included Rich McClear,

David LePage, who was re-elected to the chair, and Marita Rivero, station manager of

Pacifica station WPFW in Washington, D.C.. The delegates established working

committees to study the issues of membership, programming, minority concerns, CPB

246

relations, NPR relations, and long range planning, and passed resolutions to increase

dues, revaluate the relationship of dues and services, assist stations to interconnect to the

satellite system, and “actively seek the role of facilitator in the establishment of” the CPB

Minority Production Centers.

dccxxxviii

A final resolution addressed the organization’s

historic objective to “push for the broadening of [the CSG] criteria in such a way that it

[sic] allows for more NFCB members to participate. Strategies could include: Separation

of NPPAGs from CSGs; a different CSG program, possibly for smaller grants that would

be open to stations not now eligible; and consideration of how the involvement of more

stations will expand public radio’s audience.”

dccxxxix

Finally, the members unanimously

elected a new president, Lynn Chadwick, to pursue these ambitious goals.

“An outlier in community radio”

dccxl

Lynn Chadwick knew how to fight uphill. Chadwick came to the American

feminist movement in her early 20s, soon after she was admitted to the University of

Virginia in 1970 as a member of the first coeducational class in the College of Arts and

Sciences. “There were 12,000 men, and 100 women,” she recalled.

dccxli

She

remembered professors who refused to discuss certain topics in class, saying “Gentlemen

we would normally have this conversation, but since there’s a woman in the class…” The

very presence of women threatened the University’s honor code, argued some faculty,

who expressed concern that “we’re going to lose the honor code because of them.”

dccxlii

Chadwick became a feminist because she “found out what it meant right in my face. I

had to go [to college] under a court order.”

dccxliii

247

Outspoken, energetic, and gregarious, she graduated from college with the intent

to become a writer of some sort, and ended up composing highway safety information for

the federal government, which “was not totally fulfilling.”

dccxliv

In her personal time, she

lived in a collective house with other young people and “joined the poetry scene in

Washington, D.C..”

dccxlv

When her boyfriend came back from the local cooperative

grocery with a 3-by-5 card advertising for “Women in radio – no experience required,”

she called the number.

dccxlvi

Of some 50 women who responded to the initial call to join

the Feminist Radio Network, Chadwick was one of four invited to join the production

collective. Years later, she asked the organizers how she had come to be chosen “out of

all those people, and I remember a woman looking at me and saying. ‘We threw the I

Ching.’”

dccxlvii

Chadwick began her career in radio by producing interviews with poets.

In addition to producing programs, the Network operated a specialized distribution

network for taped programs produced by women around the U.S. One of Chadwick’s

primary duties as a volunteer for the Network involved making copies of submitted

programs. Lacking high-speed duplicators, the programs had to be copied one at a time

in real time, forcing Chadwick to listen to the same program over and over until all the

copies were complete. Dull and repetitive as it might seem, she “learned a lot from that

experience. It was learning by doing.”

dccxlviii

The experience also taught her to

appreciate the value of the audio medium and the listening experience: “Because I was

listening to these women’s voices from all over the country, I got to know all these

women in an audio way. I just started really appreciating the value of audio. I met

248

people by audio, which is different than a photograph. You get their pacing, and the

rhythm, and the voice. It was so interesting to me.”

dccxlix

In 1979, the Feminist Radio Network received a grant from the NEA to produce

the National Conference of Women in Radio at the facilities of the 4H in Chevy Chase,

Maryland. The gathering brought together dozens of prominent women in community

radio, including Nan Rubin, Pat Watkins, and Adi Gevins from KPFA, and a handful of

men, including Bill Thomas.

dccl

For three days, Chadwick recalled, the participants

“stayed in these little bunk rooms. We had no money. It was $10/night, 4 bunks to a

barracks, where the 4H kids come to town - hardcore feminists in line in the Kellogg

dining hall with the kids. That was the first time I understood what a vegan was. It was

very exotic.”

dccli

Over the next two years, while she earned a living doing everything from

copywriting to public information to typing dissertations, Chadwick became the central

administrator in the office of the Feminist Radio Network. Though she continued to

work for the Network on a voluntary basis, the position afforded her the opportunity to

connect with producers at NPR and the National Radio Theater, and with agencies

interested in promoting noncommercial radio for social causes, including the Markle

Foundation and the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization

[UNESCO]. After attending a UNESCO conference in Puerto Rico in 1980 associated

with the United Nations Decade of Women, Chadwick decided she had to choose

between working in print or electronic media. At the time, she was working steadily for

United Features Syndicate on a variety of projects, and serving on the board of the newly

249

formed Audio Independents, an organization formed to represent the interests of

independent public radio producers. At an AI board meeting in San Francisco, she met

Leo Lee, former west coast bureau chief for NPR and founder of Western Public Radio

[WPR], a nonprofit production and training institute in San Francisco. In October 1981,

Lee hired Chadwick as the managing director of WPR, with a $1 million grant from

Markle to develop a series of events under the banner of the National Radio Training

Project. As the managing director, Chadwick served as the project’s administrator and

fiscal agent, “in charge of making sure the equipment was working right, collecting the

receipts from all the things. [Leo] knew who the talent was. I was the one who had to

lay down the law, [and] design the workshops.”

dcclii

For the next four years, Chadwick worked for Lee, managing the WPR facilities

and programs and conducting workshops and other production training events. With Lee

in his 70s, she figured that he would soon retire, and she would assume his leadership

position, but Lee had no such plans. Over time, she realized that she could best put her

talents and skills to use “on the other side of the microphone,” in management and

teaching. Her income from WPR was not really sufficient to pay her living expenses in

San Francisco, as well. In the spring of 1984, she submitted an application to replace

Tom Thomas as the President of the NFCB, but was passed over in favor of Carol Schatz.

She decided instead to pursue a master’s degree, and began researching graduate

programs in California. At the University of California at Berkeley she discovered a

program in public policy that seemed to fit her background in public media and nonprofit

management. Though she had been out of school for 12 years, Chadwick applied,

250

submitting some of her radio documentaries as part of her portfolio. To her surprise, she

was admitted to the School of Public Policy in the fall of 1985.

dccliii

Ironically, Chadwick’s career in graduate school paralleled Schatz’ time at the

NFCB. As Schatz prepared to resign from the President’s position, Chadwick was

undertaking an internship at the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment [OTA]

in Washington, D.C., where she remained “blissfully ignorant of what was happening in

community radio.”

dccliv

She left Washington to complete her degree in Berkeley, and

returned to search for a job in the winter of 1987. On a visit to the NFCB, Pat Watkins

and Bill Thomas recruited her to apply for position of President. She continued to look

for other jobs in the Bay Area and Washington, including a position at OTA, when Bill

Thomas called to offer her the NFCB post. Both Leo Lee and her former supervisor at

OTA urged her to accept. Though she had misgivings about the salary, Chadwick

accepted the offer from the Federation, just prior to the Boulder conference.

Under new management

In her first official communication to the members, included in the program for

the 1987 conference, Chadwick expressed confidence in the organization and the

importance of its place in the field of public policy, as an advisor to NPR and PTFP, and

CPB. As a case in point, Chadwick announced that CPB had engaged the NFCB as a

primary contractor for the Minority Production Centers initiative. Like her predecessor,

she acknowledged that the organization could not “do all the activities we would like to

do,” but saw potential for growth in recruiting new participant members from the ranks of

current associates.

dcclv

By the time of the conference, Chadwick had already traveled to

251

San Francisco, Denver, New York, and Jackson, Mississippi, to attend meetings with

CPB program officers Augustine Dempsey and Lourdes Santiago and representatives of

minority stations. Unlike Schatz, Chadwick seemed to thrive on opportunities to go out

in the field and meet with managers and others in the NFCB and the broader public radio

system.

dcclvi

Chadwick was equally quick to advocate with the key public broadcasting

agencies, drafting budget recommendations to the CPB calling for increased money for

training, programming, audience research, and “new tiers of CSGs” appropriate for our

stations.

dcclvii

At NPR, she participated in negotiations that brought a reduction in the

satellite distribution/interconnection [DI] fee for small stations, and a 50% discount in the

first year’s fee for newly connected stations. At PTFP, she lobbied for more grants to

connect NFCB stations to the satellite.

dcclviii

When Congress returned from the summer

recess, Chadwick began lobbying for a provision in the FY1988 Budget Reconciliation

Bill to create an ongoing and dedicated source of federal funding for public broadcasting

derived from revenue from a proposed fee of 2% to 5% on the sale of commercial

broadcast licenses. To broaden the appeal of the bill, sponsoring Senators Inouye and

Ernest Hollings of South Carolina proposed in the first two years to divert a portion of the

revenue from the transfer fee to offset the legacy of federal deficits that had developed

during the Reagan years. The bill also contained a proposal to restore the FCC’s

abandoned Fairness Doctrine into law. Chadwick pushed hard to get NFCB members

directly involved in the advocacy effort, urging them to contact legislators directly to

discuss the importance of the bill for the future of community radio.

dcclix

252

Chadwick also took steps to cut expenses and raise revenues. The typeset NFCB

Newsletter was replaced by the smaller, simpler NFCB News and a series of memo

packets, all typed in the office on an IBM Selectric typewriter.

dcclx

By the end of 1987,

Publications Director Anderson left the organization. Chadwick eliminated the

position.

dcclxi

She offered a 10% discount to members who paid their 1988 dues in

advance, and imposed a $100 penalty on stations that did not return the annual dues

survey. The NEA continued its support of NFCB production training services with a

grant of $25,000.

dcclxii

When the new board of directors, still operating under the title of

the Steering Committee, met in Washington, D.C., at the end of October to consider the

long-range plan for the NFCB, Chadwick was determined to bring the financial situation

under control.

Looking back, David LePage would recall “the infamous Halloween board

meeting” of 1987 as a watershed event when “the board did some very, very strategic

decision-making” about the future of the organization. “Where are we going? Here’s

what we want to do. Here are the priorities. Here’s how much money we have. Start

sticking to the priorities.”

dcclxiii

By the time they finished with items 1 and 2 on the list,

“we had spent all the money.”

dcclxiv

Everyone agreed that advocacy and representation

before the agencies in Washington were the most important activities. There was no

money to fund anything else – conferences, new publications, on-site consultations with

members. “There was the decision,” recalled LePage. “Staff had to be laid off.

Programs had to be cut. We would focus on the priorities.”

dcclxv

Though the immediate

situation appeared bleak, Rich McClear “had a feeling that we finally had some direction.

253

I had a feeling that Lynn had some idea of where to take the organization. She had more

of a hardheaded approach. I felt good about her being there.”

dcclxvi

In November, Chadwick delivered testimony to the Senate Subcommittee on

Communications in support of the license transfer fee to recast public broadcasting as “a

national information system.” “Public broadcasting is charged with creating, distributing

and delivering the programming that commercial broadcasters ignore because it is not

marketable to advertisers,” Chadwick asserted. “Public broadcasting is in the business of

delivering entertainment, education, and news to its audience. Commercial broadcasters

are in the business of delivering their audience to advertisers.”

dcclxvii

Nevertheless, on

December 10, the full Senate voted to strip out the trust fund from the deficit reduction

bill. The vote also killed the attempt to restore the Fairness Doctrine.

dcclxviii

Operating on

the leanest of budgets, NFCB would have to find other strategies to accomplish its public

policy objectives.

Party of two

Since his election to the board, David LePage had been enjoying his work with

the NFCB more than his position at WORT. By the fall of 1987, he was ready to move

on from Madison. His strong leadership style clashed with the collectivist tendencies of

the station’s volunteers, and he was tired of the simmering conflict. The process of

separation was “not good,” he recalled. “It was a really difficult time at WORT, a

difficult time for me.”

dcclxix

He resigned without knowing exactly what he would do.

Having entered into an extremely low-profile personal relationship with Chadwick, he

decided to move to Washington, D.C., in January 1988 to get a new perspective and a

254

fresh start.

dcclxx

Within a month, Chadwick hired him to recruit new members, collect

delinquent dues, and coordinate the 1988 conference, nudging aside Pat Watkins, who

could see “things were changing.”

dcclxxi

She announced her intention to resign following

the conference in April, and work with Taylor on an application for a commercial FM

license in Missouri. To minimize costs for the Federation, the staff chose to locate the

conference in Washington. The location also provided the opportunity for members to

meet with members of Congress and representatives of CPB and PTFP.

dcclxxii

The circumstances in Washington were dynamic. Ironically, the Reagan

administration that had swept into power with a foreign policy triumph in Iran was

hamstrung in the aftermath of the Iran-Contra scheme to sell weapons to the same hostile

government, and direct the proceeds to anti-Communist insurgents in Latin America. On

March 17, Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North and Navy Rear Admiral John

Poindexter were indicted on charges of conspiracy to “defraud the United States by

illegally providing the Nicaraguan rebels with profits from the sale of American weapons

to Iran.”

dcclxxiii

With a lame duck administration fighting charges of corruption, and a

presidential election approaching in the fall, Democrats in both houses of Congress felt

more confident to flex their muscles on a host of issues, including the reauthorization of

public broadcasting. In the House, Representative Markey introduced House Resolution

4118, the Public Telecommunications Act of 1988, to authorize CPB funding through

1993.

dcclxxiv

Under the same title, Senator Inouye introduced a similar measure in the

upper chamber as Senate Bill 2114. Key provisions of both bills funded replacement of

the aging satellite system, allocation of funds to support the work of independent

255

television producers, and new financial management procedures at CPB to redirect funds

from internal administration to grant programs.

dcclxxv

Hearings on the House bill were

scheduled for April 19, just a day after the NFCB conference. PTFP grant applications

were scheduled for review on the same day.

dcclxxvi

Chadwick and LePage believed it was critical to strengthen alliances with the

other public broadcasting agencies before the hearings moved forward in Congress. In

addition, they believed that NFCB’s ability to serve the broader interests of its members

depended on outside funding. “We realized we had to stop the hemorrhaging money,”

said LePage, “and to start to focus on the members.”

dcclxxvii

One obvious source of

funding was CPB. In January 1988, the Corporation announced Audience 88, a series of

studies to be undertaken by Thomas and Clifford and two other consultants to measure

and describe the public radio audience, and develop recommendations for programming,

membership, resource development and allocation, and policy planning strategies.

dcclxxviii

If the NFCB could serve in a similar consulting capacity, Federation members could

receive additional services, and the company would receive additional revenue.

An initiative from Elaine Salazar, a former NFCB station manager who was hired

by Dave Taylor as Director of Training for NPR, offered the first opportunity for NFCB

to pursue such a consulting project. Under the title Building the Winning Team, NPR

and NFCB proposed a series of intermediate and advanced management seminars to be

held around the country. With the goal “to translate the system-wide goal of audience

service into an individualized station plan of action,” teams comprised of the general

manager, development, program, and promotion directors from each participating station

256

went through a series of exercises over two days to develop marketing and other audience

development strategies.

dcclxxix

Though the project primarily served NPR’s interests and

goals, it allowed Chadwick and LePage to involve NFCB stations in a broader system

initiative, and allowed them to consult with member stations locally as they traveled the

country to facilitate the seminars. “In fact, it didn’t end up serving that great a number of

members,” recalled LePage. “It really was NPR’s model. They led it. They said where

the workshops would be. But, it was a necessary opportunity. It gave NFCB some

credibility across public radio, because we were doing this training with NPR.”

dcclxxx

Chadwick put that credibility on the line when she testified before the Senate

Subcommitee on Communications in support of the Inouye bill. In expressing support

for continued funding for CPB, Chadwick informed the committee, “two thirds of our

members do not share in the Federal dollars distributed to public radio because these

stations fall short of the current established criteria in terms of their income and

staffing.”

dcclxxxi

Then, Chadwick expressed some of the founding principles and

objectives of the NFCB: “Their poverty should not be a barrier to participation in the

Community Service Grant program. Stations serving rural and minority audiences face

extremely difficult financial circumstances….NFCB recommends re-evaluation of the

CPB criteria for distribution of Federal dollars in order to serve more people in their

communities.”

dcclxxxii

Chadwick accompanied her testimony with a written statement,

describing the efforts of rural, Native American, and Latino stations to serve remote

communities, and asserting that “prudent use of federal funding must include service to

as many citizens as is possible given available resources.”

dcclxxxiii

Inouye questioned

257

Chadwick: “How should the CPB criteria for radio stations be revised to expand the

number of qualified stations without undermining the CPB’s fiduciary duties?”

dcclxxxiv

Chadwick responded, “You have put your finger on the crux of the issue in question. It is

difficult to answer because much of the needed data has never been made available. We

believe that CPB has gathered many of the information elements needed to redesign the

criteria. NFCB has submitted a proposal to CPB to develop the answer.”

dcclxxxv

closing, she added, “I base this request on the assumption that public broadcasting should

make every effort to fulfill its original mission: to serve those audiences unrecognized by

the general media.”

dcclxxxvi

The majority of the testimony of March 15, 1988 centered on issues specific to

public television. In addition to Chadwick, the subcommittee heard testimony from NPR

President Doug Bennet, and representatives of the Public Broadcasting Service [PBS],

the National Association of Public Television Stations [NAPTS], and the Chief Operating

Officer of the Children’s Television Workshop, producers of Sesame Street. CPB

President Donald Ledwig extolled the “quality and importance” of programming on PBS

and NPR, specifically mentioning Sesame Street and the classical music television series

Great Performances.

dcclxxxvii

Ledwig asked the committee to fund a replacement for the

public radio satellite system, and to help the system expand beyond the “300 public radio

stations that reach 82% of Americans.”

dcclxxxviii

Ledwig asked for increased funding to

help public radio “reach new and underserved audiences by expanding the number of

noncommercial stations qualified for CPB support.”

dcclxxxix

In response to a series of

pointed questions from Inouye regarding CPB’s eligibility criteria, Ledwig contradicted

258

Chadwick, asserting that the NFCB “has been an active participant in the development of

the current CSG eligibility criteria.”

dccxc

But Ledwig could only assert that NFCB was

regularly consulted: He did not mention that NFCB”s recommendations to broaden the

CSG program had been ignored for years. In contrast, Chadwick offered the committee a

letter from Gibbs Kinderman, station manager at tiny WVMR, the only broadcast service

of any kind for West Virginia’s Pocahontas Valley. “We do not qualify for a Corporation

for Public Broadcasting Community Service Grant,” wrote Kinderman, “because we are

too small....Even $10,000 per year would make a great difference to the WVMR’s of the

non-commercial radio world,” operating on annual budgets of $50,000 per year.

dccxci

In the weeks following the hearing, as NFCB members converged on Washington

for the 1988 NFCB Annual Conference, station managers and representatives of dozens

of NFCB stations had the opportunity to meet with their Congressional representatives.

