That evening, Pittsburgh radio station KDKA broadcast results from the presidential election.
Transcript
You’re listening to Today in History, a closer look at an event from the past.
Welcome to Slow English FM and World Discovery, where we explore a moment in history and what it changed. We share news and stories in clear English to help us understand the world. Today, we’re going to Pittsburgh, on November 2, 1920.
EmmaThat evening, Pittsburgh radio station KDKA broadcast results from the presidential election. The race was between Republican Warren G. Harding and Democrat James M. Cox. KDKA got the results by telephone from the Pittsburgh Post newspaper.
To understand why this broadcast mattered, it helps to know what radio was like then. Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company, a maker of electrical and radio equipment, established KDKA. The station used radio to send voices over the air, so people with radio receivers could listen from a distance.
EmmaVoice over radio was not brand new. People had sent speech by radio since 1906. But this was largely limited to military and amateur radio users. Morse code, a system of dots and dashes, was also used to send messages. KDKA showed how a company-backed station could share information with listeners beyond one-to-one radio exchanges.
Frank Conrad, a Westinghouse radio engineer and amateur radio operator, helped establish KDKA in Pittsburgh. His work linked amateur radio experiments with a station backed by a company and meant to reach more listeners.
EmmaStill, few people owned radio receivers. The Federal Judicial Center, which studies the history of the courts, gives the broadcast an approximate range of 300 miles. Before KDKA, radio hobbyists were already sending messages and listening to experimental speech and music broadcasts. So this broadcast did not begin radio listening. It brought wide attention to a new kind of public broadcast.
KDKA’s election-night broadcast is widely called the first commercial radio broadcast. Some radio experts dispute the broader claim that it was the first station. There were no advertisements in the broadcast. The Library of Congress says November 2 is the date most often cited for the start of broadcasting as we commonly understand it.
EmmaThe broadcast helped show what radio could do, and it contributed to the radio boom of the 1920s. As more stations began broadcasting, they had to share a limited number of usable frequencies. Stations could interfere with one another. The Federal Judicial Center traces later federal rules to this problem. The government created the Federal Radio Commission in 1927 and the Federal Communications Commission, or FCC, in 1934.
On election night in 1920, KDKA carried results from a newspaper to radio listeners. That broadcast became a landmark in the growth of public radio. Thanks for joining World Discovery on Slow English FM. Stay with us for more clear English and stories about the world.
Vocabulary in this episode
- broadcast results
That evening, Pittsburgh radio station KDKA broadcast results from the presidential election.
The station sent the election results out by radio so people could hear them.
- maker
Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company, a maker of electrical and radio equipment, established KDKA.
Here, a maker is a company that produces goods.
- over the air
The station used radio to send voices over the air, so people with radio receivers could listen from a distance.
This means sending sound by radio signals through the air.
- largely limited to
But this was largely limited to military and amateur radio users.
This means that, for the most part, only military and amateur radio users could do this.
- amateur radio
But this was largely limited to military and amateur radio users.
Radio used by people as a hobby, rather than as their job.
- amateur radio
Frank Conrad, a Westinghouse radio engineer and amateur radio operator, helped establish KDKA in Pittsburgh.
Radio used as a hobby; an amateur radio operator is someone who uses it as a hobby.
- amateur radio
His work linked amateur radio experiments with a station backed by a company and meant to reach more listeners.
Radio used as a hobby, rather than as a job.
- one-to-one
KDKA showed how a company-backed station could share information with listeners beyond one-to-one radio exchanges.
A one-to-one exchange is a communication between just two people or stations.
- company-backed
KDKA showed how a company-backed station could share information with listeners beyond one-to-one radio exchanges.
The station had support from a company.
- approximate range
The Federal Judicial Center, which studies the history of the courts, gives the broadcast an approximate range of 300 miles.
This is an estimated distance over which people could receive the broadcast.
- dispute
Some radio experts dispute the broader claim that it was the first station.
Here, dispute means that the experts disagree with the claim.
- cited
The Library of Congress says November 2 is the date most often cited for the start of broadcasting as we commonly understand it.
Here, cited means mentioned as support for the date.
- interfere with
Stations could interfere with one another.
This means that one station's signals could disturb another station's signals.
- landmark
That broadcast became a landmark in the growth of public radio.
Here, a landmark is an important event in the development of public radio.