Radio Programming

Battery Power.

Radios were first marketed for home use in 1920; 5 million were sold annually by 1929. The leading brands were RCA, Atwater Kent, and Crosley—all of which were battery-powered. The batteries were expensive, heavy, and inconvenient. RCA's Radiola was the most widely advertised make; the basic model with earphones, but not loudspeaker, sold for thirty-five dollars (batteries and antenna extra) in 1924. The price range for better models was $150 to $350.

Mostly Music.

Broadcasting began for the purpose of selling radio receivers. Before the later years of the 1920s, radio programming was unimaginative, offering mainly speeches, lectures, and music. The fact of radio was still so remarkable that people would listen to anything just for the sake of hearing sound coming out of the box—just as in 1947 people would watch anything on television, and still do. There were such radio-broadcast anomalies as...

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