Tag Archives: college radio

College Radio’s Rich Legacy: Latest Updates from DLARC

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Highlights include 1980s radio interviews with LL Cool J, Sonic Youth and more, 1960s amateur radio footage, college radio oral histories, and radio station correspondence from the 1940s-1960s 

By Jennifer Waits, Curator of the DLARC College Radio Collection

Feast your eyes and ears on the latest additions to the college radio collection within the Digital Library of Amateur Radio and Communications! Over the past few months we’ve added materials from numerous college radio stations and archives, including vintage and contemporary audio, film, and video pieces. 

Recruitment flyer from New York University college radio station WNYU

Most recently, the archivists at New York University student radio station WNYU-FM have contributed a number of 1980s radio interviews with music luminaries, including LL Cool J, ESG, members of Sonic Youth (Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore in 1984 and Kim Gordon in 1986), Billy Idol, and Jello Biafra. Also in the WNYU collection is audio from the station’s inaugural FM broadcast in 1973, plus paper items like program guides, flyers, and correspondence.

Another “first” broadcast recording, from campus-only AM station WWEC in 1963, is part of the Elizabethtown College Radio collection. Adding even more context to the story of radio on this Pennsylvania-based college campus is a collection of interviews conducted in 2014-2015 as part of the WWEC Oral History Project. Other WWEC items include station meeting minutes, history documents and a  Top 30 list from 1974. Elizabethtown College’s radio efforts were also represented by work done by its publicity office. Hundreds of pages of scripts for the shows “Campus Calling” and “From the Elizabethtown College Campus,” are other new additions to DLARC.

As was the case at Elizabethtown College, Auburn University also produced promotional radio programs that aired on local stations. Among the items that we’ve added from Auburn University are more than 2,000 installments of the weekly radio show “AU Profiles,” airchecks and shows recorded at student radio station WEGL, and a set of interviews about the history of WEGL.

But perhaps my favorite recent audio-visual addition is a compilation of 1960s home movies that document activities of University of Pennsylvania’s amateur radio club. They reside in our new Penn Amateur Radio Club archive, which collects items from this historically-significant club that began as the Wireless Club of the University of Pennsylvania in 1909. Early student wireless clubs were the incubators for future broadcast stations, so we hope to increase the representation of both high school and collegiate amateur radio clubs in DLARC.

Another area of curatorial interest is college radio at women’s colleges, especially since many women’s colleges built radio stations during the early carrier current boom in the 1940s and 1950s. DLARC’s new Smith College Radio Club and Stations collection provides context for understanding the college radio landscape during this time and what it was like for new stations trying to get their start. Within the collection are numerous folders full of correspondence, items from college radio conferences (including one hosted by Smith College station WCSR), organizational documents, scripts, and program schedules. Newer materials include flyers and program guides from the currently operating FM station at Smith: WOZQ-FM.  

Additionally, we continue to grow our collection of Intercollegiate Broadcasting System (IBS) materials. As mentioned in our July update, this college radio trade organization began in 1940 and has been hosting conventions and producing newsletters and other publications ever since. Since they don’t have their own archive, we’ve been piecing one together thanks to all the college radio stations and institutions that have carefully preserved IBS items over the years. 

As part of this effort, we added over 200 pages of IBS correspondence and related items from Smith College and have also sleuthed out various missing issues of IBS’ Journal of College Radio from a variety of sources, bringing our grand total to just about 100 issues. Do you have copies of IBS’ Journal of College Radio in your own collection? Our wish list includes College Radio (Volumes 1-3), Journal of College Radio (Volume 13.2, 19.4, 19.5, 20-22, 25.4 and any subsequent issues), and IBS newsletters and bulletins from many eras.

"Are you interested in radio" flyer from New York University college radio station WNYU

Finally, we have some new collections that we are just starting to populate. Take a peek at the WFMU and WHUS collections for more college radio goodies. And be sure to scope around DLARC College Radio to find other gems from stations where we haven’t established a designated collection. One of my favorites is a short animation demonstrating a Valentine’s Day-themed ‘zine from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s college radio station KCPR. 

The Digital Library of Amateur Radio & Communications is funded by a grant from Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) to create a free digital library for the radio community, researchers, educators, and students. DLARC invites radio clubs, radio stations, archives and individuals to submit material in any format. To contribute or ask questions about the project, contact: Kay Savetz at kay@archive.org.

DLARC Adds Over 1,300 Items to New College Radio Collection

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By Jennifer Waits, Curator of the DLARC College Radio Collection

In fall 2023, after learning about the amazing breadth of The Internet Archive’s Digital Library of Amateur Radio and Communications (DLARC), I started to dream about what a college radio version of that collection would look like. I shared with curator Kay Savetz some of my “wish-list” items, which developed into a plan to develop a college radio collection within DLARC.

Cover of the February 1967 issue of College Radio magazine. A large image shows a woman and a man using a large radio control board.

Launched in February 2024, DLARC’s college radio collection now contains more than 1,300 items related to student radio’s past and present. Materials in the collection include ‘zines, radio station program guides, flyers, playlists, correspondence, books, academic theses, magazines, and more. 

Publication highlights include KDViationS, the ‘zine/program guide produced by student radio station KDVS at UC Davis; RiFLe from University of Kentucky’s college radio station WRFL; and program guides from WHRB (Harvard), KUCI (UC Irvine), and WMBR (MIT).

Additionally, we’ve created a handful of radio station collections for KFJC (Foothill College), WKNC (North Carolina State University), WTUL (Tulane University) and WSUA/WCDB (University at Albany). Take a trip back in time to find 1970s “music surveys,” punk flyers from the 1980s, radio station handbooks, brochures, and other ephemera.

College radio’s storied history stretches back to the early days of radio, with the first student stations launching in the 1920s. One of the initial goals of DLARC’s college radio collection is to locate items from not only the early days of college radio, but also from long-standing college radio trade organizations like The Intercollegiate Broadcasting System (IBS). Established in 1940, IBS began as a trade organization for campus-only AM carrier-current radio stations. It has been producing newsletters, publications, educational manuals, and conferences since its inception. 

Despite IBS’ long history, it does not maintain its own archive; so it’s significant that we have built an Intercollegiate Broadcasting System collection within DLARC’s college radio collection. Now at over 200 items, the IBS materials include conference guides, promotional pieces, IBS newsletters from the 1950s, 1960s-era correspondence with radio stations, and nearly 80 issues of College Radio/The Journal of College Radio from 1966 to 1982. Full of station profiles, FCC updates, music industry reports, engineering tips, and more; College Radio/The Journal of College Radio was produced from 1965 to the early 1990s. We are still filling in gaps in the collection and are searching for more issues of this publication, as well as IBS’ earlier publications from the 1940s and 1950s (IBS Bulletin and IBS Newsletter).

DLARC College Radio also includes collections for two other student broadcasting organizations:  The National Association of College Broadcasters (which existed from 1988 to 1998) and College Broadcasters Inc. (1999 to present). 

These materials give scholars and college radio enthusiasts a richer picture of the history of college radio and the ways that student radio practitioners have intersected with both the broader radio community and music culture. If you have college radio materials that you’d like to donate to DLARC, please reach out!

The Digital Library of Amateur Radio & Communications is funded by a grant from Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) to create a free digital library for the radio community, researchers, educators, and students. DLARC invites radio clubs, radio stations, archives and individuals to submit material in any format. To contribute or ask questions about the project, contact: Kay Savetz at kay@archive.org.