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Jerry Klein's Remarks
at the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the dedication of the Temple Radio Studios - January 21, 1998
The studios were built for the fledgling Radio curriculum at Temple. And later in 1948, Radio station WRTI-AM began broadcasting from those studios. Five years later, WRTI-FM went on the air, broadcasting an amazingly wide variety of programs, not just music, but also dramas, interview shows, comedy shows, news and commentary, sports and much, much more.
The curriculum, the studios and WRTI, both AM and FM, were the product of a vision... one that held that students of this thing called radio should have a real radio station as a laboratory to work in, experiment in, and learn in.
WRTI AM and FM continued broadcasting from those studios in Thomas Hall until 1968, when new studios were opened in Annenberg Hall. I had the privilege of presiding over those inaugural ceremonies. However, less than a year later, Temple moved away the vision. WRTI AM was shut down and WRTI-FM was turned into a station playing just one kind of music, now two as a result of recent events; and most of that is played by paid staff rather than students.
But I'm happy to tell you that the vision is still alive. It lives on in the memories of hundreds of former Temple and WRTI students, many of whom have gone on to meaningful careers in broadcasting or broadcasting education, and several of whom are here today. It lives on in a web site that some of us have created to showcase WRTI the way it was . And it even lives on at another local college radio station, WBZC at Burlington County College in New Jersey. I'm on the professional advisory board for the station, and another WRTI alumnus, Rich Pokrass helped establish it. WBZC has adopted that vision of radio station as laboratory and teaching tool. I think it's no coincidence that WBZC was named the best college radio station in the country in its very first year of existence.
We're honored to have with us today the man who had that vision for the Temple radio curriculum 50 years ago, who made it one of the foremost broadcasting curricula in the country, and who established WRTI and WRTI-FM. He is also a past president of Broadcast Pioneers and one of its distinguished Persons of the Year. I ask you to join me and my WRTI colleagues in expressing our profound gratitude and appreciation to John B. Roberts.