Trivia Questions

and other Fun Things

This question was submitted via e-mail by Mike Biel

Here's a trivia question: where in the national anthem recording did we turn the transmitter switch off to have the transmitter shut off exactly at the end of the recording? I have the actual disc (vinyl)--we could scan the label and put in the audio of that very section of the music.

From Jerry Klein.....I'm sure I have audio of a sign-off somewhere too.

From Mike Muderick....In the middle of the word WA-VE. Then carrier went bye bye. Unless it was in the days when it went bye bye 15 minutes after it was turned on at 2:30 and John Bacon Wright had to run up to Conwell to reset it. That was in the days before the more modern remote control was put in. But I 'm sure you all remember that.

From Gerry Wilkinson....Well, do you think Mike Muderick is right? Send in your opinions!

Here's a second trivia question from Gerry Wilkinson. Maybe you know where in the song to turn the key but after you turned it, how many seconds did you have before you lost the carrier.

??????

From Jerry Klein.....I remember doing that, but I don't remember exactly what the timing was. Something like 11 or 16 seconds, or something like that, right?

From Mike Muderick....the answer to the trivia question is
17 seconds before the end of the anthem.

From Gerry Wilkinson....Well, do you think he's right? E-mail us your opinions.

Elsewhere in his e-mail Mike Biel mentioned how we used to take the transmitter key to turn the big Ampex (354) on. I had totally forgotten about that.

Remember how we used to swipe the key out of the transmitter remote control to turn the Ampex on? Shut the transmitter switch off, remove the key, quickly insert it in the tape recorder, turn the recorder on, remove the key, and put it back in the remote control and switch it back on before the fail-safe turned the transmitter off. John Wright never knew!! He had used the version of the switch that allowed the key to be removed off-or-on so that he could turn the machine on and keep his key. Of course, we soon discovered this lock in the Radio Shack catalog and we each had our own key!
Wright never knew this, either.

From Jerry Klein......I don't remember that. I didn't spend a lot of time in that particular control room.

From Gerry Wilkinson....Hey----I didn't know about Radio Shack. I got my key at a local hardware store near the old Uptown Theater.

The Third WRTI-FM Trivia Question

The question was submitted via e-mail by Mike Muderick

Here's a trivia question: Every studio in Thomas Hall had a "buss box." What were each of the 5 or 6 switches for? The first one was AM.......

Well, what do you think? Better hurry up before Mike Biel sends in the answer.
He sent the answer in but we held off posting it for a few days to see if anyone else remembers.

From Mike Biel....Well, since nobody seems to have replied . . .

The first one was for the AM transmitter line and the second one was for the FM transmitter line. I found an old handout from Mr. Roberts from before our time, and it mentions that the first TWO lines are for AM,and the third line is for FM. It then says the next two are for recording.

I had remembered that they all went to patches in master control. Offhand I don't remember if the bottom four lines were normalled into any specific machines. But there were the two Magnicord PT-6 machines and the Ampex 354, so the busses might have been normalled into those. I can't find any manual that we wrote that mentions this. I figured we just patched the lines into whatever we wanted, including a remote input on some other studio's board. By the way, I never had the slightest idea where the controlling relays were located. I don't remember this system EVER malfunctioning!!!!

From Gerry Wilkinson....Now the Mike Biel mentioned it. It seems to me that one of those went directly into the Ampex 354. I, too, never remembered a problem with the buss system.

From Mike Muderick....I strongly remember the second switch was FM. The third was the Mags. Fourth and fifth floated unassigned in 64. The 354 arrived a year after and was given, I think , the fourth button. And you're both right, the system didn't fail. What did fail once though, happened the night before John Wright was leaving for NAB and the patch from the bus system to the transmitter link got dirty. He had to come in from Jersey to clean the patch panel to get us back on the air. Not a happy camper.

Another Trivia Question (This is #4)....

What do John Wright and the first line of the theme song to Party Time have in common???????

From Gerry Wilkinson....They both were a little warped?

From Mike Biel...."I'm the bacon/I'm the eggs" is the first line of the song. Mike M. has been calling our illustrious Chief Engineer John Bacon Wright. I have absolutely no idea where that nickname comes from and I don't remember it at all, but that's the connection. (And by the way, neither is kosher.)

From Mike Muderick....The encyclopaedic memory of Mike Biel is correct. Bacon is the common thread. If you remember, that was his middle name, as listed on his FCC license.

For additional comments about this trivia question, please visit our message board.

To the WRTI "Old Gang" Message Board

A New WRTI-FM Trivia Question (#5)

The question was submitted via e-mail by Mike Biel

In Control Rooms A, B, and C we had the same large board. What was the three-step procedure that was necessary in order to properly put the control-room microphone on air? Extra credit if you can tell me the possible consequences for doing the three steps out of sequence. (Jerry Klein is disqualified from answering this one because we discussed it by email last week.)

Well, what do you think? Better hurry up before Mike Muderick sends in the answer.

A New WRTI-FM Trivia Question (#6)

The question was submitted via e-mail by Mike Biel

In Control Rooms A and D we had the old RCA 70-D gear drive turntables. How did we put those turntables into the 45 RPM position? Clue: it was a two-step procedure.

See the Responses Written on Our Message Board

A New WRTI-FM Trivia Question (#7)

The question was submitted via e-mail by Bill Stock

Fill in the blanks from Bob & Jerry's theme song.
("I'm peanut butter, I'm the __________, I'm Jackie Gleason, I'm your __________.")

Hurry...Get Your Answer in NOW!!!!

Some Fun with Spell Check

We have put some of our WRTI friends' names into a couple spell check programs. See how these programs think the names should be corrected.

Just for Laughs

Here's Some Egyptian Fun

We have things written in Egyptian Hieroglyphs. Guess who or what it is. It has a relationship to WRTI. There's one for AM and one for FM.

Off to Ancient Egypt Again

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