Kinderman met with Senate committee member Jay Rockefeller, while Rich McClear

engaged subcommittee member Ted Stevens, both of whom were already familiar with

and supportive of their rural stations.

dccxcii

In preparation for meetings with Congress,

Chadwick’s testimony was distributed to members through the NFCB News.

dccxciii

At the

conference, members participated in a series of plenary sessions focused on the

Federation’s policy agenda, including “Meshing audience development with community

radio’s mission,” and meetings with representatives of CPB , NTIA, NPR, APR, the

NEA, and the Public Radio Satellite System [PRSS].

dccxciv

The centerpiece was a

Saturday afternoon session moderated by Chadwick, featuring CPB President Ledwig;

Antoinette (Toni) Cook, Counsel for the Senate Subcommittee; Jack Mitchell, Chair of

259

NPR; and Tom Thomas. The topic, “Public dollars and the expansion of public radio,”

took up the issues delineated in the authorization hearings, and posed the question, “Is

there a potential for expanding the systems and the stations sharing in CPB funds?”

dccxcv

Expansion

At the Public Radio Conference in May 1988, Chadwick and LePage took their

case for expansion to the stations of National Public Radio. More stations receiving

CSGs and NPPAGs would bring more participants to the satellite system, more money to

the emerging marketplace for national programming, and more affiliates for NPR and

APR. More affiliates would mean more money for NPR’s representation efforts and

training services.

dccxcvi

Thomas and Clifford agreed: Money available for rural and

minority services would give stations an incentive to reach more distant audiences in

outlying communities through expanded transmission networks. New revenues from

additional listeners and new stations could offset any losses incurred as CSG reductions

by individual stations. Expansion of the public radio system made good political and

financial sense.

dccxcvii

Just one week after the PRC, at a press conference on May 26, CPB created “a

major upheaval in the public broadcasting industry,” asserting, “the breach of faith by the

public broadcasting community with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting on

presenting a unified approach during this key legislative period could jeopardize

Congressional authorization for public broadcasting’s funding.”

dccxcviii

The statement

demonstrated the efficacy of NFCB’s advocacy strategies. After hearing from their

constituents, Congress was following up with CPB on the questions originally raised by

260

Inouye. Senator Stevens wanted to know why more CSG money wasn’t flowing to the

rural stations that served Native populations in Alaska.

dccxcix

Representative Bill

Richardson of New Mexico wanted to know about grants to rural, Native, and Latino

stations in New Mexico.

dccc

CPB’s responses were unsatisfactory. By July, the bills

were moving through both committees toward a final vote, including an amendment

directing CPB to form an outside board “to report to Congress on the initiatives and

programmatic efforts of all public broadcasting entities with respect to serving the

television and radio needs of minority and diverse audiences.”

dccci

If CPB was not

prepared to address the issues of equity and diversity itself, Congress was ready to force

the hand of the agency by overseeing the issue directly, a prospect that must have made

Ledwig very uncomfortable.

Realizing that the agency needed to work proactively to avoid the unwanted

Congressional mandate, CPB convened a meeting on system expansion on August 3,

bringing together representatives of NPR, NTIA, NFCB, and several CPB

departments.

dcccii

In preparation for the meeting, Thomas and Clifford, acting as the

Station Resource Group, prepared a document titled “Expansion and diversification of

Public Radio – Discussion Draft.” Framing the basic opportunity as “creatively

managing normal growth and continuing toward the goal of full national coverage,” the

report advocated for system expansion and diversification to “foster greater diversity in

public radio programming, improved minority service, more opportunities for station

specialization, a critical mass of outlets for new national programming, and a broader

base to carry system-wide fixed costs.”

dccciii

Thomas and Clifford identified three

261

options to encourage expansion: Lower CSG criteria for all stations; a “step-up” path to

full qualification; and lower criteria in special circumstances, for stations serving target

audiences or providing the only available public radio service to an area.

Chadwick prepared for the meeting by writing and distributing a cover story in

the NFCB News that raised provocative points about the system’s perception of public

radio and its obligations to the audience as represented in the Audience 88 study. The

report documented an enormous opportunity to extend services to the 88% of the general

public who did not listen to public radio. Chadwick, however, found fault with the

study’s method: Though NFCB member stations operated throughout the U.S., including

stations in New York, Los Angeles, Houston, Washington D.C., and Atlanta, “not one

NFCB participant member station is in the study.”

dccciv

In fact, the study gathered

information “from people who told Arbitron in 1986 that they listened to one of the

National Public Radio members stations.”

dcccv

Consequently, “minority audiences, the

middle class, the less educated class, the working and unemployed classes, – the 88% of

the population open for expansion initiatives – were not part of the study.”

dcccvi

Chadwick called these groups “an audience we ought to care about, legally if not

morally [emphasis Chadwick].”

dcccvii

Noting that the largest stations in the system

received the overwhelming share of CPB support, while the smallest stations served this

underserved audience, she evoked the foundations of radio broadcasting as public

service, asking, “Doesn’t everyone throughout the system share a common belief in the

power of mass media to make our world a better place?”

dcccviii

262

Chadwick credited Rich McClear for the strategy. At a meeting of the NFCB

board, McClear observed, “we don’t have any money, so we should seize the moral high

ground.”

dcccix

Going back to the years long before CPB and NPR, NCE broadcasting had

been dominated by institutional interests associated with colleges and universities.

Though these institutions were noncommercial and often public agencies, their classical

music, news, and educational programming catered to the elite elements of society. The

tendency became even more pronounced as these stations assumed the mantel of Public

Broadcasting and sought financial support from well-heeled listeners, businesses, and

corporations. As the enabling agency with control over federal funds, CPB policies

perpetuated and enhanced this system. From a public policy perspective, Chadwick

knew, the system was “totally upside down.”

dcccx

In contrast, the NFCB represented an

opposing set of social forces, advocating consistently for the interests of those stations

outside the system, particularly those serving rural and minority audiences. Now, those

disenfranchised interests were a political asset, as “the system” tried to find a way to meet

the expectations of the authorities in Congress.

The Public Radio Expansion Task Force

At the NPR board meeting on October 18, Wayne Roth was elected chair by a

unanimous vote. Before becoming the station manager and representative for KUOW

Seattle, Roth had been engaged as the manager of NFCB participant member station

KVNF in Paonia, Colorado, and a program officer for CPB. In his opening chair’s report

he commented, “I view this time and this year as the beginning of a new era.”

dcccxi

Roth

263

called on the board to develop a new strategic plan focusing on system expansion and

audience growth.

On November 7, 1988, six days after the election that marked the beginning of the

end of the Reagan administration, the President signed Public Law 101-626, authorizing

funding of up to $285 million for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting through FY

1993.

dcccxii

Though the authorization provided more money for CPB, President Ledwig

was dissatisfied with the outcome. He maintained that the bill’s reporting requirements

“would restrict CPB by reducing its program funds and the amounts it uses to address the

many needs of underserved audiences, such as minorities and children.”

dcccxiii

Congress

was unconvinced. The law directed CPB “to assist radio stations in maintaining and

improving service where public radio is the only broadcast service available.”

dcccxiv

Further, CPB was required “prior to July 1, 1989, and triennially thereafter, to assess and

report to the Congress on: (1) the needs of minority and diverse audiences, including

racial and ethnic minorities, new immigrants, persons for whom English is a second

language, and illiterate individuals; (2) plans of public broadcasting entities to address

these needs; [and] (3) ways these broadcasting entities can be used to help the targeted

groups.”

dcccxv

Further, the law required “annual reports to Congress on public

broadcasting services to these groups, minority employment, and CPB efforts to increase

the number of minority public stations eligible for financial support.”

dcccxvi

The bill

included $200 million for replacement of the public radio and television satellite

interconnection system, and up to $42 million for PTFP through FY91.

dcccxvii

Tom

264

Thomas credited the efforts of Chadwick and the members of the NFCB for the directives

to CPB called for in the report language.

dcccxviii

One month after the signing of P.L 101-626, the NPR board gathered at the

network’s M Street headquarters in Washington D.C..

dcccxix

In addition to Roth and the

board members, representatives of the other public broadcasting agencies were in

attendance, including Chadwick, Thomas, and Richard Madden, director of CPB’s Radio

Program Fund.

dcccxx

After considering several items on the agenda, Roth came around to

the language of the new authorization and task of system expansion. Thomas recalled

that someone on the board suggested that NPR should form a committee to look into the

matter. Thomas cautioned the group, “You’re missing the point. This can’t come from

NPR only. We need a different approach, not owned by anybody – NPR, NFCB,

CPB.”

dcccxxi

Board member Joan Rubel agreed with Thomas, as did Roth, and eventually

the full group. Breaking with NPR’s tradition of looking to itself for answers, the board

moved to create an independent panel to investigate and recommend the next steps in the

future of public radio. “The Public Radio Expansion Task Force [PRETF] was born in

about 30 minutes,” recalled Thomas.

dcccxxii

Over the winter months, Chadwick kept up the pressure on the CPB board. In a

letter, she reminded the board, “The CSG program should not be an entitlement solely to

the wealthier public stations… To respond to Congress, we should agree to share the

CSG dollars among an expanded and diversified public radio system. Further, we should

work together as a system, including stations currently unqualified for CPB support, to

design the future of public radio.”

dcccxxiii

Concurrently, Thomas worked with NPR to

265

secure funding from one of the historic benefactors of American public broadcasting,

Carnegie, to fund the costs of the Task Force.

dcccxxiv

Additional funding came from SRG,

NFCB, and the other national organizations. The National Telecommunications

Information Administration [NTIA], parent agency of PTFP, agreed to supply research,

as did CPB.

dcccxxv

The PRETF formed at the invitation of the NPR membership committee on March

2, 1989. The members included Roth, Chadwick, Tom Thomas, Joan Rubel, Hugo

Morales, and Bruce Theriault, Senior Vice President and Director of Network Operations

for American Public Radio after he left Alaska to complete a master’s degree in public

policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.

dcccxxvi

Midge Ramsey, NPR Vice

President for Representation; Augustine Dempsey, CPB Director of Broadcast Services;

and Dennis Connors, Director of PTFP, represented the other national agencies. Tom

Livingston, general manager of NPR station WETA in Washington D.C.; and Michael

Morgan, director of radio for Mississippi Public Radio, represented NPR member

stations. Doug Sweet, general manager of NFCB member station KMUN in Astoria,

Oregon, was the sole member of the Task Force affiliated with a station not supported by

CPB. As general manager of WOSU AM/FM/TV at The Ohio State University, PRETF

chair Dale Ouzts characterized the established system of large, institutional public radio

services.

dcccxxvii

Though Chadwick recognized from the outset that the task force “was not a slam

dunk,” she was encouraged that the collective experience of the majority of the members

flowed directly from their work for, with, or on behalf of the NFCB.

dcccxxviii

This came as

266

no surprise to Thomas, because the group was intended to be “representative of

something that public radio was - and could be. Quite naturally, that included a lot of the

elements that had come through NFCB. People had a lot of shared history. It wasn’t like

people were meeting each other for the first time. These issues had been fundamental

dimensions of task force members’ careers from the earliest days of their work in

radio.”

dcccxxix

At their March meeting, the CPB board took the first steps towards fulfilling the

Congressional mandate to assist sole service stations by authorizing “an unrestricted

initial grant of $4,000 to each station that qualifies under criteria developed by

CPB.”

dcccxxx

Only WVMR qualified for the grant. In a letter to West Virginia Senator

and Communications Committee member Jay Rockefeller, Gibbs Kinderman questioned

if the grant really qualified as assistance at all, “considering that the base Community

Service Grant for the smallest CPB-qualified station is in excess of $20,000 per year,” or

was simply intended to fulfill the letter of the law.

dcccxxxi

Chadwick took the matter up

directly with CPB Vice President Fred DeMarco, telling him that NFCB members were

unwilling to be “the poster children” for public radio, and called the award

“insulting.”

dcccxxxii

In reference to CPB support, Chadwick reminded the board, “The

stations that will never qualify or have difficulty qualifying should not be viewed as

failures. In terms of audience service, they are fulfilling the mission of public

broadcasting.”

dcccxxxiii

The task force met for the first time on April 18, 1989 in Washington, D.C.,

establishing a schedule of four future meetings through November. In addition, the task

267

force agreed to hold open discussion sessions meeting at the upcoming NFCB conference

and NPR’s PRC, scheduled back-to-back in May in the Bay Area. For those unable to

attend the meetings, or wishing to submit comments in writing, Ouzts asked for response

to a series of questions focusing on effective ways to extend program services to more

Americans; improvements to existing stations and development of new ones; the

advantages to be realized from a more extensive public radio system; and concerns about

and constraints on expansion efforts. Chadwick and Sweet offered to meet informally

with NFCB members concerned about expansion during the upcoming conference.

The 15

NFCB Conference and annual business meeting took place in Berkeley,

California, May 14 through 17, 1989, in conjunction with the 40

anniversary of Pacifica

Radio station KPFA. Expansion was the prominent theme of the conference, taken up in

workshops, plenary sessions, and the annual business meeting. Chadwick informed

members that the task force was examining ways to accommodate smaller stations in the

CSG program, and provide NPPAGs to all interconnected stations, regardless of size,

budget, or service. Representing CPB, Dempsey met individually with representatives of

stations that intended to qualify for any new expansion programs. B. Morse and Jim

McEachern from NPR Satellite Distribution explained the project to replace the satellite

system in the coming years, while Thomas Hardy from PTFP advised stations intent on

applying for grants to acquire the equipment necessary for satellite

interconnection.

dcccxxxiv

NFCB participants in Alaska, down the west coast, across the

southwest, and along the northern tier from Montana to Wisconsin stood to benefit

directly from the expansion initiatives.

268

The discussions continued over the following week at the Public Radio

Conference in San Francisco, attended by Chadwick and representatives of NFCB

stations. For many of the NPR affiliates, it was their first contact with the world of NCE

radio beyond the borders of the national network. “Most of them didn’t know that every

public radio station was not already equipped with a satellite dish,” recalled

Chadwick.

dcccxxxv

“Most of them didn’t know how community radio stations actually

survived without an institution behind them. They didn’t even know these stations

existed.”

dcccxxxvi

At subsequent meetings of the taskforce, Gibbs Kinderman came in to

discuss the circumstances at WVMR. Representatives of the Native stations in Arizona,

New Mexico, Wisconsin and the Dakotas spoke about the conditions of Native radio and

life in Indian Country. Rich McClear testified on behalf of APRN and the Alaska

stations. For some members of the task force, the conversations brought a new awareness

of the diversity of public radio. “They thought public radio was all white bread,” said

Chadwick. “It was a real education project. It was back to the moral high ground, and

they knew it. Even Dale [Ouzts] got it”

dcccxxxvii

The PRETF published its final report in November 1989. Taking a global view,

the committee characterized the options for expansion as a series of initiatives in every

aspect of public radio, including programming, interconnection, extension of signal,

research, training, and outreach. With regard to the distribution of federal funds, the

report contained several recommendations:

• New CPB grants for stations “that use the public radio satellite system, but that do

not have the staff, budget, or facilities to qualify for regular grant support.”

