
ABOUT THE EVENT
Phoenixville Public Library will host a free virtual presentation, “The Early Days of Radio: From the UK to Newfoundland to the Titanic to Entertainment”, on Monday, November 30 at 7:00 PM. Journalist and author Evan Weiner will be the presenter.
Radio is a 117-year-old medium but it was not until the sinking of the Titanic that radio became important. A young amateur radio operator named David Sarnoff pushed Congress after the Titanic disaster to open up radio frequencies and start commercial radio. Sarnoff would establish NBC radio in the mid-1920s. The early days of radio were a mixture of sports, music, comedies, dramas, soap operas and information. By 1927, William Paley had launched CBS radio. Radio became the theater of the imagination as people “watched” radio shows around the living room radio. Radio’s heyday was from the late 1920s to approximately 1953. Virtually every big name in entertainment had a radio show. Television would eventually surpass radio but the stars of early TV were recruited from NBC and CBS radio.
Journalist Evan Weiner, who started his career in Rockland County, NY at WRKL Radio at the age of 15 in 1971 as well as working with the Nyack Journal News, is a recognized global expert of the “politics of sports business”. He has daily audio and video podcasts. He has been a regular on BBC radio as well as Talk Sport London and has been quoted in Bolivian and Australian newspapers. He also writes for the Guardian newspaper in the U.K. In the United States, he has been a radio commentator and a TV pundit on MSNBC, NewsMax and ABC. He is also the author of eight books and is a frequent college speaker. He won the 2010 Ronald Reagan Media Award from the United States Sports Academy. In 2015, Evan was featured in the documentary The Sons of Ben about the economic fall of Chester, Pennsylvania and how the city thought a soccer team would be a key to economic revival.
This event is free and open to the public and will take place online/by phone via Zoom. Registration is required at https://ccls.libcal.com/calendar/Phoenixville/early-radio or by calling 610-933-3013 x132. E-mail mpinto@ccls.org for more information.