1 of 1- RadioActive
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"Board" Of Education: Did You Ever Work One Of These?
I came across a place called The Texas Broadcast Museum, which is exactly what you'd think. I wonder why we don't have anything similar to this in Canada, next to maybe the MZTV Museum, which isn't exactly the same thing. There WAS an effort called the Aireum, but its website has not been updated since 2015 and I'm guessing it's DOA (or really DBA,, Dead BEFORE Arrival.)
Anyway, the Texas place boasts a recreation of an old radio studio and it reminds me somewhat of the kind of board I learned on way back in the early-70s. (Except my turnpots were multi-coloured and thus easier to remember what controlled what device.) Did anyone else cut their teeth on one of these? (And I love the signs about the pennies and the turntable, and not playing rock before 6 PM...) 
- the original hank
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Re: "Board" Of Education: Did You Ever Work One Of These?
yes, i started on a gates' board equipped with turn pots.
- Radiowiz
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Re: "Board" Of Education: Did You Ever Work One Of These?
Memories of CKCC (Centennial College) back in 1993.
My first ever radio GIG.
We had no reel to reel, but the rest of the equipment looks pretty much identical.
A CD player would sit where the reel to reel once was.
Carts were strictly for station ids and commercials.
RadioWiz & RadioQuiz are NOT the same person.
RadioWiz & THE Wiz are NOT the same person.
- paterson1
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Re: "Board" Of Education: Did You Ever Work One Of These?
All the audio boards I used in radio were almost always either McCurdy or Ward Beck. Both of these manufacturers were Canadian and based in Toronto. They were also very successful selling their product in the US and for a time in the 80's pretty much all of the American television networks used either Ward Beck or McCurdy audio boards. And of course they had the market pretty much sewn up in Canada.
McCurdy audio boards were used all over North America in the golden age of AM Top 40 radio in the 60's-70's.
WBS or Ward Beck is still around today but I believe McCurdy folded five or six years ago. 1050 CHUM was using new Ward Beck equipment on air back in 2007 when I toured the station on their 50th anniversary.
The only station I worked at that didn't use WBS or McCurdy was CFPL AM/FM in London, and they made their own audio boards. CFPL engineers were pretty amazing.
Last edited by paterson1 (October 15, 2020 7:06 pm)
- paterson1
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Re: "Board" Of Education: Did You Ever Work One Of These?
In addition to Ward Beck and McCurdy, Northern Electric also manufactured radio audio boards in Canada.
- RadioActive
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Re: "Board" Of Education: Did You Ever Work One Of These?
paterson1 wrote:
WBS or Ward Beck is still around today
Unfortunately, you won't be able to say that for much longer. I wasn't aware they were based in Scarborough.
Ward-Beck Will Cease Manufacturing
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Thread Starter- RadioActive
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Re: "Board" Of Education: Did You Ever Work One Of These?
Speaking of things that seem to be gone, it turns out there's a lot of stuff I thought was no longer being made that can still be purchased on Amazon. Included: splicing tape, cassettes and reel-to-reel tape (but boy, is the latter expensive.)
Still, it's kind of comforting in a way to know that someone is still making and selling this stuff.
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