With the sad news that KQV is planning to go off the air in the new year, it seems like a good time to visit the odd way they affected broadcast rights to sporting events.
In 1937, three local radio stations, WJAS (with Rosey Rowswell), WWSW (Claude Haring) and KQV (John Boyer), would recreate road games in-studio from Western Union reports. Home games were off-limits; stations would read boxscores when the contest ended.
Bill Benswanger was the Pirates' president from 1932 to 1946. "Frankly, we didn't know whether it was good or bad," he recounted to The Pittsburgh Press' Roy McHugh. "Nobody else did, either. I was afraid it would hurt attendance, what little we had. Remember, these were Depression days. At last I said, 'Well, we'll try it.'"
It worked well enough that in 1938, the Pirates sold broadcast rights for re-creations of road games to General Mills and the Socony-Vacuum Oil Company. (General Mills' Wheaties were the biggest sponsor of baseball broadcasts, and they were often joined by Mobil.) Those games would air on KDKA and WWSW.
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