This Sunday, November 2nd, Wesleyan University’s radio station WESU-FM will be holding an event on campus to celebrate the Connecticut station’s 75th anniversary. I’m also really pleased to see that the school has an exhibit on view which tells the tale of the station’s storied history.
The WESU website also has some archival material, including images of old program guides from as early as the 1930s, as well as other materials in celebration of the station’s 75th anniversary. There’s a recording of a student from the class of 1948 talking about the development of AM station WES, as well as a link to an article about station history from a university archivist. As I mentioned earlier this year, WESU is also hoping to do a documentary about the station’s history.
Radio at Wesleyan began with a dorm-based station in 1939. Today WESU-FM broadcasts over FM at 6,000 watts.
Especially in light of the Library of Congress’ Radio Preservation Task Force, it’s fantastic to see college radio stations and their home campuses celebrating the rich history of student radio. As a reminder, I’m working on the Task Force (and Radio Survivor is also an online partner) and would be very interested to learn about any college radio collections and archives that readers might be aware of.
