Rebels on the Air: An Alternative History of Radio in America

337 Pages·2001·2.78 MB·English

by  Jesse Walker

REBELS ON THE AIR

JESSE WALKER
REBELS ON THE AIR
An Alternative History of Radio in America
a
New York University Press • New York and London
For Mom,Dad,and Andrew
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS
New York and London
© 2001 by New York University
All rights reserved
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Walker, Jesse, 1970–
Rebels on the air : an alternative history of radio in America /
Jesse Walker.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-8147-9381-9 (alk. paper)
1. Radio broadcasting—United States—History. 2. Radio
broadcasting policy—United States. 3. Amateur radio stations—
United States. I. Title.
PN1991.3.U6 W35 2001
384.54'0973—dc21 2001003030
New York University Press books are printed on acid-free paper,
and their binding materials are chosen for strength and durability.
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
l Joe’s Garage 1
2 The First Broadcasters 13
3 Siberia 41
4 The ’60s 69
5 Into the ’70s 99
6 Money from Washington 134
7 Free Radio Abroad 172
8 American Pirates 197
9 Micro Radio: Every Man a DJ 209
10 The FCC’s Wars 245
11 CB, the Internet, and Beyond 270
Notes 285
Index 313
About the Author 326
v

Acknowledgments
It’s a funny thing about journalism: the more sources you have, the more
they contradict one another. After a while, the parts of your book that
seem the most solid are the ones you feel the least confident about. Some-
where out there, you tell yourself, are all the witnesses to history that
you couldn’t find, and once the book appears, they’ll write to tell you
everything you got wrong. (They can reach me at [email protected].)
That said, it feels like I’ve met, spoken on the phone, and/or traded
e-mails with virtually everyone ever involved with any kind of radio.
My thanks to everyone who answered my questions: David Adelson,
Don Agostino, Martin Allard, Angel Babudro, Michael Bader, Beverly
Baker, Jack Balsley, Frank Bardacke, Harriet Bascus, Mara Beth Ben-
jamin, Larry Bensky, Bob Bergstresser, Dana Berliner, Bob Bickford,
Rasta Black, Jeff Blankfort, Bo the Lover, Mike Bracy, Ed Bremer, Doug
Brewer, Willie Brown (not the mayor!), Steve Buckley, Scott Bullock,
Jeannie Bunton, Brian Butler, Ted Byfield, Lynn Chadwick, Jerry Cham-
kis, Sue Cohen, Clare Conrad, Tad Cook, John Crigler, Ronald Davis,
Frank Dean, Carol Denney, Jim Dingeman, Esty Dinur, Angel Dones,
Kate Duncan, Stephen Dunifer, Marty Durlin, Laura Ellen, Jim Ellinger,
Mac England, Lorenzo Ervin, Shawn Ewald, Eyebrow, Kathy Fennessy,
Diane Fleming, Jim Foley, Chuck Forsberg, Peter Franck, Stephen
Franco, Alan Freed (not the ’50s DJ), Ken Freedman, James Gattuso, Lyn
Gerry, Maria Gilardin, Bruce Girard, Bill Goldsmith, Charley Goodman,
Joshua Greenland, Paul Griffin, Doug Henwood, Paul Hernandez,
Luke Hiken, Ray Hill, Penelope Houston, David Huff, Lisa Huff, Ace
Humble, Mo Humble, Neva Humble, Amanda Huron, Thom Irwin,
Vince Ivory, Jef Jaisun, Jonathan Jay, Double O Jones, David Josephson,
Don Joyce, Vincent Kajunski, William Kennard, Mona Kennerson, Kelly
Kombat, Alan Korn, Fred Krock, James Lane, Jeremy Lansman, David
Leder, Michael Levier, Otis Maclay, Mike Malone, Bob Marston, R. Paul
Martin, Cathy Melio, Lorenzo Milam, Morgan Miller, Phil Miller, Nicole
Mones, Jim Moody, Chuck Munson, Allen Myers, Tom Ness, Joseph
vii
viii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Noonan, Mike O’Connor, Paul Odekirk, John Ohliger, Willy One Blood,
Robbie Osman, Geov Parrish, Jeff Perlstein, John Perry, Frederick Pha-
neuf, Pirate Jim, Reverend Poppybreath, Adam Clayton Powell III, Ron
Powell, Des Preston, Stephen Provizer, Joe Ptak, Paul Riismandel, How-
ard Rosenfeld, Wayne Roth, Greg Ruggiero, Steven Sandler, Paul Saw-
yer, Paul Schaffer, Danny Schechter, Don Schellhardt, Max Schmid, Tom
Schreiner, Curt Schroell, Pat Scott, Ruth Seymour, Mike Shay, Mike
Siegel, David Silberman, Melodie Silverwolf, Jim Simmons, Troy Skeels,
Sam Smith, Norman Solomon, John Sommers, Peter Spagnuolo, Clare
Spark, Bill Spry, Jerry Starr, Zeal Stefanoff, Cheryl Stopnick, Sue Supri-
ano, Chris Sutherland, Jerry Szoka, Parry Teasdale, Tom Thomas, John
