This is the Canadian Section of
The Broadcast Archive
Maintained by:
Barry Mishkind - The Eclectic Engineer
Last Update 1/3/05
http//broadcasting-history.ca/index2.html
Canadian Broadcasting:
- History
- Regulation
- Station Identifications
- Station Histories
Canadian Broadcast History:
One of Marconi's famous early wireless telegraphy stations was set up
in Glace Bay Nova Scotia, in 1902.
The first station to broadcast in Canada was XWA in Montreal (later
called VE9AM, CFCF, then CIQC)).
- First Broadcast: May 20, 1920.
- XWA was owned by the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company.
- The first experimental transmissions were in late 1919,
according to Canadian historian Professor Mary Vipond, who wrote a book on
early Canadian broadcasting called "Listening In".
- The first thing broadcast was a concert by a female vocalist,
Dorothy Lutton.
The second station appears to have been CJCE, Vancouver, BC, opened
March 14, 1922.
Other early stations include:
- CJNC, Winnipeg MB - April 20, 1922
- CJCA, Edmonton AB - May 1, 1922
- CJCG Winnipeg MB - May 7, 1922
- CJBC, Montreal PQ - May 19, 1922; perhaps the first french radio
station in the world.
- CKAC, Montreal PQ - September 20, 1922; it has been on 730 kHz
since February 21, 1925.
A good look at early broadcasting in Canada can be found at the Hammond
Museum of Radio in Guelph, Ontario.
By 1929, there were over 60 stations in operation in Canada. Few were
high power or gave full service. One major owner of stations was Canadian
National Railways (CN), which experimented in using the wireless to send
transmissions to moving trains. CN first opened CKCH in Ottawa on February 27,
1924. In July, CN began "renting" the CNxx prefix from Morocco, so its
stations could be CNRO, CNRA, etc.
With the Aird Commission (below) and the CRBC, there was an attempt
to convert all broadcasting to State owned facilities. While the CBC became a
major force, commercial broadcasting continued.
FM Broadcasting started just after World War II ended. The CBC's
first FM outlets were built in Montreal for English and French service (two
stations), and one each in Toronto, Ottawa and Vancouver. At least one station,
CKOI-FM in Montreal, is licensed for over 300 kW (307,000 watts).
A Canadian television service was authorized in 1949, and opened in
1952.
One of the more contentious parts of Canadian Broadcast History is
the Canadian Content (Cancon) requirements. Launched in 1970, to maintain a
sense of Canadian stations being "Canadian," it required 30% of all
broadcast content be of Canadian origin. (In 1994, CJCA was shut down for
violating this rule.)
With music, a special system was created to clarify what is
considered Canadian Content and what isn't. Last modified in 1991, most compact
discs and cassettes in Canada come with the MAPL symbol on them. It's a simple
circle divided into four parts (M, A, P and L) Two of the four parts must be
shaded to be considered Canadian Content.
M = Music
A = Artist
P = Producer
L = Lyrics
In the late 1990s and into the new century, there has been a real
migration of Canadian AM stations onto the FM dial. In some cases, the AM
channel is left idle, in others "specialized" stations have taken
over.
Regulation:
The Wireless Telegraph Act of 1905 in Canada, named the Department of
Marine and Fisheries as the licensing agency. In 1913, amateurs using voice
transmission were brought under WTA regulation.
In 1913, Canada passed the Radiotelegraph Act which rested the power
of licensing in the Federal government.
The Radio Branch of the Department of the Naval Service:
- Licensing specifically for "private commercial
broadcasting" was begun on April 1, 1922.
- Previously, all radio was considered experimental no matter
whether or not a professional company owned the station.
- Radio listeners also had to have licenses! If you had a radio
receiver, you had to purchase a license for it as of January 1922; the first
such licenses cost $1.
The Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission:
- The 1929 Aird Commission recommended a publicly-owned broadcast
system. The CRBC was created by the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Act, passed
by Parliament on May 26, 1932.
- The CRBC wielded broad regulatory powers, however the Depression
times led to the underfunding. As a result, the CRBC was forced to establish
ties and interdependencies with commerical and existing public stations in
order to fulfill its mandate.
The Canadian
Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) and extensions:
- The CBC was created on November 2, 1936. The CBC essentially
regulated as well as broadcast.
- In 1958, under Prime Minister John Defeinbaker, and acting
partially on the recommendations of the Fowler Commisssion, Canada enacted
the Broadcasting Act of 1958, creating a Board of Broadcast Governors (BBG).
This 15-man group carried out the regulatory functions of the CBC, while
leaving the CBC as public broadcaster.
- In 1968, the Canadian Radio-Television Commission (CRTC)
replaced the BBG, and added the regulation of cable television to its
responsibilities. The body was renamed the Canadian Radio-Television and
Telecommunications Commisssion in 1976.
- Industry Canada,
formerly the Dept of Transportation, industrial division, regulates the
technical aspects of Canadian broadcasting.
Station Identification:
The ITU originally assigned the call letter blocks VAA to VGZ to
Canada.
- For a while, UWA-UZZ was assigned to Canada, but deleted in 1934.
- Also in 1934, Canada was assigned the blocks CFA-CKZ and VXA-VYZ
originally assigned to "Great Britain and protectorates," and
CYA-CZZ, originally assigned to Mexico.
- Newfoundland was assigned VOA-VOZ, and was assimilated into
Canada's assignment when Newfoundland became part of Canada on April 1,
1949.
Today, Canadian station normally use call letters from
the CFAA-CKZZ block.
Station Histories:
Some histories of Canadian
stations appear here. More will be added as received.
My appreciation to Donna Halper, Mike Laverdiere and
Joseph Wilfred John FitzPatrick III for their assistance on this page.
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