269

• A step-up program “through which stations may initially qualify for limited

support from the Corporation for Public broadcasting under a reduced version of

the criteria employed for Community Service Grants.”

dcccxxxviii

• New CPB funding “to provide financial support to minority controlled stations …

that do not have the staff, budget, or facilities to qualify for regular grant

support.”

dcccxxxix

• “Funding of additional downlinks through NTIA’s Public Telecommunications

Facilities program. The target for this effort is some 100 college and community

stations that have a commitment to public service programming.”

dcccxl

Ouzts delivered the recommendations to the CPB board on January 22, 1990, calling on

the system “to change its own self perception. We envision a public radio system that is

no longer defined solely in terms of those who garner a specific grant from CPB, or that

affiliate with a particular organization; that is instead shaped as much or more by a shared

mission of public service and participation in the rich and expanding marketplace of

quality programming.”

dcccxli

Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford drafted the report language,

the denouement of 15 years of work begun in the months before NARK 1.

Following the final report of the PRETF, it took CPB another year to implement

the recommendations of the Task Force. By November 1990, 27 new stations were

receiving either a Program Acquisition and Assistance Grant (the expanded program that

replaced the NPPAG); or a Step-Up Grant, providing limited support from CPB under a

reduced version of the qualification criteria for the Community Service Grant program.

Fourteen stations, including WVMR, qualified for a recast and more generous Sole

270

Service Assistance Grant program. In addition, aided in part by new incentives for

minority licensees, 7 new stations qualified for full CSGs, including NFCB associate

member WDCU. As a consequence of 15 years’ effort by the NFCB, the public radio

industry, as recognized by CPB, expanded by more than 15% in 1990: In a single year,

the number of stations receiving annual assistance from CPB for station operations,

production, and programming jumped from 312 to 360.

dcccxlii

Over the succeeding years,

as the expansion initiatives envisioned by the Task Force took effect, the public radio

system nearly doubled: In 2007, CPB provides annual support for more than 700 NCE

radio stations.

dcccxliii

The expansion initiatives marked a paradigm shift in public radio. As it was

conceived in 1971, the public radio system relied on the support of public funds flowing

through CPB to established institutions, including NPR, public and private universities,

and statewide educational broadcasting authorities. In the struggles over the public

treasury that characterized the Reagan years, those institutions came to understand that

their continued prosperity depended on their ability to derive support directly from

listeners and other private sources. Tom Thomas, Terry Clifford, Hugo Morales, Lynn

Chadwick, and those who had operated within the listener-supported paradigm for years

were well positioned to bring their knowledge, skills, and experience to the system at a

time when the system needed new ideas.

Many of the old guard in public broadcasting adapted to the new paradigm.

Others did not. One of the casualties was CPB President Donald Ledwig. During a 1991

hearing on CPB reauthorization before the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications

271

and Finance, Morales testified to CPB’s continuing inflexibility. In a response to

Congressman Bill Richardson, Morales stated, “Consultation with the system means

essentially a resumption of the status quo.”

dcccxliv

Noting that only 20% of CPB funds

went to base grants, Morales complained, “Those of us that serve rural people are

punished for that. We get less money. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer.”

dcccxlv

Sitting beside Morales, Ledwig endured a withering statement by Richardson regarding

CPB’s poor progress on the issues of minority services and employment. “You haven’t

made much progress,” said Richardson, “and I’m at the point where I think you need

more than reports and jawboning, and as I said, I am currently drafting legislation.”

dcccxlvi

Unwilling to engage in another fight over Congressional mandates, Ledwig announced

his departure from CPB effective January 1, 1992.

dcccxlvii

For Chadwick, the successful closure of the PRETF was a turning point for NFCB

and the public radio system, “when we gave these folks a new opportunity to decide what

to do.”

dcccxlviii

In 1970, the public radio system established by CPB encompassed an

exclusive set of institutional licensees, offering limited services that appealed most to the

elite elements of American society. Over the next 20 years, as the diversity and

complexity of American society challenged the institutions of civic and cultural life,

these original public broadcasters demonstrated a limited capacity to comprehend and

respond to the changes going on about them. Community broadcasters provided the

talents, knowledge, skills, and abilities to push public radio in new directions, to become

more open to change and more responsive to listeners. In the process, the National

Federation of Community Broadcasters moved from the margins to the mainstream of

272

public radio policymaking in the United States. The ambitious goals outlined in Madison

at the National Alternative Radio Convention were achieved: The expansion of public

radio provided American citizens with a broader and richer system of noncommercial

broadcasting to serve “the public interest, convenience, and necessity.”

273

CHAPTER IX

THE PROMISE AND THE PRICE OF POWER

As a summative historical examination covering a period of 20 years, this study

necessarily offers a fairly broad view of the issues and events under investigation. Many

of the people, issues, and events included in the study could have been examined in more

depth and detail. This study relied primarily on sources originating from or directly

connected with the NFCB, it primarily portrays the viewpoint of the founders and those

who supported their efforts. This characteristic of the study manifests a conscious

decision by the researcher to work with those elements of the historical record that were

fairly available, continuous, and complete.

The mechanisms of power

All of the outcomes identified in this study are explained by the theories of

political economy. As described by Murdock and Golding, growth is a fundamental

characteristic of a system of mass communication. Between 1970 and 1990, the public

radio system grew, and NFCB grew along with the system, becoming increasingly

intertwined with the other agencies of public broadcasting over the period of fifteen

years. Murdock and Golding also cite the influence of state intervention and control in

the establishment and development of mass communication systems. Beginning with the

reservation of the NCE FM spectrum, the educational broadcasting system that evolved

into public radio was the creation of agencies of the state, beginning with the FCC, public

schools, colleges, and universities in the late 1940s. Congress intervened directly in the

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1960s, providing funding first through HEW, followed in 1967 by the Public

Broadcasting Act and the establishment of CPB. Through a network of agencies, the

state circumscribed the forms and structures that directed the development of a system of

noncommercial broadcasting within a set of narrow confines that would not threaten the

interests of private capital in the prevailing market driven system of mass

communication.

Spatialization, as described by Mosco, is a process of building alliances to

diversify and extend the influence of a mass communication enterprise. In the private

sector, spatialization describes a pattern of strategic alliances, mergers, and acquisitions

that allows a single company to exert influence across many sectors of the

communication economy. A similar patter of strategic alliances can be found in the

development of the public radio sector between 1975 and 1990, as NFCB worked with

NPR, APR, Radio Bilingue, Native American Public Telecommunications [NAPT] and

independent producers to extend their influence on CPB, PTFP, and Congress. As an

outcome of the PRETF, the public radio system became more diverse, reaching more

audiences with a wider range of programs.

Structuration, as described by Mosco, is a systematic process that reproduces

power relationships through the agencies of the state and the mass media, perpetuating

power and privilege for particular groups, especially along the lines of social class.

Mosco observes that the erosion of government funding during the Reagan years forced

public broadcasting to pay greater attention to the class constituencies, including the

corporate and chartable funders who shouldered the funding responsibility. The NFCB

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directly represented the interests of a range of minority constituencies, including rural,

Latino, and Native stations, and by extension, their audiences. The process of

structuration compelled the NFCB to accommodate the goals and objectives of the elites

who created and controlled the greater public radio system, including the largest stations,

the leadership of NPR, and members of Congress. Without these engagements, the

outcomes of the PRETF would not have been realized.

Smythe’s concept of commodification, cited by Murdock, Golding, and Mosco,

describes a process where programs are bought and sold in a market, and in turn the

audiences for the programs become negotiable commodities in the market for advertising,

or in the case of public broadcasting, program underwriting and other forms of private

financing. Prior to 1981, the American model of public broadcasting insulated

noncommercial broadcasters from the market through the agency of CPB. As market

based economic policies gained dominance over the mechanisms of federal authorization

and appropriation, public broadcasters turned to private funders to close the gap opened

by the severe cuts imposed by the Reagan administration. In the aftermath of the NPR

debt crisis of 1983, NPR station managers were no longer content to accept the opinions

of NPR management without question, and were ready to consider another model for

program development, production, and distribution. Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford saw

the opportunity to establish a broader market for public radio programming. Inexorably,

and perhaps inevitably, the market model came to dominate the relationship between

public broadcasters and their audiences, just as it always has in commercial broadcasting.

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For years, the collective will to achieve the outcomes of the PRETF exerted a

powerful binding influence on the members of the NFCB. Once those goals were

accomplished, the Federation splintered into factions over questions of mission and

market. Some, like Marty Durlin of KGNU, maintained that the mission to serve the

unserved and give voice to the voiceless was essential to community radio, and that

questions of the size and loyalty of the audience should remain subordinate, or even

immaterial, to the success of the enterprise.

dcccxlix

For others like Bill Wax, program

director of KBOO and later Director of National Programming for Pacifica, it was “all

about the programming:”

dcccl

Without programs that attracted measurable and sustainable

audiences, the mission could not survive, regardless of its moral efficacy. The issue

dominated the NFCB for most of the next decade, as a coalition of “grassroots radio”

stations joined activists from the Pacifica stations to assert the mission-centered

paradigm. The controversy was another iteration of the fundamental contradiction

confronted by Lew Hill in 1949: How can a radio station offer programming that

addresses the margins of social and political culture, and simultaneously gain access to an

audience large and/or affluent enough to sustain the station within a market-driven

broadcasting system? This fundamental tension between mission and market has never

been resolved, and probably never will be.

“I always knew money was not the issue,” said Lynn Chadwick.

dcccli

“In all the

workshops, on all the surveys, the members all said we don’t have enough money. The

members wanted more money.”

dccclii

From the beginning in the summer of 1975, the

leaders of the NFCB attended to this objective. But then something happened the

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members did not anticipate. “Once the issue was taken away, they had to face other

shortcomings – inconsistent programming, poor governance, staffing issues,” according

to Chadwick.

dcccliii

“Money didn’t fix the problems. And then, some people decided

‘that’s not who we want to be.’ I don’t mind that, but I don’t think they should pretend to

be other than they are.”

dcccliv

Subsequent events demonstrate that the outcome of the

PRETF was not the panacea envisioned by the founders when they sent Thomas and

Clifford off to Washington. But their decisions set in motion a series of actions and

events that eventually accomplished the most complex and difficult objective of the

NFCB. “We won the war,” said Chadwick.

dccclv

Almost immediately, the war over

funding was replaced by a new war, not over matters of public policy, but over the

culture and mission of the NFCB.

The view from history

Writing 25 years after NARC 1, Walker asserted, “A great community radio

station eschews bureaucracy, gives its volunteers wide latitude, and relies on listeners for

most of its funds.”

dccclvi

In Walker’s view, a community radio station should be “as

diverse, messy, and alive as the community it reflects,” “neither standardized into a

predictable sound nor rigidly balkanized.”

dccclvii

This is the Milam-Lansman version of

community radio, where, at least theoretically, “the listeners feel like family.”

dccclviii

The ideal of Sex & Broadcasting, the Milam-Lansman model where intelligent,

engaged, enthusiastic listeners embrace the full range of culture and opinion from the

mainstream to the margins of the community, inspired a generation of alternative

broadcasters. The problem is, according to Bruce Theriault, “It’s the wrong model.”

dccclix

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Applied to the realm of experience, Lew Hill’s theory of listener-sponsored radio has

never worked in the manner he envisioned. Milam’s enthusiasm for the intrepid listener

voluntarily supporting the intrepid, independent radio station has never been manifested

in a service that could sustain itself financially. Most of the Milam stations licensed in

the 1960s and 1970s did not survive. Milam and Landsman sold KDNA, which operated

on a commercial frequency, to commercial interests to finance other projects. In the end,

the signal proved to be more valuable than the service. Once Milam withdrew the

financial safety net from KRAB, KTAO, and KCHU, the stations succumbed to debt.

KUSP, the creation of Milam and David Freedman, transformed from a hippie alternative

enclave into a professionally managed and operated NPR affiliate. WORT, KBOO, and

other stations patterned after Sex & Broadcasting have regularly struggled to keep up

with the costs associated with providing power to the transmitter, equipment for the

studios, and wages for the few (if any) people who labor 40 or more hours each week to

facilitate the efforts of scores of volunteers who produce programs targeted at marginal

and niche audiences.

Ideally, as Walker suggests, most of the funds should come from listeners. But

Walker’s ideal bumps up against a number of obstacles. Some audiences, such as those

living on the reservations of the northern tier or the desert southwest, or in the migrant

camps of central and southern California, have little to give. Founders, coordinators, and

facilitators cannot sustain their voluntary efforts indefinitely. Costs associated with

operating a transmission facility sufficient to broadcast an adequate signal to a major

market such as New York and Los Angeles are very high. Equipment fails, technologies

279

become obsolete, and the next generation of gear is rarely less costly, as evidenced by the

conversion from analog to digital transmission systems in the present day. Buildings

require maintenance, and eventual replacement. Local services programmed by

community volunteers cannot benefit from the economies of consolidation and

technology that have driven profitability in the commercial radio industry since the early

days of network radio. The question is, once the listeners have given all they are willing

to give, who will pay the additional costs and close the gap between sustainability and

collapse?

Bill Thomas, Mike O’Connor, Rich and Suzi McClear, Hugo Morales and the

other founders of community radio initiatives in the 1970s recognized early on that they

had to acquire resources beyond those available from their audiences to sustain their

stations and the collective mission of community radio to serve the unserved. This was

one of the primary motivations behind the establishment of the NFCB. From the outset,

the founding members of the Federation were explicit about their intention to gain access

to the federal funds that were not available to small community licensees in the early

years of public broadcasting. Undoubtedly, in 1975 some if not most of the participants

envisioned a redistribution of CPB resources, drawing dollars away from what they

perceived as comparatively affluent institutional stations and redirecting them to

unquestionably more needy community stations. A redistribution of the collective assets

of public radio would have required a complete restructuring of the political economy of

public broadcasting. Invoking similar logic and rhetoric, Lansman and Milam undertook

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such a strategy in RM-2493 without success. The problem called for other tactics and

solutions.

Schooled at the Wilson Center in the methods and traditions of policy analysis

and coalition building, Tom Thomas took a more traditional and gradual approach to

political change, beginning with the agency he knew best, the FCC. Success on

ascertainment, production training, and similar issues of limited scope allowed Thomas

and Clifford to cultivate key relationships with the public broadcasting agencies in

Washington D.C.. Similarly, they developed productive working relationships with

established figures in Washington, such as Nicholas Johnson and Michael Bader, and

relied on alliances with other advocacy agencies such as Johnson’s NCCB to advance the

formative policy agenda of the newly-established Federation. These tactics brought

NFCB to the attention of the dominant interests in public broadcasting, and allowed

Thomas and Clifford, and later the similarly schooled Chadwick, to build momentum

behind the objectives of the Federation. At the same time, as these strategies moved

forward, they allowed the dominant interests in public radio to exert their influence on

the Federation agenda. In their efforts to craft workable strategies for the Federation,

Thomas and Chadwick invoked their backgrounds in public policy, and may have relied

on the thoughts of Edmund Burke: “Every human benefit and enjoyment, every virtue,

and every prudent act, is founded on compromise and barter.”

dccclx

In Docket 20735, Thomas and Clifford addressed the needs of NFCB stations to

gain access to spectrum, and exert the priority of full-time over part-time broadcasting

services. Concurrently, NPR and CPB shared these goals, and in developing an alliance

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with NFCB, the agencies quickly understood the advantages that could be gained from a

strategic partnership with the dynamic and effective policy team of Thomas and Clifford.

Subsequently, when Thomas joined the CPB Radio Advisory Panel, the opportunity

allowed him to have ongoing contact inside CPB and advance the NFCB agenda. At the

same time, the relationship allowed CPB to acculturate Thomas in the agency’s way of

doing business. Over time, Thomas and Clifford gained access to all of the key players in

public broadcasting, but during that time they also came to appreciate the needs, interests,

and limits of all of the agencies of public broadcasting. Eventually, they made the most

of those relationships in their efforts with the Station Resource Group, and for the

PRETF.

Throughout the first 15 years of the NFCB, the Federation and the larger public

broadcasting industry benefited from growth in the industry and in federal spending. The

Federation grew from 24 charter members to 165 participants and associates, while and

the number of CPB-supported stations grew to more than 300 before implementation of

the PRETF initiatives. Cuts imposed on CPB during the early years of the Reagan

administration were restored between FY83 and FY87, while nonfederal revenues from

listeners, business, and philanthropies doubled in the decade of the 1980s.

dccclxi

As NFCB

found in its early years, growth did not pay for growth, but growth provided public radio

broadcasters, including the members of the NFCB, with the rationale to leverage public

and private resources to benefit their enterprises.

Significant findings of the study

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The present research illuminates the political economy of public broadcasting

within the larger, market-driven system of U.S. commercial mass media through a

detailed historical case study of one particular public broadcasting agency. The founders

of the NFCB began their collective enterprises to establish and operate noncommercial,

listener supported community radio stations through the designated public agency for all

broadcasting services in the United States, the Federal Communications Commission.

