[78-L] Radio blues

[Steven C. Barr]

From: "Royal Pemberton" <ampex354 at gmail.com>
> Back in the late 1980s I lived in Keokuk, Iowa, and with a somewhat
> Frankensteined Wilcox-Gay Recordette III machine's AM radio section would
> pick up 740 in late evenings 'on the skip'.  Thus I heard 'Nightcamp' and
> such.  One problem with that was KTRH, another 50 kw flamethrower, from
> Houston, that would sometimes swamp the signal from Canada.
>
When the FCC (and international law) set aside specific "clear channel"
frequencies, and assigned a few specifically to Canada...it was not yet
known what the range of post-sunset "skip" would cover on the 540-
1500 (later 1600) kHz band might be...?! Back in 1957 or so, I was
AM-band "DX'ing" with my Philco 37-9 console (9 tubes,including
a RF stage!)...IIRC, I heard 44 or 45 states! Mexico took FULL advantage
of the rules...licensing stations like XERF (officially south of thr border,
but functionally in Del Rio, Texas!) which happily advertised various
dubious/illicit scams..."Yessir, send no money...only your name and
address! That address is XERF, Del Rio, Texas!"

Steven C. Barr