Glens Falls High School graduating senior Richard B. “Dick” Lawton in 1922 wanted to make a mark on the world. “What can I do to be forever known, and make the age to come my own?” was his favorite saying.
His fame would not be forever but, at least in Glens Falls, in Warren County, NY, he would claim the new emerging radio age as his own. Lawton, in 1923, was the first Post-Star radio editor, a new specialized beat.
“Post-Star editor to write articles that will be of help to fans,” the newspaper announced on March 12. “Because of popular demand, it is the intention of The Post-Star to publish a Radio department as a daily feature.”
The section included daily broadcast schedules for WGY of Schenectady, WHAZ of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, WOR and WJZ of Newark. N.J., and KDKA of Pittsburgh, all of which could be picked up in Glens Falls at the time.
Lawton’s writing was primarily technical in nature, offering advice on what types of radio sets to buy and which apparatuses could modify basic sets to improve reception.
At times his whimsy showed through, such as on March 12 when he reported about “Chief Lone Eagle” of the Eagle Bar Ranch in Winnett, Montana leading more than 100 Indigenous People in traditional dances set to music broadcast on WHAZ of Troy. [Editors Note: Floyd “Lone Eagle” Maine was an early white settler of Winnett who claimed to have been adopted by Sioux people. He was known for exaggerations about Native People.]
He also reported that Chicago radio stations had all agreed not to broadcast on Monday evenings so that Chicago area listeners could tune in distant stations.
On April 18, 1923, Lawton wrote about a WHAS of Louisville, Ky., promotion for its gymnastics program. “A picture was shown in a radio paper of the entire office force in one company taking their regular exercises to the instructions coming through the loud speakers,” Lawton wrote.
“Invite in all your friends who have not had the advantage of a receiving set and then get WHAS to lead you all in torpidity of the liver. That sad looking gentleman with sallow complexion will become a new individual after a few trips to your home while this broadcast is being featured. Try it!”
It was a coup for a 1922 Glens Falls High School graduate with no experience in newspaper writing to get such a job.
But there were few people, at the time, with the technical expertise, and Lawton had written a short fiction piece about electricity published in the Red and Black, the Glens Falls High School Class of ’22 yearbook.
Electricity and radio had been a passion for Lawton during his teen years. In March 1921, Lawton, along with the local Wireless Club, arranged a virtual checkers tournament using rudimentary wireless radio technology.
“Each square will be numbered and plays will be made by sending of the number from house to house,” The Post-Star reported. “In this way, practice will be obtained in the code, and also there will be entertainment derived from it.”
In November 1922, Lawton hosted a broadcast of the Yale-Harvard football game at his family’s home on Chester Street.
“They not only heard every play announced as it was made, but they caught much of the spirit of the occasion in the roars of applause, the thunderous cheering for Harvard and Yale, the bursts of song and the music of the bands, all of which came over the radio very distinctly,” The Post-Star reported.
Lawton left The Post-Star in the fall of 1923 to enroll at Union College in Schenectady. After college he would continue his career in radio equipment sales and consulting.
In 1934, he was operating a seasonal radio store at Lake George, and a second store at St. Petersburg, Fla. On the weekend of New Year’s Day 1940, Lawton engineered a temporary public address system, on behalf of the Lake George Chamber of Commerce, to broadcast Christmas carols from the top of Prospect Mountain to the Lake George business district and to skaters on the ice.
“Yesterday and Sunday, the most popular carols were, “Noel, Noel,” an importation from Paris, France, and “Russian Christmas Song,” from Leningrad, Russia,” The Post-Star reported.
In December 1940, Lawton rigged up an “experimental” system to broadcast live choral music from Caldwell Presbyterian Church out to the surrounding community through a speaker on the church’s belfry.
“Favorable comment has been heard on the amplified program and further programs are likely.”
Illustration: The logo from a 1953 Sentinel Radio Corporation stock certificate signed by Richard A. Lawton as Secretary.
