Evening star., 1928-11-06
ON AIR
COST OVER MILLION
General Use of Radio De-
CIared to Be Changing CON-
pIexion of Elections.
BY The Associated Press.


the last two months the radio bureaus
of the national committees have soWn
upon the air political seed that cost
more than S1,250,000, and today the
candidates will learn who can harvest
the crop as votes.
The Democratic national committee
announces that it has spent $500, 900
for political radio broadcasting and the
Republican national committee, al
thoush saying that no figures are avail
able. reports the spending of ''as much
as thA Democrats" The radio bill of ths
minor parties is but few thousand
dollars.
Convention BrOadcaSting Free.
The grand total of something over a
million and a quarter would have been
increased to well over S2,000000 had
the parties been made to pay for the
broadcaSting of the presidential ac-
cept;Lnce speeches and the convention
sessions, broadcasting that was done
by tha radio chains on their own ac-
court. AS it was, however, the two
maTt parties spent for radio broadcast
ing yIfct about One-SeVenth OF their en-
tire campaign funds.
OF the money the Democrats spent
on radio can}R igning 25 per cent, or
S150e00. was dOr the broadcaStlng OF
the J9 major addresses of the party'S
presidential nominee, Alfred E. Smith
The COST of broadcasting the addresses
of Herbert Hoover, the Republican cam
didate for the presidency, which num-
bered but seven, was only $4,000 or
little rsore than one-tenth of his party'S
national radio fund
The %Sce presidential nominees did
much less expensive radio Stumping.
Available figures indicate that Charles
Curtis, the Republican candidate, had
a chain bill of but $8,100 AS in the case
of the presidential candidates the DEM
ocratic candidate for vice president
gave far more costly broadcaStS than
his opponent, Joe T. Robinson speaking
over hook-lps that cost 37,700.
Mostly Chain Broadcasting.
OF the 100000 spent nationally by
each of the major parties for radio, ap-
proXimateIy two-thirds was used for
chain broadcasting, a large part of it
in coast-to-cOast hook-upS and one
third in spot" broadcasting-th is,
use of single stations for speeches ad-
dressed to localized audiences.
Both parties used both of the two
big radio chains, the National Broad
casting Co. and the Columbia System.
The 81 stations of the Columbia chain
were used for a total of 33 hours dur
ing the campaign at cost of about
$165, ,000 The National BroadcaSting
Co., in hook-ups ranging from half a
dozen to 38 stations, was used to such
an extent that its bill to the two big
parties was somewhere in the neighbor-
hood of 100000.
Women have played a large part in
the radio campaigning. filling in the
neighborhood of 20 per cent of the time
contracted for on the chain hook-upS
at expense of from $4,000 an hour to
more than twice that amount. Among
women who have given chain radio talks
for the national tickets are Mrs. Frank
lin D. Roosevelt Mrs. j. Borden Harri-
man, Mrs. Charles Dana Gibson. Mrs.
Edith Morse Rogers, Mrs. Charles H.
Sabin, Mrs. Alvin T. Hert and Mrs.
Norman Whitehouse.
This is the first national campaign
In which regular chain. broadcasting
has been utilized, neither of the present
great chains having been in existence
four years ago. Hook-upS of several
stations were contrived during the
rangement with the individual stations
desired and with the telephone COM
pany, which linked them together for
the occasion, but no such grand scale
chains as are available now were then
possible.
100 Stations Linked.
The greatest hook-ups of the present
campaign were those used for the preSl-
DENTAL acceptance addresses. approxt-
mately 100 stations linked by N. B. G.
and Columbia carrying the speeches to
the Nation. These hook-upS, which
would have cost about 5000 each,
were presented gratis to the parties by
the broadcasting companies, as was the
broadcasting of the convention sessions.
The time given to the conventions had
purchase price of more than 100000.
Both the broadcasting companies and
the political committees that had the
spending of the radio money are con-
fident that the results of the broad
casting will be plain to see when the
total number Of voters crowding the
polls today is counted.
M. II. Aylesworth, president of the
N. B. c., expressed the opinion in a
Boston speech the other day that this
years experience in political broadcast
ing will result in entirely eliminating
such traditional methods of campaign
ing as the front-porch address and the
swing around the circle in campaign
train.
Sees Change in Attitude.
Maj Andrew White, head of the Co
1unbia system, believes that broadcast
ing has done much to take the issues
and the personalities of the candidates
direct to the voters and will result in
fewer and fewer people voting for the
. candidate of one ticket because his
father always voted that way" every
man and woman now having the op-
portunity to listen to the candidates
themselves and size them up" better
than ever before.
The broadcaSting companies have
had ample indications that the polit-
ical broadcasts have had large and in
tenSely interested audiences when, as
occasionally has happened, wire trou-
BILE has caused the broadcast to go
dead" for a few minutes. The stations
then have been deluged with telephone
calls demanding that the speaker be
turned on" again without delay.
Nor do only Democrats listen to Demo-
cratic speeches and Republicans to Re-
publican ones. The switchboard girls
at the chain headquarters have grown
all too accustomed TO calls from irate
listeners who feel they must heckle
some one and demand to know why
the speaker doesn't mention this or
that issue or imagined issue. The girls
have grown to be experts in the soft
answer that, at least theoretically,
turneth away wrath.