Behind the Scenes at 1YA

Radio Record, Volume IV, Issue 27, 16 January 1931, Page 29

Behind the Scenes at 1YA

In the Announcer’s Room

(By

CALL UP

ALTHOUGH the majority of listeners have a superficial knowledge of the work carried out at a radio broadcasting station, not many. have ever actually been "behind the scenes," and many of their ideas in regard to the station's working are incorrect. In. this little article "Call Up" invites listeners to accompany him into the annouheer’s room at 1YA. ‘° Opening off the smaller of the two studios at 1YA is a door bearing the sign, "Announcer Only-Strictly No Admission," but we are privileged to enter this sanctum and to introduce ourselves to Mr. Culford Bell, the 1YA station announcer. After greeting us, he resumes his seat before the microphone at one end of the small, narrow room and then, as an item in the large studio concludes, he announces a gramophone recording and puts the record on. Owing to.the special ‘apparatus used, we hear only a muffled noise from the record, although it is playing in the same room, and as listeners cannot hear us, we are free to converse. On either side of the announcer is a glass window looking into the two studios, before him is a desk above which is suspended a loudspeaker, and by his side is the gramophone apparatus. Facing him on the desk is a large switchboard controlling the wires between the studios, amnnouncer’s room, and transmission room. Most of one wall of the little room is taken up with a large rack holding the varied collection of gramophone records necessary for the daily programmes, and opposite this stands the grandfather clock whose chimes are so familiar to listeners to the station. On one wall hangs a big board covered with a most amusing collection of radio jokes and illustrations cut from

different papers. Many a good laugh is stored in the thirty or forty humorous cuttings. The Announcer’s Job. OW monotonous!’ says the listener in referring to the announcer’s job, but according ‘to Mr. Culford Bell, such an opinion is quite wrong. "I cannot afford to even think my job is monotonous," he says, "for if I did my work would betray me. I am always subconsciously aware of the big audience listening to me, and that seems to keep one keyed ‘up. As soon as any monotony was felt carelessness would creep in, and that, of course, would never do." And so Mr. Bell sounds equally interested whether he is talking about the price of fat pigs, a Beethoven Sonata, a cyclonic depression, or the day’s racing results, just to mention a few of the hundred and one subjects with which he has to deal daily. ‘He has no opportunity to scan much of his material before reading, so he has no idea what dangerous words or sentences may lurk within. . If he does strike an outlandish word, such as the names of some.of the delegates to the Andian Round Table Conference, he must not hesitate but go boldly at it. In any event, in such a case as this particular. one there are few who could contradict him even if his pronunciation were at fault! The announcer’s work is by no means confined to speaking at the ‘"mike." There is a great deal of detail work to be done of which the listener hears nothing-forms and reports to be filled in, copy prepared, records arranged, readings chosen, and many other things. The announcer’s job is thus a busy one, and it is certainly not monotonous.

The men rushed ahead, shouted, then were silent,. suspiciously so. "Jim, take this," whispered Silver, pressing a double-barrel pistol into the hand of his young follower. "So, you’ve changed sides again," someone said as all surveyed the empty boxes that indicated that the treasure had been lifted, but Silver urged them to dig deeper for the pig-nuts. The tide had, however, turned against him. The buccaneers scrambled out of the hole to be. faced boldly by man and boy. "Mates," said the leader who had displaced Silver, "I mein to have the heart of that cup. The other’s a cripple. Now, mates,--" : Those. were his last words.. Three muskets aimed from the undergrowth rang out; and out stepped Gunn and two of the doctor’s party, The mutineers were broken. QNLY explanations and the simple matter of getting under way remained. When the doctor left the stockade he went to Gunn, who, he learned, had lifted the. treasure and stored it in his cave. The now useless chart was handed over to Silver, who allowed the party to shift to the better position in the cave. When the doctor: had re ported that Hawkins was with the mutineers Gunn and two companions hastened to the place where the treasure had been buried. Gunn outstripped his. companions and had delayed the buccaneers by playing upon their superstitious fears, while his two .companions had caught. up. They had awaited the critical moment to fire upon the party. ON the homeward journey, Silver, who had naturally not been treated too kindly, escaped to the Mexican Islands, taking with him.a small portion of the treasure. Gunn had aided his escape. . "We were not safe with that man with one leg aboard," he explained. And no one had any complaints to make, for after all the party was cheaply quit of such a dangerous man.