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Shall Advertising Be Given Given the the Air?

By O. E. DUNLAP, JR.

An article by the radio editor of the New York "Times" which clearly defines a significant development of radio broadcasting. It is something for radio fans to watch

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ROADCASTING is fast becoming commercialized, and the trend in that direction is one of the chief subjects under discussion at the fourth annual Radio Conference, which Secretary Hoover called to meet in Washington during this week.

Mr. Hoover told the delegates to last year's conclave that the quickest way to kill broadcasting would be to use it for direct advertising, but to-day advertising motives are the incentive behind most of the attractive features on the air. Radio impresarios admit that the desire to place the names of firms and products before the public is responsible for bring ing the world's greatest artists and musical organizations before the microphone.

The advertiser pays for the facilities of the broadcasting station, and he must hire the artists to perform for him. The stations seldom pay the entertainers. There are also cases where stations do not charge for use of their transmitting equipment, but the advertiser provides the programmes. The former class of station is known as a toll broadcaster.

There are hundreds of radio entertainers who are prompted to actuate the microphone because of personal publicity, or with the hope that they will attract attention and be hired to broadcast under the auspices of an advertiser. Radio entertainers who give up an evening or an afternoon for the novelty of having friends hear their voices over a wide area are now in the minority.

In some cases an advertiser is satisfied and feels that his efforts have been rewarded if his name is mentioned a certain number of times throughout the programme, but lately some of the announcers have ventured further. They tell the name of the concern under whose auspices the concert is broadcast, and then they tell what wonderful values in price and quality can be obtained at such and such a shop. Then they reveal the location of the store and invite all broadcast auditors to drop in and inspect the goods when in the neighborhood.

But how do the advertisers reap a benefit? The incentive promoting some of the morning setting-up exercises and health talks are radiated with the hope that they will serve to prolong life, so that insurance companies will benefit by having more paid-up policies, before the

policy-holders pass on to the undiscovered country. It is estimated that over 100,000 take these early morning exercises, directed by radio, and it is reported that one instructor who gives the count to the microphone every morning receives $15,000 a year, so important is his work considered.

Talks to housewives in many instances include recipes for preparing delicacies for the table, and of course each one requires that a certain brand of flour or foodstuffs be used in the cooking.

Authors broadcast so that listeners will become acquainted with their names and books. This is the case in some broadcasts for children, and it is said to create a demand for the books. College professors often go on the air with a series of educational broadcasts in order to stimulate an interest in the subject on which they have written books, and the announcer releases the news that a syllabus covering the professor's series on the air has been prepared and can be obtained for a definite sum.

Broadcasts by moving-picture theater orchestras and artists are primarily for attracting the public to the box-office. attracting the public to the box-office. Dinner and dance music from hotels is generally radiated with the hope that it will attract the listeners to dine there, or when out-of-town listeners come to the city they will have the desire to stay at the hotel they have tuned-in so often on the radio, or they may wish to dance in the grill or night club whose orchestra. has entertained in their home miles away.

Bridge lessons are the latest innovation on the air, and the promoters undoubtedly hope that this particular broadcast will stimulate greater numbers to play auction bridge, and thereby create a larger demand for playing cards.

Travelogues are wafted into space from the aerial wires so that touring agencies will be better known and people will be encouraged to travel, enticed to do so by the beautiful descriptions of foreign lands, mingled with the native music and folk-songs. Several automobile concerns do likewise to encourage travel over the motor highways, but of course in a certain make of car. Municipalities tell of their charms and the reasons why tourists should make those particular localities stopping-places on the itinerary.

When advertising over the radio first appeared, there was some protest, but most of the leaders agreed that the best solution would be public opinion. There has been little protest on the part of the public, probably because the advertisers have improved the quality of the programmes and the advertising has been tactfully shielded so that it does not dominate the entertainment value of the broadcasts. The listeners do not seem to object if an advertising trade name or the name of a manufacturer is grafted to an orchestra or a particular hour of broadcast entertainment.

It may make an evening of revelation to listen in to some of the big broadcasters, almost any evening and jot down the number of events promoted for the benefit of advertising or publicity. The auditor will find that advertising lurks in the ether channels and that for some time radio programmes have imprinted certain names on the minds of listeners, who have unconsciously accepted them because the incoming waves were sugar coated with advertising.

Stop and think. Did you ever buy a radio battery because you knew its name better than all others, or a washing powder because you liked the twins you heard on the radio by that name? Did you ever buy a box of candy because you tuned in two boys who radiated happiness once a week through your loudspeaker? And if you listen you will hear quartettes, duos, orchestras, bands, and soloists on the air bearing the names of tooth-paste, fountain pens, pianos, musical instruments, tires, radio sets, soap, furniture shops, dry-goods stores, automobiles, theatrical productions, shoes, books, jewelry, clothing, typewriters, lunch-rooms, magazines, and newspapers.

