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Dartmouth Broadcasting began in 1924 when members of the amateur radio club obtained a federal license to broadcast on the AM band, at 1170 kHz, as WFBK.[1] Later renamed WDCH, the station continued until the fall of 1925 when an inadvertent obscenity uttered over the air caused the college president, Ernest Martin Hopkins, to permanently shut it down. Radio finally returned to Dartmouth in 1941 due to the efforts of a group of determined students (led by Richard Krolik, class of 1941) and younger faculty who persuaded Hopkins to give the students a second chance.
The new station, dubbed DBS, at first broadcast via tiny transmitters in each dormitory, each operating on a different frequency.[2] In 1942 this unwieldy arrangement was changed to a "carrier current" system using the college electrical system to reach the dormitories. In 1948 the call letters were changed to WDBS, and in 1958, after considerable controversy, the station obtained a standard AM broadcast license. On March 4, 1958 the students began broadcasting to the entire Upper Valley region as WDCR at 1340 KHz on the dial.[3] Dartmouth Broadcasting launched WFRD (FM Radio at Dartmouth) 99.3 FM on February 19, 1976.[4]
- ^ Brooks, Tim, College Radio Days: 70 Years of Student Broadcasting at Dartmouth College, p. 22, Greenwich CT: Glenville Press, 2014.
- ^ Brooks, p. 39
- ^ Brooks, p. 107-128.
- ^ Brooks, p. 199