The responsibilities and obligations they assumed under the terms of their FCC licenses

led them to engage the other dominant agencies of the public broadcasting system,

especially HEW (later PTFP), CPB, and NPR. In the early 1970s, the outcomes of these

engagements were often unsatisfactory, leading the founders to establish the NFCB to

advocate for the individual and collective needs and interests of participating community

radio stations. Over time, the NFCB established functional working relationships with

these and other agencies, and engaged directly in lobbying members of Congress for

directives in legislation related to public broadcasting to establish initiatives for the

benefit of community radio stations and the broader public radio system. The advocacy

efforts of the NFCB culminated in the establishment of the Public Radio Expansion Task

Force, and subsequent changes in the definition, structure, and implementation of public

radio services in the United States.

The study demonstrates that decisive power and control over the political

economy of public broadcasting in the United States rests with the U.S. Congress,

exercised through its ability to authorize, appropriate, supplement, and rescind

programmatic and financial support for the American system of broadcasting generally

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and the public broadcasting system in particular. While many of the founders of

community radio, including those involved with the NFCB, intended to establish

independent, locally controlled, noncommercial radio stations funded entirely by

contributions from listeners, efforts to establish such stations proved to be unsustainable.

Consequently, the NFCB and its member stations turned to federally funded agencies for

opportunities to develop new systematic and financial resources for community radio

stations, including the establishment and enhancement of public radio signals,

redefinition of restrictions on noncommercial content, and the development of new

assistance programs to fund public radio services and activities. The historical record

clearly demonstrates the centrality of the U.S. Congress, in its role as the representative

and sponsor of geographic and political constituencies, in the emergence, evolution, and

continuation of the American system of public broadcasting.

The study addresses one of the significant historical controversies in American

community radio. Beginning in the mid-1990s, as pirate broadcasters asserted their

shadowy presence on the FM band and began a movement that eventually led to the

creation of new class of Low Power FM [LPFM] services in 2000, critics including

Bekken, Walker, and Fairchild chastised the NFCB for its role in the Docket 20735

rulemaking and the subsequent dismantling of protections for 10-watt stations. These

critics maintain that the NFCB undercut the regulatory safety net that allowed for the

establishment of community radio stations at minimal cost. Further, these critics contend

that the NFCB neglected the mission of community radio to provide access to and

program services for underserved and the unserved constituencies on the public spectrum,

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and instead focused its time, energy, and resources on the effort to secure “Money from

Washington.”

dccclxii

This view oversimplifies and ignores a number of important

historical facts.

At the time of Docket 20735, the 4 mHz bandwidth allotted for NCE FM had

become clogged by the FCC’s haphazard allocation of the NCE spectrum and the

unintended consequences of the FCC’s table of allotments. Applicants for FM licenses

found their applications blocked by channels reserved for or occupied by small

instructional stations, radio clubs, or larger religious or institutional stations that had

received their authorizations in the early years of NCE FM, when spectrum was more

easily available. Community stations already on the air found it impossible to extend

their signals to underserved and unserved communities, because the existing FCC rules

prohibited growth even where the spectrum was unoccupied in some cases. Like their

counterparts at NPR stations, the founders of the NFCB quickly realized that a licensee’s

greatest asset is its signal: More coverage reaches more listeners. In Docket 20735, the

NFCB persuaded the FCC to clear away the increasingly problematic traffic jam on the

NCE band that had been developing since 1946. The FCC responded by giving 10-watt

stations the opportunity to upgrade their services before the protections on their spectrum

were removed. While it is true that the rulemaking removed the possibility of

establishing new, low-cost 10-watt services, it also allowed many new, community radio

stations of 100 watts or more (with exponentially greater coverage) to come to the air,

and other, established stations to extend their services to new audiences. These advances

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in community radio would not have taken place without the rules established in Docket

20735.

The study also demonstrates the efficacy of the open marketplace for public radio

programming envisioned by Thomas and Clifford. Prior to the financial collapse of NPR

in 1983, the network maintained a virtual monopoly over the production and distribution

of public radio programs. As the sole recipient of CPB program dollars, and the de facto

owner and manager of technology and traffic for the public radio satellite system, NPR

had no incentive to engage producers outside the network. The shift of CPB program

dollars from NPR to CPB-supported stations put the decision-making power in the hands

of program directors, allowing them to buy programming from NPR, acquire programs

from other producers, or produce their own programs for the national market. The

system was further enhanced when CPB replaced the NPPAG program with the PAAG,

which made program funding available for more stations, and the NFCB collaborated

with stations to acquire new downlinks through the PTFP, bringing more stations into the

market. All of the stations, producers, and content distributors in public radio have

benefited from the dynamism and diversity engendered by this approach.

Limitations of the study

In the earliest stages of this project, the researcher contacted Lorenzo Milam to

solicit his participation as a source for the study. Milam politely but firmly declined, and

referred the researcher to the expansive reflections on his career in community radio

available in the Walker study. As this effort progressed, the researcher became satisfied

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that Milam’s extensive published record, in combination of the recollections of those who

worked with him, provided ample evidence to inform the present project.

Because the study relied heavily on the written record available in the various

iterations of the NFCB Newsletter, the constructed narrative depends extensively on

contemporaneous accounts of Tom Thomas, Terry Clifford, Lynn Chadwick, and others

who were engaged directly by the organization and had a vested interest in the positive

representation of NFCB’s positions, activities, and accomplishments. The researcher

made every effort to access other sources, including meeting minutes, correspondence,

and individuals outside the NFCB, to verify the assertions and interpret the

representations made in the NFCB publication. Without exception, these sources

confirmed the general accuracy of the documentary record. Given additional time, more

critical sources may have provided additional insights, but such critical sources did not

emerge with any significance over the course of nearly four years of research.

One reason that more critical sources may not have been available is the general

inadequacy of the documentary record of community radio beyond the sources available

through the NFCB. Because it was established as a membership organization, those

inside the NFCB who were critical of the efforts and methods of Thomas and Clifford,

Schatz, Chadwick and LePage were most often associated with individual member

stations, and those records are scattered around the country in station files or collections

of personal papers. Earlier collateral studies of individual community stations conducted

by the researcher demonstrate that attention to the preservation of historical records

varies widely from person to person and station to station. Records reaching back more

287

than 10 years, let alone those reaching back into the 1970s, are often incomplete or lost

entirely. In addition, the available record confirms that those who were involved as

participant members and delegates to the organization between 1975 and 1990 were

supportive, or at least tolerant, of NFCB’s approach to the public radio system and the

objective to secure CPB funding for more community radio stations. As documented by

Walker, Lasar, and others, the harshest criticism of NFCB emerged after implementation

of the PRETF recommendations.

dccclxiii

This more recent history lies outside the frame of

this project.

As with any study that relies on the recollections of historical actors gathered

through in-depth interviews, this project operates within the limitations of human

memory. In some cases, the order of historical events and the dates of those occurrences

required considerable probing and verification by multiple sources. The date of the

KRAB Nebula conference proved to be especially slippery: Five participants recalled the

conference in 1972, but contemporaneous documentary sources placed the event in June

1973. Recollections were more easily verified for those events that took place between

1975 and 1990. A more detailed reconstruction of the events and circumstances that took

place prior to 1975 would require additional interviews with the sources included in the

study, interviews of additional sources not available at the time of the study, or the

discovery and acquisition of additional documentary evidence, subject to the limitations

and challenges mentioned previously.

The present study tells the story of the NFCB from the viewpoint of the founders.

Almost certainly, some will disagree with the findings presented here. An alternate

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narrative may be available from other documentary sources and participants not

consulted in this project for the reasons mentioned above. Those discoveries, if they are

to be made, remain as a project for future historians of community radio.

Implications

The emergence of LPFM as a licensed class of noncommercial radio service

breathed new life into the NFCB in the first years of the 21

century. The movement to

create low power and microradio stations exhibits some striking parallels to events and

circumstances that led to the creation of the NFCB. Radio scholar Michael Keith

compares Dunifer and Sakolsky’s Seizing the airwaves, the 1997 how-to book for setting

up unlicensed micro stations, to Milam’s Sex and broadcasting.

dccclxiv

The radical,

antiestablishment traditions of community radio can be found in the rhetoric and

activities of the Prometheus Radio Project, a Philadelphia-based advocacy organization

that works with local organizations to license and construct new LPFM stations across

the country.

dccclxv

Following the FCC’s authorization of LPFM channels, the NFCB

added a staff position to help low power projects apply for licenses, build facilities, and

maintain services once they are on the air.

dccclxvi

In 2006, the NFCB membership roster

included 9 LPFM participants and 38 LPFM associates.

dccclxvii

LPFM stations face many of the same challenges that confronted the stations of

the NFCB in the 1970s. They require capital to replace their aging equipment and

continue their operations. Station founders are burning out and leaving their projects in

the hands of others. LPFM activists are looking for opportunities to improve their signals

and reach more listeners. Some in the LPFM movement wonder out loud if they should

289

advocate for support from CPB and PTFP. Others remain outspoken in their opposition

to any association with public funding agencies or corporate support.

dccclxviii

The significant difference between the LPFM stations of today and the stations

represented by the NFCB in 1975 can be found in the licenses issued by the FCC.

dccclxix

Full power FM stations may operate at a maximum output power of up to 100,000 watts.

The founders of NFCB, in competition with much larger NPR and commercial stations,

quickly realized the value of a robust signal and extensive geographic coverage, and

worked consistently to expand their signals to reach new localities and new audiences

through power increases, tower relocations, and networks of boosters and translators. For

NFCB, the primary objective of the Docket 20735 filing was to create more opportunities

to build new full power community radio stations and expand existing community radio

signals. In contrast, LPFM services are restricted to power levels between 10 and 100

watts, and cannot grow beyond these FCC-imposed limits. Constrained by these limited

signals, LPFM stations have been permanently consigned to marginal channels. Without

changes in the enabling rules and regulations, it is unlikely LPFM will produce the sort of

engagement with American audiences that has characterized the public radio system over

the past 35 years.

The circumstances of the broadcast radio industry have changed substantially

since the early years of the NFCB. The stations of the Federation shared a common

interest in providing access to the airwaves for individuals and populations who were

absent from the mainstream of commercial radio. In the present, citizens have access to

many more channels of communication, and the technologies associated with mass

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communication have moved beyond a very limited number of professional facilities into

schools, libraries, churches, and most significantly, homes. The convergence of audio

production, computing, and network technologies has removed the requirement for

studios, transmitters, towers, and antennas. The audio production tasks that used to

require a professional production facility can now be accomplished with a personal

computer, a low cost microphone, and one of several free audio production applications.

If the computer is portable, it serves as a remote studio, capable of production at any

location. Audio content can be distributed worldwide over the Internet for free through

publicly accessible networks, or through any Internet service provider for the cost of a

monthly subscription. Listeners are no longer limited to a few geographically defined

program services offering fixed schedules on an appointment basis. Listeners can acquire

audio content from all over the world over the Internet on any personal computer, and

thanks to the Apple iPod and similar personal, portable listening devices, they can engage

content when and where they choose. In 1975, producers, distributors, and listeners

turned to the NFCB to overcome the scarcity of content and constraints on delivery.

Today, producers, distributors, and listeners must come to terms with the overwhelming

number of options available for production, delivery, and reception of audio

programming in a globalized mass media system.

For community broadcasters like David Freedman, general manager of NFCB

participant member station WWOZ New Orleans since 1992, radio has become just one

of many channels capable of delivering content to listeners. “My job on that radio

program now is to get you to that web site,” says Freedman. “That’s what broadcasting is

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for. It’s casting a broad net. I’m trolling. Then, if I catch enough people, I send them

over to the web site. That’s the correct application. It’s the highest and best use of that

technology. The one thing that does not change is that now, our desire to make available

all the stuff that’s not mainstream, it can actually work now.”

dccclxx

Retired from the

broadcasting business for several years, Dave Taylor points to blogs such as Daily Kos as

the newest iteration of democratic media. “The new community radio for politics is all

on the Internet,” says Taylor. “It will be like Madison or Telluride was for community

radio. It’s huge. Anybody can write a diary.”

dccclxxi

Comparing the blogosphere of today

with the counterculture of his youth, Taylor asks, “Is this the movement? Is this one

place it can coalesce, like it did around community radio in the 70s?”

dccclxxii

Taylor finds

that the political and cultural community of the Internet lacks the sense of unity he felt in

community radio: “I don’t think it has the kind of national consensus of different groups

in different parts of the country coming together like it did back in the 70s.”

dccclxxiii

Only time will tell if any of the political and cultural movements on the Internet

will serve the same purposes and provide the same services that characterized community

radio in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. Only recently have centers of power on the Internet

started to emerge and coalesce around issues of access, control, content, delivery,

reception, and representation. As they have since the days of the first broadsheets,

content producers will continue to play a major role in the relationship between service

providers and users. Legacy media producers and distributors, including NPR, are

competing directly with on-line services for the attention of citizens and consumers. The

stunning profitability of Google demonstrates that search engines and portals such as

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Digg.com serve an important function in an environment saturated by information. With

the notable exception of regulations intended to limit sexual content, political leaders

have stayed the hand of regulation, content to allow the “invisible hand” of the market

drive the growth and development of the Internet. Scholars and activists worry that the

unregulated marketplace has already become an oligopoly that primarily serves the needs

and interests of major media conglomerates. The issue of network neutrality, now

pending before Congress, provides a significant test, pitting the regulatory powers of

government against the market powers of private capital.

dccclxxiv

The outcome will dictate

how the Internet will serve the needs and interests of American citizens for years to

come.

Suggestions for further research

Though he has been widely recognized in community radio and the alternative

press, the story of the life and influence of Lorenzo Milam should be shared with a

broader audience. As an intellectual, author, broadcaster, and social activist, Milam has

been a significant figure in social and cultural movements including the beginning of

community radio in the 1950s, the recognition of rights for the disabled in the 1980s, and

the emergence of online publishing at the turn of the 21

century. While he continues to

reside in Mexico and publishes online in the Review of Arts, Literature, Philosophy, and

the Humanities (RALPH), Milam’s lifelong battle with polio and his advancing age have

made his interactions with the wider world less frequent. Milam’s autobiographical

works provide a rich and detailed first person account of his views and experiences. In

contrast, the accounts of the individuals consulted in this project who knew and worked

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with him often varied from the Milam version. These circumstances suggest that a

Milam biography would prove to be a fascinating and rewarding undertaking.

Many community radio stations have rich histories, and founders such as Jeremy

Lansman, Mike O’Connor, Rich and Suzi McClear, Pat Watkins, and others provide

excellent resources for those interested in exploring the evolution of particular

community radio stations and the audiences they serve. Lasar has studied Pacifica from

the network perspective, and a few individuals have written about their experiences at

KPFA and WBAI. Building on these efforts, any one of the five Pacifica stations

provides an opportunity for scholarly investigation. Beyond Pacifica, many community

radio stations offer rich cultural histories, characterized by interesting and often inspired

individuals producing unique local programs, and the audiences and communities they

serve. Though it has now been off the air for more than 30 years, Lansman’s KDNA

deserves special attention. WORT Madison has broadcast continuously for the past 35

years, offering an unbroken record of service to a receptive audience in a dynamic

community. Across the U.S., dozens of community stations deserve the attention of

media historians as sites of political and cultural expression, activism, and resistance.

When the research for this project was first undertaken in the spring of 2003, it

was envisioned as a grand cultural narrative of the places, people, and agencies that

shaped community radio in the United States. Over time, it became clear to the

researcher that scope of such an effort would far exceed the available time, resources, and

expertise. The history of the NFCB has yet to be woven together with other equally

important histories of the visionaries, activists, and broadcasters, and the technologies,

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agencies, and political, social, and cultural movements that enabled the evolution of

American community radio after World War II. The history of the NFCB forms just a

small piece of a larger story that is waiting to be told.

Notes

1. Michael McCauley, NPR: The trials and triumphs of National Public Radio, New York, Columbia

University Press, 2005, 47; and “NPR wins 3 of 4 Peabody awards given for radio Performance Today,

Africa Coverage and Paul Robeson Tribute awarded broadcasting's most prestigious prize,” National Public

Radio, 31 March 1999, accessed 3 October 2006 at

<http://www.npr.org/about/press/990331.peabody.html>.

2. “About NFCB,” National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 2007, accessed 21 March 2007 at

<http://www.nfcb.org/about/about.js>.

3. Jon Bekken, “Community radio at the crossroads: Federal policy and the professionalization of a

grassroots medium,” in eds. Ron Sakolsky and Stehen Dunifer, Seizing the airwaves: a free radio

handbook, San Francisco, AK Press, 1998, 9, accessed 12 March 2003 at

<http://www.infoshoorg/texts/seizing/bekken.html>.

4. Susan Douglas, Inventing American broadcasting 1899-1922, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University

Press, 295-298.

5. John Witherspoon, Roselle Kovitz, Robert K. Avery, and Alan Stavitsky, A history of public

broadcasting, Washington D.C., Current, 2000, 7-8.

6. Ibid. 33-34.

7. Conference program, National Alternative Radio Konvention, Madison WI, 17 June 1975, 1, accessed 18

September 2005 on line at <http://www.well.com/user/dmsml/nfcb/narc.pdf>.

