John Facenda
WCAU-TV Official Photo
1952
In 1952, WCAU-TV and radio moved from 1622 Chestnut Street in Center City Philadelphia to Bala Cynwyd, just a few feet over the city line. Broadcast Pioneers member John Facenda is seen here in the station's brand new lobby.
Here's a rare find. We have a complete 11 pm John Facenda newscast from WCAU-TV. That's the good news. The announcer at the beginning of the clip is believed to be Blake Ritter. The bad news is that we have just audio, but still it's a rare find. The newscast dates from Wednesday, September 18, 1957. The audio was originally recorded on an eight and three-quarter flex green disc, the kind that were used for dictation machines. Obviously, the quality is never the best under these circumstances. It took us ten hours of work to put the audio in the form available on this site. Because of the reconstructive nature of the audio, it does NOT fall under "fair use" and the audio is protected under United States Copyright.
COMPLETE AUDIO
In our opinion, the Real Audio sounds better than the Window Media file, even though they were both encoded from the same original source material.
From the official archives of the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia
Photo originally donated by Jack Facenda, John's son
Audio originally donated by Broadcast Pioneers member Michael Muderick
Audio reconstruction by Broadcast Pioneers historian Gerry Wilkinson
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The e-mail address of the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia is pioneers@broadcastpioneers.com