Border Radio: Quacks, Yodelers, Pitchmen, Psychics, and Other Amazing Broadcasters of the American Airwaves, Revised Edition

Front Cover
University of Texas Press, Mar 15, 2002 - Social Science - 360 pages

Before the Internet brought the world together, there was border radio. These mega-watt "border blaster" stations, set up just across the Mexican border to evade U.S. regulations, beamed programming across the United States and as far away as South America, Japan, and Western Europe.

This book traces the eventful history of border radio from its founding in the 1930s by "goat-gland doctor" J. R. Brinkley to the glory days of Wolfman Jack in the 1960s. Along the way, it shows how border broadcasters pioneered direct sales advertising, helped prove the power of electronic media as a political tool, aided in spreading the popularity of country music, rhythm and blues, and rock, and laid the foundations for today's electronic church. The authors have revised the text to include even more first-hand information and a larger selection of photographs.

 

Contents

Turn Your Radio On
1
The Big Daddy of Border Radio
15
Norman Baker in Nuevo Laredo
67
Border Blaster at Black Rock
103
Crazy
135
Please Pass the Tamales Pappy
159
Radio Waves Pay No Attention to Lines on a Map
199
Coast to Coast Border to Border Your Good Neighbor along the Way
229
Blasting from Baja
275
Radio Station SAVED
295
That Outlaw X
328
Selected Bibliography
335
Index
347
Index of Song Titles
357
Border Radio song lyrics from Nevada Slim
359
About the Authors

Howlin on a Quarter Million Watts
259

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About the author (2002)

Gene Fowler is a freelance writer in Austin, Texas. Bill Crawford is a writer in Austin with an interest in Texas history.

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