8. Mike O’Connor, The National Federation of Community Broadcasters: The Constitutional Convention

Report, Madison, Back Porch Radio, 1975, 1.

9. Ibid. 5.

10. Ibid.

295

11. Charles Fairchild, Community radio and public culture, Cresskill, Hampton Press, 2001, 89-92. The

marginal status of community broadcasting is also discussed by Raymond Williams in Television:

Technology and cultural form, New York, Schocken Books, 1975.

12. William Barlow, “Community radio in the U.S.: The struggle for a democratic medium,” Media,

Culture and Society v.10, 1988, 81.

13. Witherspoon, Kovitz, Avery, and Stavitsky, 82.

14. Douglas Kellner, Television and the crisis of democracy, Boulder, Westview Press, 1990, 64.

15. Robert McChesney, Telecommunications, mass media, and democracy, New York, Oxford University

Press, 1993, 18.

16. Richard Mahler, “Community radio: Its day in the sun,” Public telecommunications review, v.7 n.2,

March/April 1979, 70-75; Liora Salter, “Two directions on a one way street: Old and new approaches to

media analysis in two decades,” Studies in Communication v.1, 1980, 85-117; Barlow, 81-105; Bekken,

1998.

17. Alan Stavitsky, Robert K. Avery, and Helena Vanhala, “From class D to LPFM: The high powered

politics of low power radio,” Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly v.78 n.2, 2001, 340-354.

18. Alan Stavitsky, “The changing conception of localism in U.S. public radio,” Journal of broadcasting

and electronic media, v.38 n.1, 1994, 19-33.

19. Robert McChesney, Rich media, poor democracy: Communication politics in dubious times, New

York, The New Press, 2000, 63-76.

Notes

. Dallas Smythe, “On the political economy of communications,” Journalism quarterly, v.37, September

1960, 564.

xxi

. Ibid.

xxii

. Graham Murdock and Peter Golding, “For a political economy of mass communications,” in Ralph

Milibrand and John Saville eds., The Socialist Register, London, Merlin Press, 1973, 232.

xxiii

. Ibid. 223.

xxiv

. Ibid. 231.

xxv

. Nicholas Garnham, “The media and the public sphere,” in Oliver Boyd-Barrett and Chris Newbold,

Approaches to media: A reader, New York, Oxford University Press, 1986, 245.

xxvi

. Oscar Gandy, “The political economy approach: A critical challenge,” Journal of media economics, v.5

n.2, Summer 1992, 24.

xxvii

. Ibid. 31.

296

xxviii

. Ibid. 30.

xxix

. Vincent Mosco, The political economy of communication, Thousand Oaks, Sage, 133.

xxx

. James Hamilton, “Alternative media: Conceptual difficulties, critical possibilities,” Journal of

Communication Inquiry, v.24 n.4, Fall 2000, 363.

xxxi

. Ibid. 368.

xxxii

. Ibid. 371.

xxxiii

. Sydney W. Head, Christopher H. Sterling, Lemuel B. Schofield, Thomas Spann, and Michael

McGregor, Broadcasting in America, Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1998, 396.

xxxiv

. Ibid. 212.

xxxv

. Christopher H. Sterling and John Kittross, Stay tuned: A concise history of American broadcasting,

Mahwah, Lawrence Erlbaum and Associates, 2002, 40-41.

xxxvi

. Ibid. 563.

xxxvii

. Ibid. 566.

xxxviii

. Eric Barnouw, A history of broadcasting in the United States: Volume 3 – The image empire, New

York, Oxford University Press, 1970, 199-200.

xxxix

. Douglass Cater, “Introduction: The haphazard business of institution building,” in Douglass Cater and

Michael J. Nyhan, The future of public broadcasting, New York, Praeger Publishers, 1976, 3.

. Ibid. 4.

xli

. Witherspoon, Kovitz, Avery, and Stavitsky, 2000, 97.

xlii

. James Tracy, Direct action: Radical pacifism from the Union Eight to the Chicago Eight, Chicago,

University of Chicago Press, 1996, xv.

xliii

. Lorenzo Milam, Sex and broadcasting, Los Gatos, Dildo Press, 1971, 19.

xliv

. Ibid. 42.

xlv

Peter Fortunale and Joshua E. Mills, Radio in the television age, Woodstock, The Overlook Press, 1980,

174.

xlvi

. Ibid.

xlvii

. William Barlow, “Community radio in the U.S.: The struggle for a democratic medium, Media, culture

and society, v.10, 1988, 83.

xlviii

Ibid. 99.

297

xlix

. Bekken, 1.

. Ibid. 6.

. Ibid.

lii

. Peter M. Lewis and Jerry Booth, The invisible medium: Public, commercial and community radio,

Washington D.C., Howard University Press, 1990, 120-121.

liii

. Fairchild, 166.

liv

. Ibid. 167.

. Jesse Walker, Rebels on the air: An alternative history of radio in America, New York, New York

University Press, 2001, 143.

lvi

. Ibid. I45.

lvii

. Ibid. 146.

lviii

. John Dewey, The later works, 1925-1953, volume 1: Experience and nature, Jo Ann Boydston ed.,

Carbondale and Edwardsville, Southern Illinois University Press, 1988, 171.

lix

. Ibid. 134.

. Dewey, The public and its problems, New York, Henry Holt and Company, 1927, 219.

lxi

. Theodor W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer, “The culture industry: Enlightenment as mass deception,”

1947; available from Soundscapes.info 2, 2000, accessed 21 September 21 2005 at

<http://www.icce.rug.nl/~soundscapes/DATABASES/SWA/Some_writings_of_Adorno.html>.

lxii

. Ibid.

lxiii

. Ibid.

lxiv

. Raymond Williams, The long revolution, New York, Penguin Books, 1961, 348.

lxv

. Williams, Television: Technology and cultural form, New York, Schocken Books, 1975, 37.

lxvi

. Richard Hoggart, On culture and communication, New York, Oxford University Press, 1972, 23.

lxvii

. Michele Hilmes, Radio voices: American broadcasting, 1922-1952, Minneapolis, University of

Minnesota Press, 1997, xvi.

Notes

lxviii

. Sterling and Kittross, 248.

298

lxix

. Peters, John Durham, “Genealogical notes on ‘the field’,” in Mark R. Levy and Michael Gurevitch,

eds., Defining media studies, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1994, 376.

lxx

. Elihu Katz, “On conceptualizing media effects,” Studies in communication, v.1, 1980, 120.

lxxi

. Alan Stavitsky, “Counting the house in public television: A history of ratings use, 1953-1980,” Journal

of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, v.42 n.4, Fall1998, 521.

lxxii

. Denis McQuail, McQuail’s mass communication theory, Thousand Oaks, Sage, 2000, 7.

lxxiii

. Ibid.

lxxiv

. Ibid.

lxxv

. G. William Domhoff, “Studying power,” Santa Cruz, University of California Santa Cruz, 2005,

accessed 1 April, 2007 at http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/theory/studying_power.html.

lxxvi

. Ibid.

lxxvii

. J.M. Bernstein, “Introduction,” Theodor Adorno - The culture industry: Selected essays on mass

culture, J.M. Bernstein, ed., London, Routledge, 1991, 26-27.

lxxviii

. Ibid. 85-92.

lxxix

. Smythe, 1960, 563.

lxxx

. Ibid. 564.

lxxxi

. Ibid. 569.

lxxxii

. Dallas Smythe, “Communications: Blind spot of western Marxism,” Canadian journal of political and

social theory, v.1 n.3, Fall 1977, 20.

lxxxiii

. Murdock and Golding, 1973, 207.

lxxxiv

. Graham Murdock, “Blindspots about Western Marxism: A reply to Dallas Smythe,” Canadian

journal of political and social theory, v. 2 n.2, Spring-Summer 1978, 113.

lxxxv

. Ibid.

lxxxvi

. Murdock and Golding, 1973, 207-223.

lxxxvii

. Graham Murdock and Peter Golding, , “Culture, communications, and political economy,” in James

Curran and Michael Gurevitch (eds.), Mass media and society, New York, Oxford University Press, 1996,

lxxxix

. Mosco, 174.

. Ibid. 183.

xci

. Ibid. 196.

299

xcii

. Ibid. 204.

xciii

. Ibid. 212.

xciv

. Ibid. 219.

xcv

. Garnham, 250.

xcvi

. Mosco, 242.

xcvii

. Dewey, 1988, 133.

xcviii

. Ibid. 134.

xcix

. Ibid. 132.

. Ibid. 135.

. Ibid.

cii

. Ibid.

ciii

. Dewey, 1927, 213.

civ

. Ibid. 218-219.

. Ibid.

cvi

. Armand Mattelart and Michele Mattelart, Theories of communication, Thousand Oaks, Sage, 1998, 20-

21.

cvii

. Jurgen Habermas, The structural transformation of the public sphere, Thomas Burger and Frederick

Lawerence trans., Cambridge, MIT Press, 1991, 3

cviii

. Ibid. 24.

cix

. Ibid. 56.

. Ibid. 195.

cxi

. Craig Calhoun, “Introduction,” Habermas and the public sphere, Craig Calhoun ed., Cambridge, MIT

Press, 1997.

cxii

. Ibid. 33.

cxiii

. Ibid. 37.

cxiv

. Sydney W. Head, and Christopher H. Sterling, Lemuel B. Schofield, Thomas Spann, Michael A.

McGregor, Broadcasting in America, Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1998, 16.

300

cxv

. Williams, 1975, 28.

cxvi

. Ibid. 30.

cxvii

. Ibid. 31.

cxviii

. Hamilton, 2000, 362.

cxix

. Williams, 1975, 148.

cxx

. Hamilton, 2000, 362.

cxxi

. Ibid. 363.

cxxii

Lewis Hill, Voluntary listener-sponsorship, Berkeley, Pacifica Foundation, 1958, 2.

cxxiii

. Ibid. 5.

cxxiv

. Ibid. 6.

cxxv

. Ibid.

cxxvi

. Ibid.

cxxvii

. Ibid.

cxxviii

. Ibid. 7.

cxxix

. Lorenzo Milam, “A plan to change the world,” The Sun, n. 337, January 2004, 11-12.

cxxx

. Milam, 1975, 43.

cxxxi

. Barlow, 81.

cxxxii

. Ibid. 83.

cxxxiii

. Pacifica Foundation, Articles of incorporation, 1946, accessed 27 February 2006 at

http://www.pacifica.org/governance/460819_PacificaOriginalBylaws.html.

cxxxiv

. Barlow, 100.

cxxxv

. Fairchild, 92.

cxxxvi

. Lewis and Booth, 1990, 9.

cxxxvii

. Ibid. 8.

cxxxviii

. Ibid. 120-121.

cxxxix

. Mosco, 89.

301

cxl

. O’Connor, 1975, 5.

Notes

cxli

. Mosco, 27-29.

cxlii

. John Lewis Gaddis, The landscape of history, New York, Oxford University Press, 2002, 30

cxliii

. Ibid. 64.

cxliv

. James D. Startt and William David Sloan, Historical methods in mass communication, Northport,

Vision Press, 2003, 51.

cxlv

. Catherine Marshall and Gretchen B. Rossman, Designing qualitative research, Thousand Oaks, Sage,

1999, 2.

cxlvi

. Harold Garfinkel, Studies in ethnomethodology, Englewood Cliffs, Prentice- Hall, 1967, 8.

cxlvii

. Ibid. 34.

cxlviii

. Ibid.

cxlix

. Startt and Sloan, 182.

. Thomas R. Lindlof and Bryan C. Taylor, Qualitative communication research methods, Thousand Oaks,

Sage, 2002, 173.

cli

. Ibid.

clii

. M.E. McCombs and D.L. Shaw, “The agenda setting function of the press,” Public opinion quarterly,

n.36, 1972, 176-87.

cliii

. R.M. Entman, “Framing: Towards clarification of a fractured paradigm,” quoted in McQuail, 343.

cliv

. Ibid. 344.

clv

. Pamela Shoemaker and Stephen Reese, Mediating the message: Theories of influences on mass media

content, New York, Longman, 1991.

clvi

. Lindlof and Taylor, 17.

clvii

. Ibid.

clviii

. Peter Johansen, “For better, higher and nobler things,” Journalism history, v.27 n.3, 2001, 94.

clix

. Startt and Sloan, 158.

clx

. Martha Howell and Walter Prevenier, From reliable sources: An introduction to historical methods,

Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 2001, 150.

302

clxi

. Startt and Sloan, 179.

clxii

. Marshall and Rossman, 150.

clxiii

. Lindlof and Taylor, 218.

clxiv

. David L. Altheide, “Ethnographic content analysis,” Qualitative sociology, v.10 n.1, 1987, 65–77.

clxv

. Lindlof and Taylor, 215.

clxvi

. Earl Babbie, Observing ourselves: Essays in social research, Prospect Heights, Waveland Press, 1986,

15.

clxvii

. Ibid. 17.

Notes

clxviii

. Walker, 15.

clxix

. Susan Douglas, Listening in: Radio and the American imagination, New York, Random House, 1999,

68.

clxx

. Ibid.

clxxi

. Tom Lewis, Empire of the air: The men who made radio, New York, Harper Collins Publishers, 1991,

337.

clxxii

. Ibid. 5.

clxxiii

. Erik Barnouw, A tower in Babel: A history of broadcasting in the United States to 1933, New York,

Oxford University Press, 1966, 7-39.

clxxiv

. Christopher H. Sterling and John Michael Kitross, Stay tuned: The history of American broadcasting,

Mahwah, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2002, 30-32.

clxxv

. Ibid. 30-32. See also Barnouw, 1966, 42.

clxxvi

. Lewis, 69.

clxxvii

. Douglas, 1999, 57-58.

clxxviii

. Walker reports that “the number of active stations grew rapidly, from about 150 in 1905 to around

600 in 1910 to more than 10,000 in 1914,” 16.

clxxix

. See Barnouw, 1966, 28-32.

clxxx

. Sterling and Kitross, 40.

clxxxi

. Ibid. 42.

303

clxxxii

. Ibid. 43

clxxxiii

. Barnouw, 1966, 32.

clxxxiv

. Sterling and Kitross, 95. 360 meters is the equivalent of 833 kilohertz frequency on the AM band.

clxxxv

. Barnouw, 1966, 33-48.

clxxxvi

. Sterling and Kitross, 48.

clxxxvii

. Walker, 26.

clxxxviii

. Douglas, 1987, 288.

clxxxix

. Ibid.

cxc

. Sterling and Kitross, 57.

cxci

. Ibid. 58.

cxcii

. Barnouw, 1966, 60.

cxciii

. Sterling and Kitross, 63.

cxciv

. Walker, 29.

cxcv

. Barnouw, 1966, 61

cxcvi

. Sterling and Kitross, 45. See also Barnouw, 34-35.

cxcvii

. Barnouw, 1966, 64.

cxcviii

. Douglas, 1987, 259.

cxcix

. Ibid. 28.

. Douglas, 1999, 62.

cci

. Barnouw, 1966, 94.

ccii

. Sterling and Kitross, 94.

cciii

. Many of the original Class A AM stations survive to this day, including WABC (originally WJZ) New

York, KOA Denver, and KGO San Francisco. Under the right nighttime weather conditions, the signals

from these stations can still be heard over vast areas of the U.S. An explanation of the FCC’s AM station

classes is available on the Commission’s web site at <http://www.fcc.gov/mb/audio/amclasses.html>.

cciv

. Douglas B. Craig, “Radio at the margins,” in Fireside politics: Radio and political culture in the United

States, 1920-1940, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000, 237-238.

ccv

. Sterling and Kitross, 119.

304

ccvi

. McChesney, 1994, 14

ccvii

. Susan Smulyan, Selling radio: The commercialization of American broadcasting, 1925-1930,

Washington, Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994, 71.

ccviii

. Sterling and Kitross, 92.

ccix

. Barnouw, 1966, 281.

ccx

. Ibid. 301-302.

ccxi

. Craig, 67.

ccxii

. McChesney, 1994, 21-22.

ccxiii

. Barnouw, 1966, 301.

ccxiv

. FRC 1929, quoted in McChesney, 1994, 27.

ccxv

. Ibid.

ccxvi

. Walker, 40.

ccxvii

. Witherspoon, Kovitz, Avery, and Stavitsky, 6.

ccxviii

. Ibid. 6-9.

ccxix

. S.E. Frost Jr., Education's own stations: the history of broadcast licenses issued to educational

institutions, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1937.

ccxx

. Robert J. Blakely, To serve the public interest: Educational broadcasting in the United States,

Syracuse, Syracuse University Press, 1979, 53.

ccxxi

. Lewis, 248.

ccxxii

. Ibid. 269.

ccxxiii

. Ibid.

ccxxiv

. Erik Barnouw, The golden web: A history of broadcasting in the United States 1933-1953, New York,

Oxford University Press, 1968, 115.

ccxxv

. Ibid. 127.

ccxxvi

. Matthew Lasar, Pacifica Radio: The rise of an alternative network, Philadelphia, Temple University

Press, 1999, 7.

ccxxvii

. Ibid.

ccxxviii

. C. Stephen Evans, “Kierkegaard,” in Robert Audi, ed., The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy,

Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1999, 468-470.

