Chapter 6: Popular Radio and the Origins of Broadcasting
True/False
1. Radio evolved from technology developed in the 1840s.
2. Group radio station owners prefer syndicated over locally produced programs.
3. Guglielmo Marconi is initially credited with inventing the wireless telegraph.
4. Inventor Lee De Forest developed a vacuum tube capable of detecting and amplifying radio
signals.
5. The 1996 Telecommunications Act set off an unprecedented consolidation in radio station
ownership.
6. The Radio Corporation of America (RCA) was formed after World War I to give the United
States an early worldwide monopoly over radio broadcasting.
7. Alexander Popov was a Russian academic whose experiments in wireless communication
occurred at roughly the same time as Marconi’s.
8. Nikola Tesla was the founder of the first radio network.
9. Network radio helped give the United States “a national identity.”
10. William Paley built the CBS network by charging large fees to its affiliates.
11. Congress created National Public Radio to help win the Cold War.
12. Radio soap operas got their name because they were often sponsored by makers of soap
products.
13. Early radio inventors like Marconi focused on ship-to-shore communication.
14. The invention of the transistor in the late 1940s made radio more accessible and portable than
ever.
15. The Wireless Ship Act of 1910 resulted from the sinking of the Titanic.
16. Internet radio stations are those that stream or simulcast a version of their on-air signal over the
Web or that create a station exclusive to the Internet.
17. The period of the 1920s through the 1940s was marked by a proliferation of informative and
entertaining radio programs.
18. The Radio Act of 1927 created the Radio Corporation of America.
19. AM radio is superior to FM radio for broadcasting music.
20. The first person to discover and develop FM radio in the 1920s and the 1930s was David
Sarnoff of RCA.
21. The aim of networks such as CBS and NBC was to serve the public interest.
22. The radio industry transformed its business model in the 1950s because of television.
23. In the 1940s, NBC sold its Blue network, which then became CBS.
24. Payola is the illegal practice of record promoters paying deejays to play certain songs on the air.
25. The term Top 40 is derived from the number of records stored in a jukebox, and Top 40 format
refers to the forty most popular hits in a given week as measured by record sales.
26. Jazz music formats in radio today reach more total listeners than any other format.
27. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 has resulted in more competition and less consolidation
in U.S. radio.
28. Most of the applicants for low-power FM radio licenses have been national retailers like Wal-
Mart.
29. Most radio markets in the United States are dominated by a few owners.
30. The nation’s largest radio network is owned by telephone giant AT&T.
31. The practice of payola affected 1950s radio, but does not occur today.
Multiple Choice
Note: The correct answer is asterisked.
32. The very earliest uses of Marconi’s wireless radio were for
33. Which event led to the Radio Act of 1912 (which required most large ships to carry wireless
technology)?
34. The telegraph was useless as a means of communicating between ships at sea or between ships
and the shore because
35. The act that first emphasized that broadcasters did not own their channels but were granted
licenses provided that they operated in the “public interest, convenience, or necessity” was the
36. What did the government do with radio when the United States entered World War I?
37. The person credited with making the first voice broadcast is
38. In the late 1920s, which of the following was not a part owner of the National Broadcasting
Company?
39. As a new network, CBS was able to compete with NBC by
40. Who set up a crude radio station above his Pittsburgh garage in 1919?
41. What time period is considered the “golden age” of radio?
42. The transistor made radio receivers
43. Radio formats usually target special audiences according to
44. Compared to AM radio, FM radio
45. The ________________ was important to radio technology because it allowed radio signals to
be amplified.
46. The Radio Corporation of America was formed when a group led by General Electric bought
which of the following?
47. The public found it easy to believe Orson Welles’s broadcast of War of the Worlds because
48. TV snatched radio’s
A. Audiences
Fill in the Blank
49. The Communications Act of ____________ established the Federal Communication
Commission.
50. In the mid-1860s, James Maxwell theorized that there existed _______________ waves.
51. Westinghouse established a station with the call letters ________________, which aired
national returns from the Cox-Harding presidential election on November 2, 1920.
52. Lee De Forest claimed as his biggest breakthrough the development of the ___________, or
triode, vacuum tube.
53. Person-to-person or point-to-point transmission of wireless messages is called ____________.
54. A type of radio and sound transmission that is sufficient for talk but not ideal for music is called
______________________.
55. The ______________________ is a private, nonprofit corporation created by Congress in 1967.
56. __________________ refers to the practice of making audio files available on the Internet so
that listeners can download them to their computers and transfer them to portable MP3 players.
57. The system of sending electrical impulses from a transmitter through a cable to a reception
point was developed by American inventor Samuel __________.
58. _________________________ is a noncommercial radio network established in 1967 by
Congress to provide an alternative to commercial radio.
59. Payments from record companies to radio stations to play a song a specific number of times is
called _______________.
60. _________________ is a digital technology that enables AM and FM radio broadcasters to
multicast two or three additional compressed signals within their traditional analog frequency.
Matching
Select from the following list of terms to match the question with the best answer.
A. Lee De Forest
B. David Sarnoff
C. Guglielmo Marconi
D. 1912
E. Reginald Fessenden
F. 1920
G. 1934
H. Edwin H. Armstrong
61. First radio act
62. Developed FM radio
63. NBC
64. Wireless telegraphy
65. First to send voice through the airwaves
66. FCC
67. Debut of KDKA
68. Audion, or triode, vacuum tube
Essay
69. Explain how radio survived the coming of television.
70. How and why did radio networks develop?
71. Define radio format and give examples.
72. What were Marconi’s and De Forest’s contributions to radio?
73. How did broadcasting come to be federally regulated?
74. What has been the effect of deregulation on radio?
75. What is the significance of the Communications Act of 1934?
76. Pick two of the media that we have studied so far (magazines, sound recording, radio) and
briefly describe their evolution in terms of the three stages of emerging mass media.