Various musical funds have been attempted as a means of supporting broadcasting, but all have failed because the public did not respond and contribute. One of the biggest attempts sponsored by prominent bankers and business men fell flat and the money was returned to subscribers because the contributions were scarcely enough to pay one or two Metropolitan Opera stars to broadcast a single concert.

Then the advertisers saw their opportunity, and when the stations opened the door they walked in. Several managers

offered the facilities of their transmitting apparatus and hired solicitors to bring in business for their ethereal channel, so that their efforts in broadcasting would no longer be for the love of the thing but for money. The public wondered why any concern in no way allied with the radio industry should find an advantage in providing radio entertainment and in some cases pay as high as $3,000 to $5,000 for broadcasting an hour's programme. Surely they were mad! But to-day there is so much advertising material passing through the ether, seeking loudspeakers from coast to coast, that the method in their madness is clearly apparent. And it costs money to weave

a name through space so that it will enter millions of homes.

The following prices have been verified by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company: Station WEAF, New York, $500 an hour, $312.50 per halfhour, and $195.35 per quarter hour; Philadelphia, WFI or WOO, $200 an hour; Pittsburgh, WCAE, $200 an hour; Washington, WCAP, $150; Buffalo, Washington, WCAP, $150; Buffalo, WGR, $200; Boston, WEEI, $250; Providence, WJAR, $250; Cleveland, WEAR, $150; Cincinnati, WSAI, $200; Detroit, WWJ, $200; Davenport, WOC, $150; Worcester, WTAG, $150; Minneapolis-St. Paul, WCCO, $250; and St. Louis, KSD, $250.

The gross charge per hour, using the thirteen-station American Telephone and Telegraph hook-up above mentioned, is $3,000 per hour. Talks are limited to ten minutes, and are assessed at half the hourly charge. Broadcasting music or entertainment for half an hour is onehalf the hourly charge, plus 25 per cent. In addition to paying for the station's facilities the advertiser must pay the artist, which in the case of some stars runs at least $1,000 for a single radio performance. As John McCormack said, "I'm a business man. I never said that I would not sing over the radio. I will sing when they come to me with a business proposition."

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The Air Service Serves

By WILLIAM C. GREGG

Mr. Gregg tells of some of the practical work accomplished by our
aviators during the past few years. Here is an article on
aviation outside the realm of propaganda and opinion

HE knockers of our Air Service

have had their say. Now let us put away our emotions and prejudices and look at some of the facts. For five years the Geological Survey

has been borrowing four or five airplanes a year from the Army and Navy to make photographic maps of the United States. Their photographs cover every square yard of the surface they fly over, and

their total work for 1925 alone will equal an area about the size of Pennsylvania. To fly over and photograph every square yard of the State of Pennsylvania in one season is some job. Airplane map

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A section of Chicago. This photograph contains details which no hand-made map could include, the most prominent

of which is the exact depiction of the filth and pollution in the Chicago River

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making commenced in 1920, and has approximately five months;" the flying been steadily increasing.

I asked Colonel Glenn Smith, of the Geological Survey, how many deaths and accidents had occurred over the fiveyear period. His answer is amazing: "No deaths and no accidents." (The Colonel rapped gently on the wooden table.)

The Forest Service also uses airplane patrols to report forest fires. This work has been going on for the last few years. The flying has been done both by the Army and its own men, but all with Army planes. This year they are using nine machines in three different districts. So far one district reports 83 flights, averaging five hours each in duration. Mr. Kneipp, acting Forester, wrote me, October 20: "During the year's operations (1925) not a single man was killed or even seriously injured. While there were several forced landings, there were no serious accidents to men or machines." I understand the same is true of previous years. The Coast and Geodetic Survey has used Navy machines since 1920 in making photo maps of harbors. One recent job was photographing the delta of the Mississippi River where it spreads out like a great fan into the Gulf of Mexico. The Survey Bureau does not know of any serious accidents in previous years. It reports further on 1925, "The total time of the parties in the field aggregated

"has been completed for this Bureau by either the Army Air Service or the Naval Air Service without casualties as far as this Bureau has any knowledge."

The Post Office Department has run an Air Mail Service since 1918. Here is the record:

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The killed include 9 passengers and 2 on the ground.

The seriously injured include 16 on the ground.

The average miles flown are three hundred and thirty thousand to one dead aviator.

I don't at all believe that flying is as safe as automobiling, but the above mileage to one death is equal to an airplane going from New York to San Francisco one hundred times.

This record of the fliers of the Post Office Department is one to be proud of. Last year was their best, with over two million miles flown and two deaths. If you examine this table carefully, you will see that 1920 was their worst year con

sidering miles flown. You will also see
that in 1925 they have decreased their
accidents while increasing the flying over
the year 1924. Their main line is be-
tween New York and San Francisco.
They go over the same territory regu-
larly.
larly. They gradually improve their
practice and systematize their inspection
and repairs. They eliminate as much as
possible the experimental element. But
woe to aviators who get drunk or care-
less, or even just overconfident! Theirs
is a dangerous business.

Every flier must have-
A sure running motor in
A never failing airplane,
Reasonable weather,
Natural or artificial light,
A good landing-place,

And be himself 100 per cent efficientthat is, if he follows the business and dies of old age.