305

ccxxix

. Among the Americans prominent in the interwar pacifist movement was a young Edward R. Murrow,

president of the National Student Federation of America in 1930-31. The NSFA provided Murrow with the

introduction to the people, politics, and culture of western Europe.

ccxxx

. Lawrence Wittner, Rebels against war: The American peace movement, 1933-1983, Philadelphia,

Temple University Press, 1984.

ccxxxi

. Lasar, 14.

ccxxxii

. James Tracy, Direct action: Radical pacifism from the Union Eight to the Chicago Eight, Chicago,

University of Chicago Press, 1996.

ccxxxiii

. Gretchen Lemke-Santangelo, “The radical conscientious objectors of World War II: Wartime

experience and postwar activism,” Radical History Review, n. 45, 1989, 6.

ccxxxiv

. Lasar, 25.

ccxxxv

. Hill, Lewis, quoted in James Tracy, Direct action: Radical pacifism from the Union Eight to the

Chicago Eight, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1996, 56.

ccxxxvi

. William Issel, “Liberalism and urban policy in San Francisco from the 1930s to the 1960s,” Western

Historical Quarterly, v. 22 n. 4, 1991, 432.

ccxxxvii

. Russ Coughlin, in Laurie Harper, Don Sherwood: The life and times of “The world’s greatest disc

jockey,” Rocklin, CA, Prima Publishing, 1989, 19.

ccxxxviii

. Issel, 437.

ccxxxix

. Ibid. 44.

ccxl

. Lasar, 46.

ccxli

. Ibid. 56-64.

ccxlii

. Ibid. 68.

ccxliii

. Ibid. 69.

ccxliv

. Lewis Hill, Voluntary listener sponsorship: A report to educational broadcasters on the experiment at

KPFA, Berkeley, California, Berkeley, Pacifica Foundation, 1958, 6.

ccxlv

. Ibid.

ccxlvi

. Ibid.

ccxlvii

. Lasar, 164.

ccxlviii

. Walker, 55.

306

ccxlix

. William Barlow, Voice Over: The Making of Black Radio, Philadelphia, Temple University Press,

1999, 99. See also Michael H. Burchett, “Notes on the 20th Century: The History of Black Radio

Broadcasting,” accessed 18 January 2006 at <http://www.terraplanepub.com/century12.htm>.

ccl

. Walker, 62-63.

ccli

. Lorenzo Wilson Milam, The cripple liberation front marching band blues, San Diego, Mho and Mho

Works, 1984, 16.

cclii

. Walker, 64.

ccliii

. Milam, 1984, 104.

ccliv

. Lorenzo Milam, “A plan to change the world,” The Sun, January 2004, 11.

cclv

. Ibid.

cclvi

. Milam, quoted in Walker, 64.

cclvii

. Milam, 2004, 11.

cclviii

. Ibid.

cclix

. Ibid. Though Milam’s efforts were unsuccessful, Pacifica would eventually license WPFW FM in

Washington D.C. in 1977.

cclx

. Ibid.

cclxi

. Milam, 1984, 127-134.

cclxii

. Milam, 2004, 12.

cclxiii

. Milam, 1984, 135

cclxiv

. Ibid.

cclxv

. Milam, 2004, 11-12.

cclxvi

. Ibid. 12

cclxvii

. Walker, 80.

cclxviii

. Ibid.

cclxix

. Ibid.

cclxx

. Ibid, attributed to John Bevelan.

cclxxi

. Scott Christiansen, “Tweaking the culture, Anchorage Press, V. 13, n. 34, 4, August 26 2004,

accessed 31 May 21, 2006 at <http://www.anchoragepress.com/archives-

2004/coverstoryvol13ed34.shtml>. Also Walker, 82.

307

cclxxii

. Ibid. Also Walker, 81.

cclxxiii

. Walker, 82.

cclxxiv

. Lorenzo Milam, “The first program guide,” The radio papers, San Diego, Mho and Mho Works,

1986, 4.

cclxxv

. Ibid. pp 3-5.

cclxxvi

. Lorenzo Milam, Sex and broadcasting,” Los Gatos, Dildo Press, 1975, 43.

cclxxvii

. Milam, “Supplementary radio,” 1986, 22.

cclxxviii

. Walker, 82.

cclxxix

. Milam, “Panels,” 1986, 11.

cclxxx

. Milam, “Programmed silence,” 1986, 6.

cclxxxi

. Milam, “Author’s introduction,” 1986, ii.

cclxxxii

. Milam, “Shambles,” 1986, 36.

cclxxxiii

. Milam, “The first program guide, ” 1986, 3. See also Walker, 86.

cclxxxiv

. Milam, “Shambles,” 1986, 36-37.

cclxxxv

. Milam, “Radio ego,” 1986, 56.

cclxxxvi

. Walker, 87.

cclxxxvii

. Grey Haertig, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Portland, Oregon, 20 April 2006.

cclxxxviii

. Milam, “Marathon,” 1986, 39.

cclxxxix

. Ibid. 38-39.

ccxc

. Ibid.

ccxci

. Ibid.

ccxcii

. Ibid. 40.

ccxciii

. Federal Communications Commission, Form 340 Application for authority to construct or make

changes in a noncommercial educational TV, FM or standard broadcast station,” submitted by the Jack

Straw Memorial Foundation, 22 December 1965, s.V-B 1 and exhibit 1 1-5.

ccxciv

. Walker, 89.

ccxcv

. Walker, 89-90; Christiansen, 5.

308

ccxcvi

. Tom Thomas, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 24 February 24

2005.

ccxcvii

. Ibid.

ccxcviii

. Walker, 90-91.

ccxcix

. Robert K. Avery and Robert Pepper, “Balancing the equation: Public radio comes of age,” Public

Telecommunications Review, March/April 1979, 22.

ccc

. Witherspoon, Kovitz, Avery, and Stavitsky, 10.

ccci

. Broadcasting Yearbook, Washington D.C., 1958, A-235.

cccii

. Public Broadcasting Service. The first measured century, 2000, accessed on line 19 November 2003 at

<http://www.pbs.org/fmc/book/pdf/ch5.pdf>.

ccciii

. A.C. Nielsen Company, “Estimates of ETV audience, October 1966,” in Public television: A program

for action, New York, Bantam Books, 1967, 251.

ccciv

. A.M. Sperber, Murrow: His life and times, New York, Fruendlich Books, 1986, 385.

cccv

. Robert Skedgell, quoted in Sperber, 385.

cccvi

. David Farber, The Age of great dreams: America in the 1960s, New York, Hill and Wang, 1994, 51–

52.

cccvii

. Erik Barnouw, Tube of plenty, New York, Oxford University Press, 1990. 142; Witherspoon et al, 11-

12.

cccviii

. John E. Burke, “The Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. Part I: Historical origins and the Carnegie

Commission,” Educational broadcasting review, v. 6, no. 2, April 1972, 107-110; Witherspoon et al, 12.

cccix

. Witherspoon et al, 13.

cccx

. William Harley, interview by Burton Harrison, interview transcript, The public radio oral history

project, National Public Broadcasting Archive, College Park, University of Maryland, 29 October 1978, 9

cccxi

. Ibid.

cccxii

. Robert Caro, The years of Lyndon Johnson: Means of ascent, New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1990,

xxxiii.

cccxiii

. Burke, 107.

cccxiv

. Avery and Pepper, 23.

cccxv

. Jerrold Sandler, interview with Burton Harrison, interview transcript, The public radio oral history

project, National Public Broadcasting Archive, College Park, University of Maryland, 24 October 1978, 1-

309

cccxvi

. Avery and Pepper, 23; Witherspoon et al, 13-14.

cccxvii

. John E. Burke, “The Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. Part 2: The Carnegie Commission report,

development of legislation, and the second national conference on long-range financing,” Educational

broadcasting review, v. 6, no. 3, June 1972, 181.

cccxviii

. Ibid. 183-5.

cccxix

. Sandler, interview with Harrison, 20.

cccxx

. Edward Berkowitz, “Losing ground: The Great Society in historical perspective,” in David Farber,

David and Beth Bailey, The Columbia Guide to America in the 1960s, New York, Columbia University

Press, 2001, 105-106.

cccxxi

. The Public Broadcasting Act of 1967, 4, accessed on line 28 January, 2007 at

<http://www.cpb.org/aboutpb/act/pbact.pdf>.

cccxxii

. McCauley, 23-24.

cccxxiii

. Todd Gitlin, The sixties: Years of hope, days of rage, New York, Bantam books, 1993, 164.

cccxxiv

. Lasar, 221.

cccxxv

. Ibid. 185.

cccxxvi

. Ibid. 343. An eyewitness account of the underground newspaper movement is available in Abe Peck,

Uncovering the sixties: The life and times of the underground press, New York, Pantheon Books, 1985.

Peck worked for the Chicago Seed.

cccxxvii

. Milam, 1975, 229.

cccxxviii

. Gitlin, 211.

cccxxix

. Sterling and Kitross, 433.

cccxxx

. Reverend Richard Hodges, “Alternative media project,” Its alright ma [student newspaper], Plainfield

VT, Goddard College, v.1, n. 5,15 April 1970, accessed 15 August 2006 at

<http://wgdr.net/wgdrsite/archive/AMP/Scans3/studentpaperamGIF>.

cccxxxi

Parker Donham, “Media freaks act out battles of the radicals,” Boston Globe, 21 June 1970, 29,

accessed 15 August 2006 at <http://wgdr.net/wgdrsite/archive/AMP/Scans2/freakarticle1.GIF>.

cccxxxii

. Walker, 106.

cccxxxiii

. The Woodstock Music and Art Fair, billed as “3 days of peace and music” drew more than 300,000

to the rural area around Bethel, New York in August, 1969.

cccxxxiv

. Jeremy Lansman, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 4 June 2006.

310

cccxxxv

. Al Aronowitz, “Vermont vibrations,” New York Post, 19 June 1970, 38, accessed 28 January 2007 at

<http://wgdr.net/wgdrsite/archive/AMP/Scans2/nypostarticle.GIF>. Aronowitz is most famous as the

person who introduced Bob Dylan to the Beatles, as recounted in Martin Scorsese’s documentary on Dylan,

No Direction Home.

cccxxxvi

. Richard Todd, “Alternatives,” Atlantic Monthly, November 1970, n.226, 112, accessed 15 August

2006 at <http://wgdr.net/wgdrsite/archive/AMP/Scans3/ampatlantic.GIF>.

cccxxxvii

. Donham, 30-31.

cccxxxviii

. Ibid.

cccxxxix

. Ibid. 31.

cccxl

. Milam, 1975, 351.

cccxli

Ibid.; Nan Rubin, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 12 May 2006.

cccxlii

. Milam, 1975, 154-155.

cccxliii

. Ibid.

cccxliv

. Ibid.

cccxlv

. Ibid.

cccxlvi

. Ibid.

cccxlvii

. Ibid.

cccxlviii

. Ibid. 158.

cccxlix

. Rubin interview.

cccl

. Haertig interview.

cccli

. Milam, 1975, 157.

ccclii

. David Freedman, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Portland, Oregon, 20 April 2006.

cccliii

. Milam, 1975, 157.

cccliv

. Freedman interview.

ccclv

. Ibid.

ccclvi

. Ibid.

ccclvii

. Ibid.

ccclviii

. Ibid.

311

ccclix

. Ibid.

ccclx

. Ibid.

ccclxi

. Ibid.

ccclxii

. Ibid.

Notes

ccclxiii

. “Weather,” Madison Capital Times, 18 June 1975. Thanks to Michele Hilmes at the University of

Wisconsin for this information.

ccclxiv

. Lorenzo Milam, in a letter to radio stations, 9 March 1975. Correspondence file, National Federation

of Community Broadcasters, Oakland, California.

ccclxv

. Ibid.

ccclxvi

. Julia Bottles, “Like KDIC? Thank activists, Noyce and the FCC,” Scarlet & Black, online edition, 6

October 2006, v. 123, n. 6, accessed 7 November 2006 at

<http://web.grinnell.edu/sandb/archives/Volume_123/Number_6/arts/002.html>. The original station

manager recalls that much of the startup equipment for KDIC was donated by Intel founder Charles Noyce.

ccclxvii

. Bill Thomas, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 3 November 2004.

ccclxviii

. Ibid.

ccclxix

. Mike O’Connor, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 1 June 2006.

ccclxx

. Ibid.

ccclxxi

. Ibid.

ccclxxii

. Milam letter, 9 March 1975.

ccclxxiii

. Ibid.

ccclxxiv

. Ibid.

ccclxxv

. Ibid.

ccclxxvi

. Bill Thomas, in a letter to radio stations, 28 April 1975, National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, Oakland, California.

ccclxxvii

. Ibid.

ccclxxviii

. Ibid.

ccclxxix

. Bill Thomas, in a letter to radio stations dated between 9 March and 28 April 1975, National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, Oakland, California.

312

ccclxxx

. Ibid.

ccclxxxi

. Several underground newspapers joined together in the late 1960s to form the Liberation News

Service, but the operation fell apart as the participants succumbed to organizational friction and financial

hardship, described by Peck, 1985.

ccclxxxii

. Terry Clifford, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 24 February 24

2005.

ccclxxxiii

. Tom Thomas, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 19 January 2007.

ccclxxxiv

. Ibid.

ccclxxxv

. Ibid.

ccclxxxvi

. Bill Thomas interview, 2004.

ccclxxxvii

. Buckley Broadcasting/WOR, “WOR History,” 2006, Accessed 9 February 2007 at

<http://wor710.com/pages/58403.php>. Mutual’s national programs included The Shadow, 20 Questions,

and Can You Top This?

ccclxxxviii

. Rich McClear, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 11 June 2006.

ccclxxxix

. Lasar, 168.

cccxc

. Rich McClear interview.

cccxci

. Ibid.

cccxcii

. The historical record offers conflicting spellings of the conference title and the acronym. Some

documents, including the front cover of the event program, use a capital K to spell Konvention. Other

documents use conventional spelling, including the rear of the event program. With the exception of direct

references to the title printed on the convention program cover, the C spelling is used here to demonstrate

consistency between the acronym and the associated colloquialism.

cccxciii

. Bill Thomas, National Alternative Radio Konvention (conference program), Madison, 17 June 1975,

7-8.

cccxciv

. Bruce Theriault, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 2 June 2006.

cccxcv

. Rich McClear interview.

cccxcvi

. Susan McClear, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 11 June 2006.

cccxcvii

. Bill Thomas, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 24 October 2006.

cccxcviii

. Lorenzo Milam, NARC program, 3-4.

cccxcix

. NARC program, 9.

. Ibid. 8.

313

cdi

. Rich McClear interview.

cdii

. NARC program, p.11.

cdiii

. Theriault interview.

cdiv

. Ibid.

cdv

. Ibid.

cdvi

. Mike O’Connor, The National Federation of Community Broadcasters: The Constitutional Convention

Report, Madison, National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 1975, 2.

cdvii

Ibid. 1.

cdviii

. Dave Taylor, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 31 May 2006.

cdix

. Pat Watkins, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 31 May 2006.

cdx

. Ibid.

cdxi

. Ibid.

cdxii

. Ibid.

cdxiii

. Mike O’Connor, Constitutional Convention Report, 2-3.

cdxiv

. Ibid.

cdxv

. Ibid. 13-14.

cdxvi

. Ibid.

cdxvii

. Ibid. 16.

cdxviii

. Ibid.

cdxix

. Ibid. 3.

cdxx

. Ibid. 7.

cdxxi

. Ibid. 8.

cdxxii

. Ibid.

cdxxiii

. Ibid. 6.

cdxxiv

. Ibid. 7

cdxxv

. Ibid. 11-12.

314

cdxxvi

. Ibid.

cdxxvii

. Ibid.

cdxxviii

. Ibid. 9.

cdxxix

. Ibid. 10.

cdxxx

. Ibid.

cdxxxi

. Ibid.

cdxxxii

. Rubin interview.

cdxxxiii

. Ibid.

cdxxxiv

. Ibid.

cdxxxv

. Mike O’Connor, Constitutional convention report, 4.

cdxxxvi

. Ibid. 4-5.

cdxxxvii

. Ibid. 5.

cdxxxviii

. Ibid.

cdxxxix

. Ibid. 3.

cdxl

. Don Mussell, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Portland, Oregon, 20 April 2006.

cdxli

. Ibid.

cdxlii

. Ibid.

cdxliii

. Ibid.

cdxliv

. National Federation of Community Broadcasters [NFCB], untitled newsletter, v.1 n.2, 1 October

1975, 3.

cdxlv

. Ibid.

cdxlvi

. Ibid.

cdxlvii

. Ibid. p.1.

cdxlviii

. Ibid. 2.

cdxlix

. John Crigler, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 14 May 2006.

cdl

. NFCB, untitled newsletter, v.1 n.2, 1 October 1975, 2.

