First kind of entertainment on radio.?

Question

What was the first kind of entertainment to be broadcast on the radio?

Answer 1

The first radio station with a regularly scheduled broadcast first just talked, then he, Dr. Herrold, read some poetry. Not long into his experiment, he began playing records on a wind-up Victrola. He was the first radio DJ.

The station went on the air in 1909 in San José, CA. Of course, it had no call letters because, if you were listening to the radio, you were listening to him. Later on, it became KQW and is now KCBS.

Answer 2

There was a lot of experimental stuff around the turn of the century. Then a Dutch engineer, Hanso Schotanus à Steringa Idzerda made the first regular wireless broadcast for entertainment from his home in The Hague on 6 November 1919. He broadcast his popular program four nights per week until 1924 when he ran into financial troubles. There is no mention of what exactly he aired. Perhaps another member can offer some clarification.

On 27 August 1920, regular wireless broadcasts for entertainment began in Argentina, pioneered by the group around Enrique Telémaco Susini. On 31 August 1920 the first known radio news program was broadcast by station 8MK, the unlicensed predecessor of WWJ (AM) in Detroit, Michigan. In 1922 regular wireless broadcasts for entertainment began in the UK from the Marconi Research Centre at Writtle near Chelmsford, England. Again, the content is sketchy.

To this day WWJ and KDKA have a (sort of) friendly agreement to disagree on which was the first commercial station in the US. Programming was built around big department stores pitching radio receivers themselves.

Eventually musical concerts and recordings, news, variety, comedy, drama, adventure and talent shows filled the airwaves. Soap Operas (so named for their sponsors like Proctor & Gamble pitching laundry detergent) began in the early 1930s.

There's lots of material on the web, check your favorite search engine.

-a guy named duh