Village Squire, 1976-03, Page 7"Doc" Cruickshank at his original 10BP transmitter built in 1926.
It was one of those traditional snowbelt winter days, cold,
blustery, not fit for man nor beast. It certainly wasn't fit for
trudging out trying to convince people they should buy radios.
Radios were a luxury in February 1926 and it could take some
persuasion to convince someone to buy one. It wasn't the kind of
weather to try that persuasion.
So the young man, the only radio retailer and service man in a
50 mile radius, sat in the rear of his little shop on Main street in
Wingham and idly examined a copy of Popular Mechanics
magazine. He came across a story on how to build a simple radio
transmitter, and decided to give it a try. He had all the needed
parts around the shop and within an hour had put the thing
together. A telephone mouthpiece was utilized for a microphone
and some storage batteries provided the power.
The young man didn't even know the set worked until tinkering
with it a day or two later he had a telephone call from a citizen to
whom he had earlier sold a radio set to say that the signal was
coming in fine. Almost by accident Wilford Thomas "Doc"
Cruickshank had stumbled onto the career that was to make him
a legend in western Ontario and in the Canadian broadcasting
industry. That day, February 20, 1926 became the beginning of a
broadcasting business that is now one of the major industries in
the town of Wingham and is still growing. That experimental
radio set was eventually to become CKNX radio and later lead to
CKNX television, today providing jobs to about 80 people.
Of course, Doc didn't have any delusions of grandeur on that
day. Radio, was still an unknown quantity. There were few
stations in Canada at all. The nearest station to Wingham was in
Detroit, 150 miles away. Even American stations were on air for
short periods of time. Radio receivers were also scarce. It seemed
like a hobby.
It was to remain that way for a good long time, an expensive
hobby at that. First Doc soon learned he needed a licence if he
was to continue his fiddling with the little apparatus. He was
assigned the call letters 10 BP (he'd earlier called his station
JOKE).
The power of the first broadcast, he was later to estimate, was
probably about two watts. The licence gained him the power of 10
watts and the frequency of 1200 kilocycles.
But 10 BP was strictly an amateur arrangement. The licence
didn't allow for sale of advertising. Things were pretty rocky
financially because Doc was not a rich man. He'd been born in
1897 about two miles south of Wingham in Morris township and
moved with his family to town in 1912. When his father died in
1915 he had to quit school in Grade 8 and go to work. He worked
in a furniture factory for a time then as chauffeur to a local doctor
where he picked up the nickname "Doc". In 1924 he was working
in Western Foundary for 10 hours a day then selling radios
between 7 and 8 p.m. before rushing to the local theatre where he
worked as a projectionist from 8 to 11.
His interest in radio though was growing and when he heard
the agency for a well-known radio line was available, he took it on
50 years of miracles
Doc' Cruickshank really
started something that
stormy day
An operator works in a studio about 1951.
and set up the shop from which the first radio broadcast was to
originate.
So this young man didn't have the money to put into a losing
proposition which 10 BP most certainly was. But those who had
come to rely on the station came to the rescue after the venture
threatened to fall through after four years of struggle. The idea of
a Radio Club came up and three hundred members joined
providing a dollar each per year. The money went toward bus ing
new equipment and the staff was doubled as another radio
enthusiast George Howson helped out. Programming took place
about three weeks for an hour or so and Sunda\ sersices \sere
broadcast from the local churches.
John Langridge, the present manager of CKNX radio recalls
some of the stories Doc used to tell about the earls das' The
radio Shop which also served as a studio ssas on main street in
Wingham, one of the lowest places in tossn. Somedass. Mr.
VILLAGE SQUIRE /MARCH 14'b. 5