The Senior Living Magazine published an excellent artice on SPARC!
updated 12 May, 2009
As explained elsewhere on our pages, we often take a sampling of our museum display items into the community, and enliven the day with our own vintage music and chatter in the form of a "broadcast remote", the way radio stations did it in the 50s and 60s.
Make a reminder to visit these events, and drop by to see us.
The Senior Living Magazine published an excellent artice on SPARC!
Senior Living Magazine, in their February 2008 issue, told the story of our museum to its readers. SPARC's Jack Watson greets you on the front cover, holding an AFRS 16-inch transcription (not an "LP"). This was excellent exposure for our organization, because the publication reaches readers who can remember the old radios when they were new.
Red Robinson has topped himself - Donates his own tape collection to SPARC.
Red's radio broadcast career has spanned 53 years, from which he has carefully saved many tapes - almost 400 - and he has put them into SPARC's hands. There are celebrity interviews, old radio shows, station jingles, and some priceless airchecks. You should be hearing some of these over the next while on the museum floor! To think we were adjusting to having received Cullen's collection (see below)...
The late adored broadcaster, Jack Cullen, had accumulated a huge collection of LPs, 78s and other recorded rarities over six decades. After his passing, most of his treasure was sold off to the corners of North America. We're happy to report that a large number of Jack's private archive of recordings did not meet that fate and fell to the care of Red Robinson. Red is also a veteran and current broadcaster who is passionate (and very knowledgable) about radio history. Red has shown his support for SPARC by donating this collection to us. There are over 700 tapes and a two-foot-high stack of 16-inch transcriptions. We have listened to a sampling of these, and what we've auditioned are really engaging. We hope to be sharing these somehow, as audio archives on our website, or by streaming them on our audio server. Visit our Server page at Program Schedule to learn of our progress.
Thanks doubly, Red!
SPARC made these appearances at community outings last summer...
We participated once again with the Tree Fest
This day of tree walking tours and cultural events is held annually in the Fall, in the Riverview grounds. These very grounds on which our museum building is located is home to a huge variety of tree types, making a yearly conducted tree tour event a well-attended occasion. The tree fest organizers always book the "Crystal Palace" trailer (from EPR Financial), formerly used by CKNW at the PNE and other remote broadcasts. Since it's a Sunday event, our low-power radio station was able to carry special programming all day. The exciting change this year was to originate the program from the trailer, using the original CKNW board, which was still in the trailer. Thanks to Meridian RV, a couple of days were spent at their facility giving some TLC to the equipment. We added our own tape machines to the trailer and beamed the program up the hill to our SPARC building. Notice the genuine CKNW shirt.
The tree-fest's shuttle bus played our music (from our FM signal) for the whole day. It was a great joint event. The pictures below show the trailer with the CKNW board still on its desk, plus the SPARC gear that we used. This board is the same model as donated by CJAV (see "Consoles" on the Studio News page).
SPARC participated again in the "Fair in the Square" event on July 12th and 13th at Heritage Square, in the Maillardville area of Coquitlam.
As in previous years, we had on show some of our nice old radios from our collection. To support the display, we ran a 'broadcast remote', transmitting music to our radios that were set up at our table, and to the speakers throughout the Place des Arts complex.
Jack is 'on-air'!
Our mobile "studio" was set up in Mackin House, with our 'transmitter' site in a car parked outside. The studio consisted of equipment donated by CKWX (the Collins mixer, used for broadcasts from Nat Bailey stadium), CJAV in Port Alberni (the Revox tape machine), and CKNW (the Ampex machine). We also played vintage commercials and station breaks from a cartridge tape deck.
Click here for more information on Place des Arts.
Click here for more information on Mackin House.
Two great Classic Car Shows, with SPARC providing the music
On July 27th SPARC was at the Ford Galaxie Club of Canada's Classic Car Show in Coquitlam. There were lots of gorgeous 40s, 50s, and 60s Fords there, and we played music to match. We even were able to insert vintage commercials from the old long-gone car dealerships! On hearing the "Domimion Motors" spot, one of the owners came over to our broadcast table to tell us that's where he bought his car being displayed that day!
The broadcast remote position was at the left, with our display of radios to the right. The second picture shows the view we looked out on.
Labour Day...
On September 1st, it was the Canadian Falcon Fairlane Comet Club's turn to show off their classic cars out in Langley at their "Picnic in the Park" (24th annual!). It was yet another great day. Once we got the gas generator running at the correct speed, the music on tape began sounding better. It was a cool day, but there was no rain. The pictures show our broadcast position with the day's awards in the background. Also, there sits Jack Watson, who did a good job of answering all the questions, when he wasn't out dancing to the music!
These successful shows are great showcases for our "broadcast remote" programming and for promotion of our collection. These outings are becoming quite a hit in the community...
As you can see, SPARC often takes items from our collection into the community to promote awareness of the history of radio, the part it plays in our culture, and how we are preserving the artifacts of radio. Whenever we are able, we do this by staging a "remote broadcast", as radio stations often did, playing live music from dance halls, and recorded music on location from malls and even furniture stores! In our case, the music is played over the antique radios on display.
To see more photos of these remotes, go to the Studio News page - the link is on our homepage.
The Philco Wreck
A recent acquisition at the museum (Really! It is an acquisition!) is a Philco Model 20. Our restoration volunteers are truly gifted, but there are limits. We loved this example of the ravages of a leaky barn so much, that the decision was made to make it a display item as is. The photo here of the chassis layout is pasted on the tube shield at the left in the view from the back. The remains are resting appropriately in a child's "Radio Flyer' wagon. We have two other hopeless cases of this model at SPARC that are pristine by comparison!
For those of you who are hams or SWL (Short-Wave Listener) addicts, the items in the shortwave section are always being added to and reorganized. Existing display items are being electrically restored as nearly as possible to the original factory-operating performance, so that radios of different vintages can be compared. This will allow us to gain a perspective on engineering improvements over the decades.
One group worked on was our fairly complete Hallicrafters product line. Two wonderful items are the SX-42 and SX-62 from 1947 - they are big, heavy, but impressive radios. Also, an SX-100 has just been restored to factory operating condition; as a museum visitor, ask for a demonstration. This late-50s model was Hallicrafters' first set to be aimed at the SSB (single-sideband) user. Pictured on the table, left, is the SX-62, and right, is the SX-100. By the way, after having done the work on the SX-100, there was an SX-96 in storage that we thought was ready for the dumpster. Since it is almost identical to the SX-100, it seemed convenient that we give it a thorough workover. It absolutely came to life. In spite of it not being of display caliber, the lesson is that old items that appear unrepairable can live again!
We should develop a page dedicated to this absorbing section of the museum.
A friend of the Museum came across this curio, and thought it should have a place at SPARC. It is an old record cleaner, carrying the "Nipper" logo. Notice that the company name is The Gramophone Company -- it does not say RCA Victor, or even Victor. It is much older than we first thought, perhaps from the 20s. Apparently it is British in origin, as was the artist who created the 'Nipper' painting.
We've put this in the glass case at the museum entrance, and leaned it up against one of the turrets on one of our excellent Atwater Kents. (Thanks, Peter R.)
A server is being built so you can hear SPARC's vintage music and radio shows on the Web. High-speed access is now running at the museum. We are using a radio microwave shot to link with the world. Trials are being carried out on streaming software. Watch this page for more news and a schedule.
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