KFNF Radio - Recording of the Henry Field Memorial Radio Broadcast 10/17/49

63
"The conservative voice of Liberal, Oregon!"

KFNF
Shenandoah, Iowa

Recording of the Henry Field Memorial Radio Broadcast
October 17, 1949

On October 13, 2006, I was able to procure a very rare piece of horticultural, as well as, radio broadcast history. A seller on ebaY had recently attended an auction for the estate of Henry Field's daughter Georgia Talbot held in Aurora, Missouri. What she found and was offering for sale was described as, " . . . an original three record set of recordings on 33-1/3 made by KFNF, The Friendly Farmer Station, Shenandoah, Iowa of the Memorial Program in Honor of Henry Field dated 10/17/1949. It appears to be in its original unplayed condition."

The auction was listed on October 5th and when I saw it, I realized how historically significant and rare of a find this was. It was a long week. It was hard to wait. On the evening of the auction end, no bids had been made. Then, thirteen minutes until close, another bidder went for it. I was panicked! I made the decision that I would bid as much as $101 and hoped that it would be enough. Not wanting to show my hand, I also decided that I would wait as long as possible and snipe a bid in. With seven seconds to spare, I placed the bid . . . and won . . . for $20.50!

When the package arrived, the work began. Although I have had them for over a month, I have yet to listen to them. I decided to research the media and learn what special precautions needed to be taken prior to playing and digitally archiving. The facts I learned was that the recordings were made on 12-inch, dual sided, Soundcraft Instantaneous Recording Discs on 10/17/49 at 12:30 p.m. laterally at 78 RPMs.

What I learned so far is that a lateral cut groove is often referred to as a needle cut. The undulations of the audio are cut into the sidewalls of the groove causing the stylus to vibrate back and forth from left to right if you will. Most vintage records (about 95% of them in fact) are laterally cut. The laterally cut grooves offer improved fidelity and wider dynamic range than vertically cut grooves. The stylus motion in the case of a lateral cut groove, is analogous to a car traveling on a smooth but windy street of constant width. On a vertical cut groove, stylus motion is analogous to the car traveling down straight constant width street with many bumps, hills and dales.¹

Soundcraft discs, from what I have been able to determine so far, is that they are shellac discs overlaid on an aluminum substrate. These are fragile and cannot be cleaned with liquids. Additionally, some sites said that they were not stable so there may only be one chance at playing them and archiving the recording.

So I decided to be cautious. Another fact I learned is that the grooves on 78 RPM recording is wider than modern microgroove records. This means that if you use a needle that is intended for a modern 33-1/3 RPM vinyl, it will ride in the bottom of the 78s groove, pickup all of the noise, dirt, etc., and possibly do damage to the recording. I am in the process of finding a cartridge and stylus optimized for these disks.

References:

1. Video Interchange's 78 RPM Page

[ Home Page ]
[Click to Listen] [About Us] [Technical Info]
[Broadcast History Links] [Old-time Radio Shows]

The Victory Seed Company

"Preserving the past, one seed at a time"