55th Anniversary: KPFA On the Air On April 15, 1949, at 3 pm, a charismatic, chain smoking conscientious objector named Lewis Hill sat before a microphone and said "This is KPFA Berkeley." 55 years ago today, KPFA went on the air and the first listener-supported radio station in the United States was born. Hill had an idea for creating a radio station that would not be funded by advertising sponsors, but rather by listeners. FM radio was in its infancy so in addition to broadcasting the signal, KPFA had to give out radios to listeners to receive it. Today we bring you a documentary "KPFA on the Air", a film by Veronica Selver and Sharon Wood and narrated by Alice Walker. Here's a link to find some more on listener-sponsored radio. The notion of listener-sponsored radio is overwhlemingly important, in this day and age of corporate media entites that by definition can never represent anything other than a profit agenda...
Bumped, smacked and kicked. The video and/or audio makes it SO clear how fragile actual free speech is in its employment...particularly since its hard...