315

cdli

. Ibid, 1; Tom Thomas interview, 2005. Johnson’s post-FCC career in chronicled in Beth Caron Fratkin,

The National Citizens Committee for Broadcasting: A Forgotten Chapter of Media Reform Movement of

the 1960s and 1970s, unpublished masters thesis, University of Utah, May 2002, accessed 17 February

2007 at <http://www.cc.utah.edu/~bcf2/thesis.html>.

cdlii

. Tom Thomas interview, 2005. Kramer’s efforts are documented in Howard Junker, “The greening of

Nicholas Johnson,” Rolling Stone, 1 April 1971, 32-39, accessed 17 February 2007 at

<http://www.nicholasjohnson.org/about/rollston.html>.

cdliii

. Media Access Project, “About MAP,” 2002, accessed 17 February 2007 at

<http://www.mediaaccess.org/about/>.

cdliv

. Lorenzo Milam, writing as Pastor A.M. Allworthy, The petition against God, Dallas, Christ the Light

Works, 1975, 17-19.

cdlv

. Ibid.

cdlvi

. Ibid.

cdlvii

. Ibid.

cdlviii

. Ibid.

cdlix

. Federal Communications Commission, 75-946: In the matter of RM-2943 Memorandum Opinion and

Order, Washington D.C., 1 August 1975, 941-942. In The petition against God, Milam claimed the FCC

received 1.5 million letters.

cdlx

. Ibid.

cdlxi

. Ibid.

cdlxii

. Ibid. 945.

cdlxiii

. Ibid. 950.

cdlxiv

. Ibid. 951.

cdlxv

. NFCB, untitled newsletter, v.1 n.3, 15 October 1975, 1.

cdlxvi

. Ibid.

cdlxvii

. Ibid.

cdlxviii

. NFCB, NFCB Newsletter, v.1 n.5, 15 November 1975, 1,3.

cdlxix

. Ibid.

cdlxx

. NFCB/Possible Tape Exchange, untitled catalog, 1975, 1.

cdlxxi

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.1, 26 January 1976, 5-6.

316

cdlxxii

. Ibid.

cdlxxiii

. Ibid. 1, 3-4.

cdlxxiv

. Ibid. 7.

cdlxxv

. NFCB Newsletter, v.1 n.6, 1 December 1975, 2.

cdlxxvi

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.1, 26 January 1976, 8.

cdlxxvii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.2, 9 February 1976, 1.

cdlxxviii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.4, 8 March 1976, 1.

cdlxxix

. Ibid. 3-4.

cdlxxx

. Ibid. 3.

cdlxxxi

. Ibid.

cdlxxxii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.7, 3 May 1976, 1,4.

cdlxxxiii

. Ibid.

cdlxxxiv

. Ibid.

cdlxxxv

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.6, 5 April1976, 1,4.

cdlxxxvi

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.7, 19 April1976, 3.

cdlxxxvii

. Lorenzo Milam, “Towards a new generation of ideas,” NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.10, 31 May 1976, 1.

cdlxxxviii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.10, 31 May 1976, 2.

cdlxxxix

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.11, 14 June 1976, 3.

cdxc

. National Alternative Radio Konvention (conference program), 1-7.

cdxci

. NARC 2 Telluride 1976 (conference program), Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, 16 June 1976, 2-3.

cdxcii

. Ibid. 2, 33-38, 12-18.

cdxciii

. Ibid, 17.

cdxciv

. Rich McClear interview.

cdxcv

. Susie McClear interview.

cdxcvi

. O’Connor interview.

317

cdxcvii

. Rich McClear interview.

cdxcviii

. O’Connor interview.

cdxcix

. Ibid.

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.12, 12 July 1976, 2-3.

. Ibid.

dii

. Ibid.

diii

. Ibid. 1.

div

. Tom Thomas, “The Inside Story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.16, October1976, 2.

. Ibid.

dvi

. Nan Rubin, “First NFCB regional conference held, NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.16, October1976, 1.

dvii

. Ibid.

dviii

. Ibid.

dix

. Bill Thomas, “Muffin crumbs in the typewriter,” NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.16, October1976, 5.

. Bill Thomas, “Possible tape exchange,” NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.18, December 1976, 3.

dxi

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.18, December 1976, 1.

dxii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.13, 26 July 1976, 1.

dxiii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.16, October 1976, 3.

dxiv

. “Legal Eagle,” NFCB Newsletter, v.2 n.17, November 1976, 4-5.

dxv

. NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.1, January 1977, 1.

dxvi

. Ibid.

dxvii

. The FCC divides the FM band into channels separated by .2 mHz (200 kHz), beginning at 88.1 mHz.

The next channel occupies 88.3, then 88.5, 88.7, 88.9, and so on up to 107.9 mHz. Concurrently, the

regulations protect any signal on an assigned FM channel from interference on the first, second, and third

adjacent channels above or below the assigned frequency. For example, a station assigned to 89.5 mHz is

protected from 89.3 and 89.7 mHz (the 1st adjacent channels), 89.1 and 89.9 mHz (2nd adjacent channels),

and 88.9 and 90.1 mHz (3rd adjacent channels). Under conditions of haphazard allotment and oversight,

protection from adjacent channel interference can result in large chunks of unusable spectrum.

dxviii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.1, January 1977, 1.

318

dxix

. Ibid.

dxx

. Rubin interview.

dxxi

. Milam (as Allworthy), 1975, 21.

dxxii

. Tom Thomas, “Tuning up the band,” NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.4, April 1977, 4.

dxxiii

. Rubin interview.

dxxiv

. Nan Rubin, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.7, July 1977, 3.

dxxv

. NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.6, June 1977, 3.

dxxvi

. NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.3, March 1977, 1.

dxxvii

. NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.7, July 1977, 4.

dxxviii

. Ibid. 1.

dxxix

. Ibid. 4.

dxxx

. Ibid. 1,5.

dxxxi

. “Introduction,” 1977 Annual Report, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, August 1977, 2.

dxxxii

. Ibid.

dxxxiii

. Ibid.

dxxxiv

. Ibid. 19-21.

dxxxv

. NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.9, October 1977, 1.

dxxxvi

. NFCB Newsletter, v.3 n.8, September 1977, 1.

dxxxvii

. “Legislation,” 1977 Annual Report, 13.

Notes

dxxxviii

. “NFCB Steering Committee elected at conference,” NFCB Newsletter, v.3, n.8, September 1977, 2.

dxxxix

. Theriault interview.

dxl

. Ibid.

dxli

. “Timeline: Alaska Pipeline chronology,” The Alaska Pipeline, Washington D.C., Public Broadcasting

Service, 2006, accessed 26 February 2007 at

<http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/pipeline/filmmore/index.html>.

319

dxlii

. “General fund unrestricted petroleum revenue – history FY 1959-2006,” Fall 2006 revenue source

book, Juneau, Alaska Department of Revenue Tax Division, 2, accessed 19 August 2006 at

<http://www.tax.state.ak.us/sourcesbook/PetroleumRevenue.pdf#search=%22Alaska%20state%20tax%20r

evenues%201975%20198>.

dxliii

. Theriault interview.

dxliv

. “Statement of Thomas J. Thomas, Executive Director, National Federation of Community

Broadcasters,” Public Broadcasting Act of 1978, Washington D.C., Subcommittee on Communications,

House of Representatives Committee on Interstate Commerce and Foreign Commerce, April 19, 1978, 581.

dxlv

. Tom Thomas, “Tuning up the band: FCC strikes a chord,” NFCB Newsletter, v.4, n.6, June 1978, 1, 4-

dxlvi

. “We were very fond of the NFCB Newsletter,” recalled attorney John Crigler in a 2006 interview with

the author. “Mike Bader – he used to get the Newsletter and he would read it, because he read everything,

and then he would drop it in my office and he would say, ‘this is the best newsletter in the broadcast

business. It’s got more information, more succinctly summarized than anything else out there.’”

dxlvii

. 1978 NFCB Annual Report, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters,

1978, 4-14.

dxlviii

. Hugo Morales, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene Oregon, 16 June 2006.

dxlix

. Jeannette Soriano, “Harvard’s Latino community thirty years and counting,” ReVista Harvard review

of Latin America, Cambridge MA, David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies, Harvard

University, Fall 2001, accessed 20 September 2006 at

<http://drclas.fas.harvard.edu/revista/articles/view/590>.

. Morales interview.

dli

. Ibid.

dlii

. “KFCF 88.1FM,” Fresno Free College Foundation annual report 2005-2006, Fresno CA, Fresno Free

College Foundation, 2006, accessed 26 February 2007 at <http://www.kfcf.org/>.

dliii

. Morales interview.

dliv

. “National conference,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.6, September 1979, 1.

dlv

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.1, January 1979, 7-8.

dlvi

. Morales interview.

dlvii

. “Application search results,” Media Bureau CDBS, Washington D.C., Federal Communications

Commission, accessed 26 February 2007 at <http://svartifoss2.fcc.gov/cgi-

bin/ws.exe/prod/cdbs/pubacc/prod/app_list.pl>.

dlviii

. Morales interview.

dlix

. “New members approved,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.6, September 1979, 5.

320

dlx

. “Members elect 79-80 leadership,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.6, September 1979, 3.

dlxi

. “Archive and outreach project underway in Champaign,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.1, January 1979, 1;

“Include NFCB distribution in your program grant,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.1, January 1979, 6.

dlxii

. “Program service news,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.4, May-June 1979, 4.

dlxiii

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.4 n.5, May 1978, 2.

dlxiv

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.2, February 1979, 2.

dlxv

. “New bill shifts gears for public broadcasting,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.3, March-April1979, 4;

“Carnegie: Agenda for change,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.1, February 1979, 1.

dlxvi

. House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce Subcommittee on Communications, The

Communications Act of 1979: Hearings on H.R.11100, H.R.12021, and H.R.12073, 95th Cong., 2nd sess,

1978, 160-179.

dlxvii

. “1978 Funding Bill,” NFCB Newsletter, v.4 n.10, October 1978, 1,7.

dlxviii

. “Planning Grant,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.4, May-June 1979, 7.

dlxix

, Tom Thomas and Theresa Clifford, “Planning for community radio,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.4, May-

June 1979, 8-11.

dlxx

. Ibid. “Planning for community radio (2),” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.5, July-August 1979, 8-13.

dlxxi

. Ibid. “Minorities and community radio,” NFCB Newsletter, v.5 n.5, July-August 1979, 4-7.

dlxxii

. Ibid.

dlxxiii

. Dennis Kita, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 27 June 2006; Tom

Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.1, January 1980, 6.

dlxxiv

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.1, January 1980, 6.

dlxxv

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.2, March 1980, 2.

dlxxvi

. McCauley, 50.

dlxxvii

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.2, March 1980, 2.

dlxxviii

. Theriault interview.

dlxxix

. Rich McClear interview.

dlxxx

. Ibid.

dlxxxi

. “New NFCB members,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.2, March 1980, 8.

321

dlxxxii

. Bruce Theriault, “Planning for community radio (3),” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.1, January 1980, 8.

dlxxxiii

. Ibid.

dlxxxiv

. Ibid. 9.

dlxxxv

. Ibid. 13.

dlxxxvi

. “NFCB holds planning meeting,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.2, March 1980, 1,3.

dlxxxvii

. Ibid.

dlxxxviii

. Kita interview.

dlxxxix

. Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford, “Minority ownership in public radio,” reprinted from the NFCB

Newsletter, 1980, 1.

dxc

. “Working conference for minority producers in public radio,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.3, August 29

1980, 4.

dxci

. Kita interview.

dxcii

. Peggy Berryhill, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 6 June 2006.

dxciii

. Sharon Maeda, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Seattle, Washington, 26 May 2006.

dxciv

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.3, 2.

dxcv

. “NFCB to offer programs over satellite system,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.4, 8 October 1980, 1.

dxcvi

. “CPB revises radio funding, opens door for station grants,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.34, 1,3.

dxcvii

. “Funds of public policy work,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.6, 10 December 1980, 1.

dxcviii

. “Steering committee meeting,” NFCB Newsletter, v.6 n.6, 10 December 1980, 1.

dxcix

. Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford, “Community radio in the 80’s – The national environment,” NFCB

Newsletter, v.7 n.1, 15 January 1981, 8.

. Ibid. 7.

dci

. Douglas Kellner, Television and the crisis in democracy, Boulder CO, Westview Press, 1990, 92.

dcii

. Nicholas Johnson, “Media concentration: A historical perspective,” lecture, FCC Commissioners Copps

and Adelstein Forum on Media Concentration St. Paul MN, 9 December 2004, accessed on line 1 March

2007 at <http://www.nicholasjohnson.org/writing/masmedia/FCCForum.html>.

dciii

. Thomas and Clifford, “Community radio in the 80’s – The national environment,” 4.

dciv

. “Public broadcasting wins first round on budget cuts,” NFCB Newsletter, v.7 n.2, 1 April 1981, 1.

322

dcv

. “Public broadcasting funding bill passed,” NFCB Newsletter, v.7 n.5, 20 August 1981, 1.

dcvi

. Thomas and Clifford, “Community radio in the 80’s – The national environment,” 7.

dcvii

. Theriault interview.

dcviii

. “Governance and finances,” NFCB Annual Report 1981-82, Washington, D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, June 1982, 12.

dcix

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.8 n.2, April 1982, 2.

dcx

. “New access to NPR programs,” NFCB Newsletter, v.8 n.1, February 1982, 1.

dcxi

. “CPB changes two funding programs,” NFCB Newsletter, v.8 n.4-5, 30 June 1982, 1.

dcxii

. “Facilities funds,” NFCB Newsletter, v.7 n.8, 28 December 1981, 1.

dcxiii

. Facilities funds,” NFCB Newsletter, v.8 n.8, 18 October1982, 1.

dcxiv

. “CPB: Good news and bad,” NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.3-4, 21March 1983, 1.

dcxv

. “New NPR program fees set,” NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.2, 10 February 1983, 1,8.

dcxvi

. McCauley, 57.

dcxvii

. Ibid. 56-57.

dcxviii

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.3-4, 21 March 1983, 2.

dcxix

. “NPR budget bombshell,” NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.5, 2 May 1983, 1.

dcxx

. Taylor interview.

dcxxi

. Ibid.

dcxxii

. Ibid.

dcxxiii

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.5, 2 May 1983, 2.

dcxxiv

. Ibid.

dcxxv

. Tom Thomas, “NFCB budget and activity planning – General concerns,” memorandum to the NFCB

Steering Committee, 18 January 1983, 2-3.

dcxxvi

. Tom Thomas, “NFCB budget and activity planning – Issues and options in major activity areas,

memorandum to the NFCB Steering Committee, 18 January 1983, 1.

dcxxvii

. Ibid, 2.

dcxxviii

. Ibid, “NFCB budget and activity planning – General concerns,” 18 January 1983, 4.

323

dcxxix

. Ibid, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.5, 2 May 1983, 2.

dcxxx

. Ibid, “Refining budget/activity options,” memorandum to the NFCB Steering Committee, 5 February

1983, 4-5.

dcxxxi

. Ibid. “Revenue projections,” 1-2.

dcxxxii

. “NFCB begins financing project, NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.6-7, 15 June 1983, 1,16.

dcxxxiii

. “NFCB receives Markle support,” NFCB Newsletter, v.9 n.12, 8 December 1983, 1.

dcxxxiv

. “NFCB to seek new president,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.3, 15 March 1983, 1.

dcxxxv

. Tom Thomas, memorandum to the NFCB Steering Committee, 20 February 1984, 1, Tom Thomas

papers, National Federation of Community Broadcasters, Oakland CA.

dcxxxvi

. Tom Thomas interview, 2007.

dcxxxvii

. Indicia, NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.3, 15 March 1983, 2.

dcxxxviii

. Tom Thomas interview, 2007.

dcxxxix

. Tom Thomas, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.1, 11 January 1984, 2.

dcxl

. Ibid.

dcxli

. “NPR members focus on debt,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.5, 8 May 1984, 2.

dcxlii

. “Federal funding still vital,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.4, 2 April 1984, 1,8.

dcxliii

. “Deregulated!,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.6-7, 2 July 1984, 1,16.

dcxliv

. “On the hill: More dereg,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.3, 15 March 1984, 5.

dcxlv

. Tom Thomas, memorandum to the NFCB Steering Committee, 3 March 1984, 1-10, Tom Thomas

papers, National Federation of Community Broadcasters, Oakland CA.

dcxlvi

. Tom Thomas, memorandum to the NFCB Steering Committee, 10 March 1984, 1-10, Tom Thomas

papers, National Federation of Community Broadcasters, Oakland CA.

dcxlvii

. Barbara Day and Betsy Rubenstein, “Minutes of annual NFCB members meeting August 15, 17, and

18, 1984; Washington D.C.,” 3-4.

dcxlviii

. “CPB honors Thomas and Clifford,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.8-9, 14 September 1984, 1.

dcxlix

. Day and Rubenstein, “Minutes,” 1.

Notes

dcl

. Diane Kaplan, unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 25 July 2006.

