940

^^ Great map!! It's also interesting to note that Mexico was given the "X" call letter designator and Canada was given the "C"...

In the book, "Texas Signs On", it mentions what the various old call letters stood for..and in fact, many of the original radio stations had requested call letters as they did stand for something, as brucesw mentions in his examples above..here are some more of some original stations' call letters and what they stood for originally. KPRC Houston (Kotton Port Rail Center) WCAR San Antonio (Alamo Radio) became KTSA San Antonio (Kome To San Antonio) WOAI San Antonio (World Of Agriculture Information) WBAP Fort Worth (future Pres. Herbert Hoover personally assigned the call letters..(We Bring A Program)) KFRO Fort Worth..later transferred to Longview (Keep Forever Rolling On) WRR Dallas (Where Radio Radiates)...of note, this was licensed to the City of Dallas and was the first broadcasting station in the entire state of Texas and about the fifth or sixth in the US. July 1921 WFAA Dallas (Working For All Alike) KFDM Beaumont (Kall For Dependable Magnolene)..magnolene being the trade name of the gasoline sold by the Magnolia Petroleum Company..eventually Mobil.. WQAC Amarillo (Where Quality Always Counts) The first broadcasting station in Houston was WCAK licensed to an Alfred P. Daniel of 2504 Bagby Street in early 1922. KPRC began broadcasting in 1925.

It is a great book and I just assumed that you probably had it as well b/c of all the good information you posted that I recognized. I've read it once all the way through but I find myself picking it up again and reading parts of it b/c it's so interesting and also b/c broadcast communications was my major at Trinity U.

That's true now but in the beginning, that rule didn't apply which is why you have WOAI Channel 4 in San Antonio and WFAA Channel 8 in Dallas. For those interested, channel 2 was originally KLEE-TV named after owner W. Albert Lee. It was affiliated with CBS network first and began broadcasting on January 1, 1949. Bill Hobby from KPRC radio was interested in buying KLEE-TV with affiliation through the Houston Post. The newspaper assumed ownership on June 1, 1950. On July 3, the call letters were changed to KPRC-TV. The purchase price was $743,000. Television began in Texas on Sept. 27, 1948 when WBAP-TV channel 5 in Fort Worth televised the speech of President Harry S. Truman from downtown. It was the first television program in the South. On Sept. 15, however, WBAP broadcast a test pattern. It was a still picture with music, however, folks from Dallas, Denton, Waxahachie and McKinney called in to say they could see the picture. In fact, a town 87 miles away from Fort Worth was able to view the test pattern. This and other interesting information concerning radio and television beginnings in Texas can be found in a book entitled, "Texas Signs On" by Richard Schroeder. The book is full of interesting things including how radio and television began in the major cities of Texas. Lots of information on Houston as well including how channel 8 began, how channel 39 was originally KNUZ-TV, and that channel 11 was originally assigned to Galveston but they weren't allowed to move their broadcast tower much further north toward Houston because it was afraid that the signal would interfere with channel 11 in Fort Worth!