CFRC-FM
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CFRC is the campus radio station of Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
The station has one of the longest radio histories in the world, surpassed only by the Marconi companies. CFRC remains in operation at the present time and serves the Queen's University campus and greater Kingston. The station broadcasts at 101.9 MHz, although for most of its past it operated at "1490 on the AM dial," including a period during which it was simulcast on 1490 KHz AM and 91.9 MHz FM.
A comprehensive oral history of the station was compiled by Arthur Zimmerman, which was broadcast on the station in 1982 and was published in book form in 1991.
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[edit] Pre-broadcast history
Radio technology has a surprisingly long history in Kingston, dating back to the early radio experimentations of Queen's first Professor of General Engineering, Lester James Gill. He mounted the first public exhibition of wireless telegraphy at a convocation lecture on April 28, 1902, only four months after Guglielmo Marconi's first successful trans-Atlantic transmission from Signal Hill. By the 1910s regular courses on wireless technology and theory were being taught by Gill, and Professor Gill and many of his students went on to work in the Canadian Signal Corps and contributed directly to the use of wireless and radio technologies by the Allied forces during World War I.
An informal wireless club was formed by a group of its students, who kept experimenting with the latest available wireless technology. With the help of Professor Douglas Jemmett an experimental station license (9BT) was obtained in the Spring of 1922. The station's equipment was housed in the basement (later moved to the second floor) of the Electrical Engineering building Fleming Hall (named after Sir Sandford Fleming). It had a power output of approximately one-quarter of a kilowatt, and had an estimated range of 160 kilometers. While there were likely some preliminary, unscheduled broadcasts, the station's first scheduled public broadcast was on October 7, 1923 as Professor Richard O. Jolliffe called the football game between Queen's and McGill. (At that time, the University's football/rugby team, the Queen's Golden Gaels, were the winners of the Grey Cup for three consecutive years, and it is a common understanding that when the current call letters were assigned, their meaning was "Canada's Famous Rugby Champions.")
An alumnus donation in early 1923 made possible the acquisition of better, more reliable transmitting equipment, and a private commercial license was obtained under the call letters CFRC by July 1923. It remained Kingston's only radio station until the launch of CKWS (now CFFX) in 1942, at which time CFRC dropped its CBC affiliation (moved to CKWS) and the commercial license.
[edit] CFRC Sports Team
The CFRC Sports Team consists of Matthew Bisson, Brendan McNamara, Mike Cotton and Tyler King. Bisson, McNamara and Cotton are collectively known as the "voice of the Golden Gaels" for their work on broadcasts of all Golden Gaels football games.
Bisson also hosts the CFRC Sports File program, a weekly sports news digest and interview show, from 1:06 to 1:30 PM on Tuesday afternoons. McNamara and King are regular contributors to the show.
Hockey games were historically covered by CFRC, most recently by commentator Richard Zussman. However, no games were broadcast during the first half of the 2006-2007 OUA hockey season. Hockey broadcasts returned to the schedule in January, but only of home games, with King as the play-by-play commentator and McNamara doing colour commentary.
January 2007 also saw the return of 'Between the Lines', a sports talk show that had left the schedule the previous year. The show places its emphasis on sports opinion and professional sports. Hosting the show is Tyler King, during the Tuesday 5:00 - 5:30 timeslot.
[edit] Notable CFRC alumni
- Lorne Greene (1915-1987), CBC wartime announcer, later star of Bonanza and Battlestar Galactica
- Charles P. B. Taylor (1935-1997), radio/TV/print journalist (Reuters in London 1955-'62; Globe & Mail in China 1962-'70s), author, horsebreeder (son of E. P. Taylor)
- Matthew Barber, musician
- Shelagh Rogers, CBC Radio personality
- Jeffrey Simpson, print journalist
- Gord Sinclair, musician
- The Arrogant Worms, musical group
- Chris Cuthbert, hockey & football commentator
- Jaime Stein, football commentator
[edit] References
- Zimmerman, Eric Arthur, Ph.D. In the Shadow of the Shield. Self-published, 1991. ISBN 0-9695570-0-0
