From Mifflin Avenue United Methodist Church 1896–1996
It may seem strange to include in our history the birth of radio as we know it. Frank Conrad, a Westinghouse engineer, had as early as 1916 installed a transmitter in his garage at Penn Avenue and Peebles. Afer the war, amateurs were allowed to again operate and Conrad started to broadcast under the call letters 8XK. One day he placed a microphone before his phonograph and played some records—the birth of the first musical broadcast. To have a variety of music he borrowed records from a neighborhood music store in exchange for mentioning the store's name. Thus, the first radio advertisement.
By 1922 the main studio of KDKA, as his station was now known, had moved to East Pittsburgh and it was there on a Sunday afternoon that Dr. McKnight and a Quartet from our choir conducted a radio chapel that reached listeners with crystal sets as far as Ohio and West Virginia. Numerous letters expressing appreciation of the program were received at the church and a special bulletin with some of the letters was printed. The Quartet was made up of Mrs. A.H. McKibben, Mrs. A.L. Broomall, G.A. Jones and Dr. W.H. Wright. Miss Corinne Crawford was the pianist. It is not known if this was a regular venture of Dr. McKnight, and KDKA has no records of the programming in those early days. We do know that our youth were fascinated by radio and a club was formed that met regularly where crystal sets were built and tried.
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Wilkinsburg Public Library Digital Archives:
Mifflin Avenue United Methodist Church 1896–1996, Centennial booklet, appendix II.