Powers Gouraud
1950

Powers Gouraud, "The Old Night Owl," began some of his earlier nightly commentary on WCAU radio, which was sponsored by Yellow Cab, with "Yel-low, night owls and night owlettes, yel-low!"

Gouraud was an avid sports fan and a patron of the arts. His broadcasts were mostly live and heard at 11:15 pm over WCAU Radio. Gouraud's air presence spanned three decades in Philadelphia broadcasting and he was highly thought of and well respected in the broadcast community.

From Monday, May 29, 1950, we have a complete Powers Gouraud interview with his "ol' Pal," Ted Husing. They talked about baseball and the "upcoming" 1950 season. Ted picked the winners of each league correctly.

While this interview has been on our website since 2000, it was not until 2010 that we became able to present to you a digitally restored version of this historic broadcast. Our original version was bassy, had pops and clicks and was slightly off speed. These problems now have been corrected.

In the mid-60s, we transferred this recording from the original WCAU Radio 16" transcription disc onto reel-to-reel tape. Our tape was cut on half track stereo equipment. The original disc was returned. It is our understanding the original transcription disc no longer exists today. So our tape is the next best thing.

Our original audio file done in 2000 was played back on a quarter track reel to reel machine using the original tape. Some of the oxide had already flaked off from the top track (that was the only track that was playable in the forward direction.

However, on our 2010 version, we pulled the audio from the middle track using a quarter track playback machine. The inner track was still totally intact but was encoded backwards. Today's technology now allowed us to "flip" the audio in a digital audio editor so it would play forward, like normal. Thus, we had the stepping stones of doing a better job of preparing a cleaner version for our website. We hope you'll agree that it was well worth the effort.

Listen in Real Audio!
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From the official archives of the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia
Photo and Audio clip originally donated by Broadcast Pioneers historian Gerry Wilkinson
Digital Restoration by Broadcast Pioneers historian Gerry Wilkinson
© 2010, Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia
All Rights Reserved

The e-mail address of the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia is pioneers@broadcastpioneers.com