Early KPFA Frequencies
Stephen J Hawes
frequencies KPFA had started on, and why the changes were made. "Surely
someone must have fuller information."
I did some research at the station, looking both at things already compiled
(a thesis and some reports) and digging through the files myself. (I started
volunteering there in 1955 and have worked at KPFA since 1957 (and at KPFK for
a couple of years at its beginning), but I had never dug back that far in the
files before.) I haven't found some of the very early documents (such as the
first Construction Permit application) yet.
The original operation began on April 15, 1949 on 100.1 MHz with an ERP of
550w. It referred to to itself as "KPFA Interim" (it really was an
experiment in listener-sponsored radio). Studio and transmitter were atop
the office building at 2054 University Ave in Berkeley.
The frequency was changed to 104.9 on March 7, 1950 and the ERP raised to
1kw to eliminate the interference from KNBC-FM on 99.7 which had raised its
power since KPFA first started operating on 100.1. (Somewhere in here
the station ran out of money and went off the air for a while.)
On May 19, 1951, KPFA started operating on 104.5 (a "Class B" - higher
power channel) from a transmitter site on Panoramic Way in the Berkeley
hills. Judging from the correspondence with the Oakland Planning Commission
(for use variance) and with a neighborhood group, this site was intended
to be temporary - 2 years max - with the tower and building to be removed at
the end of that time. A 3 KW Raytheon transmitter was used and a 100 ft
guyed tower was erected. The ERP was 16 KW.
There were no telephone lines in the area, so a 942 MHz link was used from
the studio, still at 2054 University Ave. (The STL was "not nice" - the
transmitter was 2 - 5 ft racks full of "loctal" tubes, 4X250 triplers and
10,000 rpm blowers. Fortunately it was only used for the Panoramic Way
site, but I did see it sitting in the hallway at the station when I first
started there.)
This temporary tower fell in a windstorm on December 3, 1951 and KPFA was
off the air again. By this time the Pacifica Foundation had already
purchased the land and equipment at what is the present KPFA transmitter
location. This site had been constructed in 1947 and operated by KSFH,
San Francisco on 94.9 until they ran out of money and "went dark" in 1950.
A 3 KW RCA transmitter was used, with a 4 section RCA "Pylon" antenna to
produce 15.8 KW ERP. KPFA had already filed an application for a
Construction Permit for operation from this site on 94.1 MHz with a 10 KW
GE transmitter they had located, but this application was still working its
way through the Commission. Special Temporary Authority (STA) was granted
on December 18, permitting operation from the KSFH site, but on 94.1 MHz.
While all this was happening the studios were moved from 2054 University
Ave to 2207 Shattuck Ave., where they remained until the move to the new
studios in the fall of 1992.
Later, the transmitter was replaced with the 10 KW, a few years later the
antenna was replaced, and then a more efficient transmission line finally
resulted in the 59 KW ERP of today. (And the rest is history...)
Regarding "the original KPFA was KPFB", as I understand it the original KPFA
_transmitter_ was used for KPFB, but I'm not positive about that. The first
KPFA transmitter was 250 watts, and I know that the 250 watt RCA transmitter
that became KPFB in 1954 was in possession of the station at the time of the
STA to use the KSFH facilities, and that the KPFB transmitter contained the
KSFH modulator panel, which had some missing parts because of a theft when
KSFH was dark. I was never really clear about this, but I surmise (conjecture
mode on) that the modulator panel was taken out of the original KPFA xmtr
to get the old KSFH unit on the air, and probably went with it when the 3kW
RCA was sold. That left the KSFH panel with the missing parts in the 250w
that later became KPFB. Those missing parts had to replaced locally and some
had to be built in a machine shop of the one of the listeners. The KPFB
transmitter never looked (or acted) quite like a stock RCA.
Whew! Hope that wasn't more than you wanted to know about this!
Steve Hawes
Transmitter Engineer KPFA (part time)
oms...@uclink.berkeley.edu (where I work full time)
David A. Kaye
: I did some research at the station...
Wow! Thanks!! That's fascinating stuff. About the KPFA having been
KPFB, I guess what I was told by someone at KPFA 20 years ago was as you
say -- that the *transmitter* had been used by KPFA rather than the
frequency as I'd always assumed. I guess people have different ideas
about what constitutes the existence of a station.
: There were no telephone lines in the area, so a 942 MHz link was used from
: the studio, still at 2054 University Ave.
I'm surprised that part of the spectrum was even in use in 1951.
Considering how hard it was to stabilize a receiver in the FM band in the
1950s, I would think it was a major pain to stay on frequency way up at
942.
--
d...@crl.com "AM stereo is like putting lipstick on a pig."
San Francisco -- John Higdon, radio engineer
Larry or Lynn Tunstall
move to the new facility at 1929 Martin Luther King Jr. Way was in
fall 1991, not fall 1992.
For more info on KPFA/Pacifica history, gopher to
gopher.well.sf.ca.us
and choose Communications & Media, then KPFA/Pacifica. If anyone out
there has articles, documents, or whatever that would be appropriate
for this archive, please contact me by e-mail.
Thanks, Late Night Larry (The Beedle Um Bum Show, KPFA/KFCF)
beed...@netcom.com or beed...@aol.com
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