Oldest Tampa radio station ministers to ships at sea
April, 20, 1972
Published on Page-1a
By DANE SUMBERG
Times Staff
Writer
Nestled between two quivering antennae, Tampa's first
radio station hides in a little-known, run-down shack, squealing its
mysterious Morse code over the din of the waterfront.
Established in 1919 inside one of Tampa Bay Hotel's towering Moorish minarets (now the University of Tampa), WPD radio still broadcasts after 53 years to the extremes of the globe.
To the station's founder, George Warner, the raucous squawks of dots and dashes were his love, his life and finally his death in 1939 – when electrocuted while he was working on a faulty transmitter.
Fuses and grinning-dialed boxes smother the wall of the radio shack at 1330 McKay St., where it has been in continuous operation, except for the two world wars, for almost half a century.
The floor, gouged by termites and decades of weather and wear, supports an ancient, sagging table straining under the weight of years-old equipment.
As Rhea Johnson jiggles the telegraph key, prompting ear-piercing screeches, the single, funnel-covered lightbulb suspended from the sagging ceiling by a frayed chord goes dim with each dit-dah.
Appearing shabby and outmoded, the WPD radio shack serves as the ears and voice of the Port of Tampa, providing valuable communication solely by radio-broadcasted telegraphy between local shipping agents and vessels heading for the harbor.
Mainly, the agents learn through WPD when and where to expect vessels, what their cargo is and what supplies they require.
Johnson is one of the two wireless operators who work the station for Warner's widow, Mrs. Clara Lee Wood, 3410 Obispo St.
Mrs. Wood said the station vacated
its lofty perch atop the old hotel after alarmed guests complained of
frequent Western Union messenger boys climbing the fire escape to the
transmitter, the only means of
access.
Mrs. Wood inherited
the station and license, unique in that it shares with a Baltimore,
Md., station the distinction of being the only privately owned
radio-telegraph services in the country.
Other such services throughout the
nation are either owned by RCA or ITT, but WPD maintains an
affiliation with RCA because of the corporation's aid in collecting
foreign bills.
Mrs. Wood said she handles the money end of the
station, leaving technical aspects up to her hired operators. To her
knowledge, she said, she is the only woman in the world who has the
sole responsibility for running a radio-telegraph service.
Performing another valuable
service, WPD's operators maintain "radio silence" twice
each hour, complying with federal law which requires them to listen
for possible distress signals.
Also, valuable weather
information concerning the port of Tampa is broadcast several times
daily for the benefit of Tampa-bound ships. The clock on the wall
remains five hours ahead of local time, always giving the operator
Greenwich, England, time so necessary in coordinating international
radio dis-
patches.
WPD remains Tampa's only "sure
way" to cut through poor atmospheric conditions, called "skip,"
that plagues voice transmissions, Mrs. Wood said, and added
radio-telegraphy by far outreaches radio-tele-
phone.
In 1968, Warner's son offered the
station for sale to the Tampa Port Authority for $75,000, and later,
after interest died, to Port Manatee officials.
But,
recognizing the obsolescence of the equipment and only marginal
profits, all action died, and the station continued as
before.
Anchored to Tampa's port through history and service,
though old and shabby in appearance, WPD is likely to be heard on the
airwaves for many more years to come, giving aid to Tampa's lifeline
shipping in the same pioneering spirit that gave birth to modern
communication.
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