The Army and Navy are running two experimental aviation departments. We could of course stop that hazardous business, with its necessary loss of life. We could also close down the other activities of the Army and Navy. But the American people know that experiments must be made in order that we may live in this uncertain world with a certain power of self-defense.

I have great respect for constructive criticism, but little patience with the constant fault-finder, who becomes disgustingly intemperate when the delayed

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but inevitable accident happens. Colonel Mitchell seems to belong to this class. If he were made the high cockalorum of everything in aviation-Navy, Army, Post Office, Forestry, and Map Making -I suppose we would have a Mitchell millennium. He would, of course, handle equally well the hundreds of thousands of miles of flying that are now made without fatality. Do we think he could handle all the rest without fatality? Of course not. But, if he admits that accidents would happen in the best Mitchell

regulated aviation families, what guaranty have we against more accidents than we have at present? Nothing but his more or less plausible comments on past accidents. But isn't that hindsight criticism? Does he think that his mere appointment to absolute control of United States aviation would reduce life insurance rates on his aviators?

Aviation is very new. When it becomes as old as politics, we shall be able better to measure promise and performance. In the meantime, why not express

a little appreciation of the progress we have made and are making under the present administration and its various departments? Let us keep in mind that the airplane is becoming a machine, like an automobile, but to be handled as yet by experts only. Why may not each department of the Government buy its planes as it now buys its trucks and run them both? We may have a general production and repair department, but why "unified command" over airplanes any more than over automobiles?

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Lest We Forget

By ELIZABETH WASHBURNE WRIGHT

HE moon is nothing but a cinder so they say-a dead thing dragging terrifically in the wake of the earth. To walk across those blanched and lifeless plains or upon the brittle crispness of its high places is a thought cold as death and not to be entertained.

Walking about Verdun that night was like exploring the cinder-strewn expanses of the moon. All the bellows in the world could blow until they burst, and there would be nothing but the scattering about of cold ashes. The heat and life had gone forever. To be a living thing venturing there was an effrontery. There was that in the atmosphere that pushed one back, with a not too gentle hand-something silent, somber, and resistant. One advanced with reluctance. and hesitation.

The silence was overwhelming. There were no lights in the town, and no moon. But against the bright blackness of the sky was a ragged silhouette of broken. walls looming high, and through empty window sockets the stars were shining as from an immeasurable distance. The way was strewn with bricks and plaster and fallen masonry. Verdun drew her remaining rags about her, victorious but utterly spent, and brooding and morose. We groped with our feet along the cobblestones, as though following a trail. At the end of the long dark street, at an immense distance, broke a shaft of yellow light. There were people passing, stumbling with us in the darkness and speaking in low tones. The sense of what had been was overpowering. We went whispering in the face of it, our spirits crushed as under a colossal weight. Skulking so, we came to the low doorway whence fell the light. It was a

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DEATHLY silence met us. Around a bare table sat a perfectly motionless company. A candle in a shallow tin hung from the low ceiling. It threw long, crooked shadows. It was a menacing scene, and strangely dramatic. Three gaunt women in black veils sat side by side. Their faces were the color of tallow, like the candle above them. Their eyes stared at us without seeing. In some way their three shadows shrouded in veils were cast on the ceiling directly above them. A soldier and a very old man sat beyond. In the distance somewhere, infinitely remote, sat other shadOWS. There was not a word-not a breath-not a movement. We sat palsied in the midst of this mute and striking scene. Finally bread was served, and cheese, and yellow wine in a glass decanter was passed in silence down the long board.

They had come, these women, to find their dead. They lay there somewhere in the plain about Verdun. It seemed very near, with only the wall between.

After the long waiting, the barrier was down. The tension, the noise, the haste, the grime, and the blood had all faded away. In their place the silence had come, and the gloom and the paralyzing languor. One could at last pass this way. The gate to France was openmutilated France-marred beyond recognition, utterly benumbed.

We crept away once more in silence down the long dark street. We passed over the drawbridge and beyond the walls of the town. There was not a soul to be seen. We spent the night in an empty railway carriage in the station. Verdun lies high, guarding the passes in the hills. The air grew chill and very thin, with the freshness of mountain air. An old lopsided moon rose late and shone into the windows of the car. The world outside lay bathed in a great luminousness. The familiar dipper mounted high in the sky, swinging over that silent but indomitable fortress, and over the great battlefield where lay the unmarked graves of thousands and hundreds of thousands of men. The cold silence was all-surrounding, a silence cutting like knives. They were sleeping about us and forever-those men. So near they were and so recent the sleep that it seemed almost that one could hear them breathe and stir. And from their immense distance the stars shone down upon them in silent and silver benediction.

In the morning we saw the German prisoners marching in squads about the town-amazingly blond, very young, with raw, bold faces. They were clad in old French uniforms dyed a bottlegreen, and on their heads were the little Boche caps with faded red band. They looked sturdy and ruddy and well fed.

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