Tirpack, Travesty, Pete triDish, Tony Truong, Phil Tymon, Uncle Sher-
man, Eduardo Vera, Dennis Wharton, Harvey Wheeler, Greg Whit-
comb, Napoleon Williams, John Winston, Andy Wolcott, Jenny Wong,
Mark Worth, Joni Wright, Larry Yurdin, Tom Zarecki, and Sara Zia-
Ebrahimi, plus a few anonymous informants (on both sides of the law)
and various people whose names now escape me or who answered e-
mails I’ve foolishly forgotten.
Some of these people merely replied to a quick query or two. Others
gave me hours of their time. Many became friends. One or two became
the opposite, and a few more may decide they don’t like me when they
see what I’ve written about them. I appreciate their help, nonetheless.
Thanks also to several fellow writers on radio who generously
shared their advice, their research, or the occasional lead: John Ander-
son, Jon Bekken, Tom Bell, Ted Coopman, Sarah Ferguson, Tom Hazlett,
Benn Kobb, Richard Kostelanetz, Matthew Lasar, David MacFarland,
Anita McCormick, Ron Sakolsky, Solveig Singleton, Tracy Jake Siska,
John Whiting, and Andrew Yoder. Similar thanks are due my fellow ed-
itors at Reason,both for their help and for their patience: Brian Doherty,
Charles Paul Freund, Nick Gillespie, Chris Hull, Michael Lynch, Vir-
ginia Postrel, Sara Rimensnyder, Jacob Sullum, and Jeff Taylor. Fellow
staffers Mike Alissi, Barbara Busch, Robert Honrado, and Mary Toledo
also offered some valuable assistance, as did our former colleagues
RiShawn Biddle, Mariel Garza, Jennifer George, and Ryan Sager.
Yet more appreciation, less evenly distributed, is owed to the mem-
bers of the Freepacifica, MRN, Pho, and Progressive Radio e-mail lists.
And I offer a warm thank-you to my former colleagues at WCBN and
KSER: it was DJing with you that started me on this particular road.
Several people read and gave me useful feedback on parts of the
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ix
book: Bryan Alexander, Josey Ballenger, Alison Clark, Nathan Crow,
Lyn Gerry, Michael A. Levine, Meredith McGhan, Virginia Postrel, Sta-
cia Proefrock, Dave Rahbari, Timothy Virkkala, Jessamyn West, and
John Whiting. Three more—Matthew Lasar, Lorenzo Milam, and Sara
Ryan—read the whole blasted manuscript. Several publications al-
lowed me to work out portions of the book in their pages: I owe thanks
to the editors of the Alternative Press Review, the Cato Institute’s Policy
Analysis series, Chronicles, Hobby Broadcasting, Inside.com, Liberty, the
New Republic,the Portland Free Press,the Seattle Scroll,and Z—and Rea-
son,of course.
Then there’s the broad “miscellaneous” category: from Mike Pay-
son, who called me whenever radio-related material arrived in his
bookstore, to Chad Williams, who helped me track down the lyrics to
“Convoy.” I couldn’t possibly list everyone who rendered such timely
kindnesses, but here are a few more: Matt Asher, Mary Beth Barber,
Jonathan Chait, Bill Kauffman, Rona Kobell, Wendy McElroy, Hugh
Morley, Michael Papadopoulos, Debbie Shamoon, and Martin Wooster.
I owe a great debt to many writers who came before me. The
granddaddy of all the recent revisionist histories of radio is Erik
Barnouw, whose three-volume History of Broadcasting in the United States
is essential reading. The economic analysis of telecom policy has not
been the same since Ronald Coase published his classic article, “The
Federal Communications Commission” in 1959. And of the many good
books about radio that have appeared since then, two deserve special
mention here: Susan Douglas’s Inventing American Broadcasting(1987), a
strong influence on chapter 2 of this book, and Matthew Lasar’s Pacifica
Radio(1999), an equally strong influence on chapter 3.
Thank you to my editor, Eric Zinner, and to my agents, Lynn Chu
and Glenn Hartley, for their help in bringing this book into print. Thank
you to Despina Papazoglou Gimbel for supervising the editing and pro-
duction and to Judy Kipp for compiling the index. Thank you to my old
cohorts at Entity Haus, and to my fellow members of the Liberty dias-
pora. And thanks, finally, to my family: to my brother, Andrew, and my
parents, David and Marjorie. I’m not sure what strange bug prompted
me to write a book, but I know they had a role in infecting me with it.