Interviews and live concerts by local and national bands, several commercial music recordings, selected Pacifica programming. Date range = 1950s-70s, with additional material from 80s + 90s
News + public affairs shows (including coverage of Vietnam War protests + student takeover of campus administration building), freeform music shows, and "Film" and video interviews with former station workers. Additional documentation includes runs of station program guides. Dates pick up in 60s and run through 70s and beyond.
Content types:
Sounds and Other
Formats:
Disc (Commercial, Homemade, Transcription), Reel-to-reel, Audiocassette, Film, Videotape, Digital tape (DAT, DCC), and CD
The vast majority of the collection consists of audio recordings of more than 2000 radio broadcasts of nostalgia shows hosted by Clark including Rock, Roll Remember, Countdown America, US Music Survey, National Music Survey, Dick Clark’s Music Machine, and Dick Clark’s Solid Gold. The tapes were produced by Dick Clark Productions and broadcast from the mid-1980s to the early 2000s.
The 3608 Toscanini recordings include test pressings of Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra in concerts, as well as NBC broadcasts of operas, festival performances, sacred music and more, including rehearsals; for many of these, the location and date of the recording is given and in some cases additional information such as names of performers. Broadcasts took place in the 1930s and 40s.
Content types:
Sounds and Other
Formats:
Disc (Commercial, Homemade, Transcription) and Reel-to-reel
Extent:
3608 recordings (747 tapes, unknown number of lacquer discs)
Recordings from various talk, interview, and telephone shows on NBC radio that Nebel conducted over his career, spanning the years 1964-69 (including Addio, Long John Nebel Phone Show, Long John Nebel All Night Show, Long John Nebel Early Hour, Straight Line, etc.). Nebel's programs dealt with a variety of topics, including religion, politics, medicine, and the theater. Many of the shows were concerned with psychic phenomena and the occult, with representative topics such as ESP, UFOs, hypnotism and spiritual healing.
Recordings from Corwin’s CBS radio series (One World Flight, This is Radio, Radio is Here to Stay, Columbia Presents Corwin, An American in England, etc.). Broadcast from the mid-1930s to the mid-1950s.
Content types:
Sounds and Other
Formats:
Disc (Commercial, Homemade, Transcription) and Reel-to-reel
Extent:
374 16-inch glass and aluminum based lacquer discs and a few reel tapes
These tapes of WAER broadcasts primarily hold topical broadcasts and live concert recordings. Few of the tapes are dated, but those that are cover a span from 1965 to 1979. Announcers or presenters are rarely identified. The news items include a mix of national and local productions, but there are relatively few in the collection compared to the concert recordings. Many concerts were given by popular artists such as Pink Floyd, Bonnie Raitt, Canned Heat, Niels Lofgren, and Commander Cody, taken from national broadcasts, mostly originating from New York City or Boston. The collection contains recordings of only a handful of concerts broadcast by Syracuse University student ensembles. 25 tapes are identified as having been recorded on-campus at the Jabberwocky Café; surviving performances from this intimate venue include those given by John Fahey, Taj Mahal, and David Bromberg.
Unknown number of magnetic tapes, presumably of concerts of the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra as broadcast on WCNY Classic-FM, Central New York’s classical music radio station.
Consisting of recordings dubbed from WSYR radio broadcasts between 1939 and 1957, the collection largely consists of news broadcasts and speeches. Many important events and public figures of the era are recorded on these broadcasts.
Content types:
Sounds
Formats:
Disc (Commercial, Homemade, Transcription) and Reel-to-reel
Extent:
10 linear feet of material, primarily 78 and 33 RPM instantaneous disc recordings, along with 176 reel to reel tapes.
Wide-ranging collection spanning 1928-70s and beyond. Holdings include local programming from stations throughout the country, including WBAI, WCBS, WNEW, WRCA, WMCA, WRVA, WNWK, WABC, WWL, WNEW, WOR, WHN, WQXR, WNYC, WBRC, WBRD, WBYN, WCAU, WCKY, WOL, WCOI, WEA, WFUN, WGAR, WIIN, WIFE, WINS, WJZ, WJVA, WKIX, WKLO, WLEA, WLOD, WLS, WXRK, WOKO, WONE, WPLI, WQAM, WQUA, WSAF, WTAN, WTYC, WTRY, KFOX, KMET, KABC, KPFK, KPHO, KRLA, KLSX, KROC, Pacifica. Content includes news coverage, interviews, classical and popular music, drama, sports, non-English language programming, etc. Personalities include later-nationally famous hosts and DJs and hosts such as Bob Fass, Dr. Demento, Casey Kasem, Alan Freed, Bob Crane, Arthur Godfrey, among others.
Content types:
Sounds
Formats:
Disc (Commercial, Homemade, Transcription), Reel-to-reel, Audiocassette, Videotape, Digital tape (DAT, DCC), and CD
Air checks, sports, news, political coverage, local DJs, local music, station IDs/jingles, and local commercials from stations WKBW, WBEN, WINE, WHSO, WEBR, and WGR, from 1950s-1980
Content types:
Sounds and Other
Formats:
Disc (Commercial, Homemade, Transcription), Reel-to-reel, Audiocassette, CD, MiniDisc, External drive, Website, VHS (audio), Betacam SP, 1, 2, and 3/4 in videotape, DVC pro tapes, and DVD
We have a fair number of audio recordings of public programs and lectures at The New School going back to the late 1950s--certain of them bear evidence of having been recorded by Pacifica Radio at The New School (I'd have to call them in from offsite storage to check if the station name bears the names of both WBAI and Pacifica), and indicates air dates. These are on 1/4" reel to reel tape. We have a small amount of documentation between TNS and the station(s) and surmise that The New School had a relationship with WBAI or Pacifica to record and broadcast lectures/programs featuring well-known participants. The Pacifica Radio Archive lists at least some of these recordings in its online catalog.
Content types:
Sounds and Other
Formats:
Reel-to-reel
Repository/Collector:
The New School Libraries and Archives, Archives & Special Collections