324

dcli

. Ibid.

dclii

. Ibid.

dcliii

. Ibid.

dcliv

. Ibid.

dclv

. Ibid.

dclvi

. Ibid.

dclvii

. “…And members meetings,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.8-9, 14 September 1984, 11.

dclviii

. Kaplan interview.

dclix

. Morales interview.

dclx

. Carol Schatz, unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 6 June 2006; KYUK

AM, Home page, Bethel AK, Bethel Broadcasting, accessed 10 March 2007 at

<http://www.kyuk.org/radio.htm>.

dclxi

. “Schatz elected NFCB president,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.8-9, 14 September 1984, 1.

dclxii

. Schatz interview.

dclxiii

. “Schatz elected NFCB president.”

dclxiv

. Ibid.

dclxv

. Schatz interview.

dclxvi

. Carol Schatz, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.8-9, 14 September 1984, 2.

dclxvii

. Ibid.

dclxviii

. Ibid.

dclxix

. $5.35 million in supplemental funds to go to stations,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.10, 1 October 1984,

1; Tom Thomas, email to the author, 12 March 2007.

dclxx

. Ibid.

dclxxi

. “CPB establishes FY’85 national radio program fund,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.12, 30 November

1984, 1.

dclxxii

. “CPB authorization vetoed again,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.11, 1 November 1984, 1.

dclxxiii

. “Reagan approves CPB FY’87 appropriation,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.12, 30 November 1984, 3.

325

dclxxiv

. Schatz interview.

dclxxv

. Schatz interview; Lynn Chadwick, unpublished interview with Michael Huntsberger, Eugene Oregon,

6 January 2007.

dclxxvi

. “Babcock Foundation renews NFCB finance project support,” NFCB Newsletter, v.10 n.12, 30

November 1984, 1.

dclxxvii

. “FCC freezes noncoms,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.1, 9 January 1985, 1.

dclxxviii

. Ibid.

dclxxix

. Ibid. 3.

dclxxx

. Watkins interview.

dclxxxi

. “FCC relaxes freeze: NFCB requests further lifting,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.2, 4 February 1985,

1,3,12.

dclxxxii

. “The inside story – NPR recommends ‘buy-back’,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.2, 4 February 1985, 2.

dclxxxiii

. Ibid. 8.

dclxxxiv

. Ibid.

dclxxxv

. “CPB supports increasing station share of federal funds,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.3-4, 8 April

1985, 1,3.

dclxxxvi

. “NPR revises business plan,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.5, 7 May 1985, 1,2.

dclxxxvii

. Ibid; Wayne Roth, unpublished interview with Michael Huntsberger, Seattle, Washington, 25 May

2006.

dclxxxviii

. “FCC accepts NFCB’s, others’ proposed interference rules,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.6, 17 June

1985, 1,2,9.

dclxxxix

. Ibid.

dcxc

. Schatz interview.

dcxci

. “NFCB participants,” Ten years – NFCB conference schedule of activities, July 22-28, 1985,

Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, July 1985, 25.

dcxcii

. Carol Schatz, “Welcome letter,” Ten years – NFCB conference schedule of activities, July 22-28,

1985, 3.

dcxciii

. Betsy Rubenstein, “Minutes of NFCB steering committee meeting, July 22 1985, Madison

Wisconsin,” Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 1985, p 3.

dcxciv

. Indicia, NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.9-10, 10 October 1985, 2.

326

dcxcv

. “Minutes of NFCB steering committee meeting, July 22 1985, Madison Wisconsin,” pp 2-3.

dcxcvi

. Taylor interview.

dcxcvii

. Ibid.

dcxcviii

. Carol Schatz, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.3, 3 March 1986, 1.

dcxcix

. “CPB action brings station autonomy nearer,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.1-2, 18 February 1986, 1.

dcc

. “5-0 vote launches radio program fund,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.5 19 May 1986, 1.

dcci

. Carol Schatz, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.9-10, 2.

dccii

. “CPB funding scheme unlocks public radio’s future,” NFCB Newsletter, v.11 n.11-12, 3.

dcciii

. Indicia, NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.5, 2.

dcciv

. Bill Thomas interview, 2006.

dccv

. “Reaching new heights,” (advertisement), NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.4, 1 April 1986, 4.

dccvi

. “NFCB launches two successful RF transmission training seminars,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.8-10,

October 1986, 5.

dccvii

. “Wednesday, July 23,” The public radio training conference – schedule of activities July 20-24, 1986

(conference program), Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, July 1986, 23.

dccviii

. “NFCB – Taking care of business,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.8-10, 4.

dccix

. Charles Tom Davis, “Minutes of NFCB steering committee meeting, October 10-11, 1986, San

Francisco, California,” Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 1986, pp 1-9.

dccx

. Rich McClear interview.

dccxi

. Carol Schatz, “The inside story,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.8-10, 2.

dccxii

. Schatz interview.

dccxiii

. “NFCB President resigns: Paves way for further progress,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.8-10, 1; Schatz

interview.

dccxiv

. Bill Thomas interview, 2006.

dccxv

. David LePage, unpublished interview with Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 13 June 2006.

dccxvi

. Ibid.

dccxvii

. Ibid.

327

dccxviii

. Ibid.

dccxix

. Ibid.

dccxx

. Ibid.

dccxxi

. Ibid.

dccxxii

. Ibid.

dccxxiii

. Ibid.

dccxxiv

. Ibid.

dccxxv

. Ibid.

dccxxvi

. Ibid.

dccxxvii

. Ibid.

dccxxviii

. “CSG criteria for radio changed,” NFCB Newsletter, v.12 n.12, 2.

dccxxix

. LePage interview.

dccxxx

. Diane Kaplan, “Executive steering committee meeting results,” (memorandum), Washington D.C.,

National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 24 November 1986, 1-2.

dccxxxi

. Pat Watkins, “1987 business meeting – Washington, D.C. April 26 & 27th 1987 Public Radio

Training Conference – Boulder, CO July 3-6th,” (memorandum), Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, 19 November 1986, 1-2.

dccxxxii

. Kathy E. Anderson, “NPR audience building task force report NFCB survey of member stations,”

(memorandum), Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 18 November 1986,

1-3.

dccxxxiii

. Ibid.

dccxxxiv

. Ibid.

dccxxxv

. “Legislative update,” NFCB Newsletter, v.13 n.1, Winter 1987, 3.

dccxxxvi

. “CPB news: Board meetings,” NFCB Newsletter, v.13 n.1, 3.

dccxxxvii

. “Public radio: Minorities claim their share,” NFCB Newsletter, v.13 n.1, 7.

dccxxxviii

. Kathy E. Anderson, “NFCB business meeting report,” (memorandum), Washington D.C., National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, 19 May 1987, pp 1-6.

dccxxxix

. Ibid.

dccxl

. Lynn Chadwick, unpublished interview with Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 5 March 2005.

328

dccxli

. Ibid.

dccxlii

. Ibid.

dccxliii

. Ibid.

dccxliv

. Ibid.

dccxlv

. Ibid.

dccxlvi

. Ibid.

dccxlvii

. Ibid.

dccxlviii

. Ibid.

dccxlix

. Ibid.

dccl

. Ibid. Chadwick refers to Bill Thomas as “the Zelig of community radio.”

dccli

. Ibid.

dcclii

. Ibid.

dccliii

. Ibid.; Chadwick interview, 2007.

dccliv

. Ibid.

dcclv

. Lynn Chadwick, “NFCB President’s report,” Public radio training conference schedule of activities,

July 24-28 1987 Boulder Colorado hosted by KGNU-FM, Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, July 1987, 3.

dcclvi

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dcclvii

. Lynn Chadwick, “President’s memo,” (memorandum), Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, September 1987, 1-2.

dcclviii

. Ibid.

dcclix

. Lynn Chadwick, “Inside story – permanent funding for public broadcasting/A transfer fee on station

sales,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, October 1987, 1-

dcclx

. NFCB Community Radio Monthly, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, August/September 1987.

dcclxi

. Lynn Chadwick, “Inside story – interiors,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, January 1988, 2.

329

dcclxii

. “NFCB receives $25,000 NEA media arts grant,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, October 1987, 3.

dcclxiii

. LePage interview.

dcclxiv

. Ibid.

dcclxv

. Ibid.

dcclxvi

. Rich McClear interview.

dcclxvii

. Lynn Chadwick, “The inside story – Testimony for public broadcasting oversight hearings,” NFCB

News, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, December 1987, 1-2.

dcclxviii

. “Public broadcasting trust fund and Fairness Doctrine defeated in Senate,” NFCB News, Washington

D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, December 1987, 3.

dcclxix

. LePage interview.

dcclxx

. Ibid.

dcclxxi

. Watkins interview.

dcclxxii

. Lynn Chadwick, “Inside story,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, February 1988, 1.

dcclxxiii

. Phillip Shenon, “North, Poindexter and 2 others indicted on Iran-Contra fraud and theft charges,”

The New York Times, 17 March 1988, A1.

dcclxxiv

. Public Telecommunications Act of 1988, HR 4118, 100th Cong., 2nd sess, accessed 18 March 2007

at <http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-

bin/bdquery/z?d100:HR04118:@@@L&summ2=m&|TOM:/bss/d100query.html>.

dcclxxv

. Public Telecommunications Act of 1988, S. 2114, 100th Cong., 2nd sess., Accessed 22 September

2006 at <http://thomas.loc.gove/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d100:23:./temp/~bdg4FJ:@@@D&summ2=m&>.

dcclxxvi

. Lynn Chadwick, “Inside story,” NFCB News, February 1988, 1.

dcclxxvii

. LePage interview.

dcclxxviii

. A history of the use of audience research in public radio is available in Alan Stavitsky, “Guys in

suits with charts: Audience research in U.S. public radio,” Journal of broadcasting and electronic media,

v.39 n.2, spring 1995, 177-189.

dcclxxix

. Lynn Chadwick, “Inside story,” NFCB News, March 1988, 1.

dcclxxx

. LePage interview.

dcclxxxi

. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation Statement Subcommittee on

Communications, Public Telecommunications Act of 1988: Hearing on S. 2114, 100th Cong., 2nd sess., 15

March 988, 155-156.

330

dcclxxxii

. Ibid.

dcclxxxiii

. Ibid. 156-157.

dcclxxxiv

. Ibid.

dcclxxxv

. Ibid. 157-158.

dcclxxxvi

. Ibid.

dcclxxxvii

. Ibid. 9-13.

dcclxxxviii

. Ibid.

dcclxxxix

. Ibid.

dccxc

. Ibid. 24-27.

dccxci

. Ibid. 210-211.

dccxcii

. Gibbs Kinderman, unpublished interview with Michael Huntsberger, Portland, Oregon, 21 April

2006; Rich McClear interview.

dccxciii

. Lynn Chadwick, “Inside story,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, April 1988, 1-3.

dccxciv

. “Saturday, April 16,” The National Federation of Community Broadcasters Annual Conference April

14-18, 1988 (conference program), Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters,

April 1988, 7.

dccxcv

. Ibid.

dccxcvi

. Chadwick interview, 2007; Lynn Chadwick, “Cover story,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, June 1988, 1.

dccxcvii

. Tom Thomas interview, 2007; Thomas J. Thomas and Theresa R. Clifford, Expansion and

diversification of public radio, Takoma Park, Station Resource Group, August 1988.

dccxcviii

. “As we go to press…,” NFCB News, June 1988, 1.

dccxcix

. McClear interview.

dccc

. Morales interview.

dccci

. “As we go to press…,” NFCB News, June 1988, 1.

dcccii

. Lynn Chadwick, “Cover story,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, August 1988, 1.

dccciii

. Thomas and Clifford, Expansion and diversification of public radio, August 1988, 1.

331

dccciv

. Lynn Chadwick, “Cover story: Public radio’s audience,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, July 1988, 1-3.

dcccv

. Ibid.

dcccvi

. Ibid.

dcccvii

. Ibid.

dcccviii

. Ibid.

dcccix

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dcccx

. Ibid.

dcccxi

. “Wayne Roth is new NPR board chair,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, November 1988, 4.

dcccxii

. Public Telecommunications Act of 1988, HR 4118; “Public broadcasting bill update,” NFCB News,

Washington D.C., National Federation of Community Broadcasters, November 1988, 3-4.

dcccxiii

. Donald Ledwig, “CPB’s role in public broadcasting,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, September 1988, 2-3. Ledwig provided this essay at the request of

NFCB.

dcccxiv

. Public Telecommunications Act of 1988, HR 4118.

dcccxv

. Ibid.

dcccxvi

. Ibid.

dcccxvii

. “Public broadcasting bill update,” NFCB News, November 1988, 3-4.

dcccxviii

. Tom Thomas interview, 2007.

dcccxix

. “At a glance,” NFCB News, November 1988, 16.

dcccxx

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dcccxxi

. Tom Thomas interview, 2007.

dcccxxii

. Ibid.

dcccxxiii

. Lynn Chadwick, “Cover story,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, February 1989, 1-3.

dcccxxiv

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dcccxxv

. Lynn Chadwick, “Cover story,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, February 1989, 1-3.

332

dcccxxvi

. Theriault interview.

dcccxxvii

. “The members of the public radio expansion task force,” Public radio expansion task force final

report, Washington D.C., National Public Radio, November 1989, ii.

dcccxxviii

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dcccxxix

. Tom Thomas interview, 2007.

dcccxxx

. “Highlights of the CPB board meeting,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, April 1989, 4.

dcccxxxi

. “Highlights of the CPB board meeting,” NFCB News, Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, April 1989, 4.

dcccxxxii

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dcccxxxiii

. Lynn Chadwick, “Cover story,” NFCB News, April 1989, 1.

dcccxxxiv

. The National Federation of Community Broadcasters Annual Conference & Membership meeting,

May 14-17 1989 (conference program), Washington D.C., National Federation of Community

Broadcasters, May 1989, 4-10.

dcccxxxv

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dcccxxxvi

. Ibid.

dcccxxxvii

. Ibid.

dcccxxxviii

. Dale Ouzts, “The task force recommendations,” Public radio expansion task force final report,

Washington D.C., National Public Radio, November 1989, 16-17.

dcccxxxix

. Ibid.

dcccxl

. Ibid.

dcccxli

. Ibid. “Strategic framework – changing our view of the system,” 16.

dcccxlii

. Lynn Chadwick, “Cover story,” Community radio news, Washington D.C., National Federation of

Community Broadcasters, January 1991, 1.

dcccxliii

. “How many public broadcasting stations are there?” About public broadcasting, Washington D.C.,

Corporation for Public Broadcasting, 2007, accessed 25 March 2007 at

<http://www.cpb.org/aboutpb/faq/stations.html>.

dcccxliv

. House Committee on Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Telecommunications and Finance,

Corporation for public broadcasting reauthorization: Hearing. 102nd Cong. 1st sess., 7 July 1991, 164.

dcccxlv

. Ibid.

333

dcccxlvi

. Ibid, 166.

dcccxlvii

. “CPB president will not seek re-election,” Community radio news, Washington D.C., National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, October 1991, 9.

dcccxlviii

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

Notes

dcccxlix

. Marty Durlin, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 1 June 2006.

dcccl

. Bill Wax, Unpublished interview by Michael Huntsberger, Eugene, Oregon, 2 June 2006.

dcccli

. Chadwick interview, 2007.

dccclii

. Ibid.

dcccliii

. Ibid.

dcccliv

. Ibid.

dccclv

. Ibid.

dccclvi

. Walker, 170.

dccclvii

. Ibid.

dccclviii

. Ibid.

dccclix

. Theriault interview.

dccclx

. Edmund Burke, Speech on the conciliation of America, 1775, accessed 26 March 2007 at

<http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext04/burke10.txt>.

dccclxi

. Tom Thomas and Terry Clifford, Public radio’s financial support, Takoma Park, Station Resource

Group, 1992, 3.

dccclxii

. Walker, 134-171.

dccclxiii

. Ibid.

dccclxiv

. Robert L. Hilliard and Michael Keith, The quieted voice: The rise and demise of localism in

American radio, Carbondale, Southern Illinois Press, 2005, 193.

dccclxv

. “Our mission,” About Prometheus, Prometheus Radio Project, 12 October 2005, accessed 27 March

2007 at <http://oldsite.prometheusradio.org/mission.shtml>.

dccclxvi

. “Staff,” About NFCB, National Federation of Community Broadcasters, 2007, accessed 27 March

2007 at <http://www.nfcb.org/about/staff.jsp>.

334

dccclxvii

. “2006 member roster,” 2006 NFCB membership meeting (report), Washington D.C., National

Federation of Community Broadcasters, 22 April 2006, 12-16.

dccclxviii

. Field notes, Low Power FM stations affiliates meeting, Baltimore, National Federation of

Community Broadcasters Community Radio Conference, 14 April 2005.

dccclxix

. Stavitsky, Avery, and Vanhala, 341-354.

dccclxx

. Freedman interview.

dccclxxi

. Taylor interview.

dccclxxii

. Ibid.

dccclxxiii

. Ibid.

dccclxxiv

. Christopher Stern, “The coming tug of war over the Internet,” The Washington Post, 22 January

2007, B1.

335

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