The Voice of time signal station WWV has passed away. Marty Edwards, a
newscaster who doubled as the voice of WWV, died on Friday, December 10th.
Edwards did the speech transcripts for the time checks provided by the U.S.
Navy Bureau of Standards and broadcast on WWV from Ft. Collins, Colorado.

(Published news reports via ARNewsline December 31 via John Norfolk, dxldyg)

Mike Terry wrote:

The Voice of time signal station WWV has passed away. Marty Edwards, a
newscaster who doubled as the voice of WWV, died on Friday, December 10th.
Edwards did the speech transcripts for the time checks provided by the U.S.
Navy Bureau of Standards and broadcast on WWV from Ft. Collins, Colorado.

(Published news reports via ARNewsline December 31 via John Norfolk, dxldyg)



The job obviously killed him. Twenty four hours a day for decades..A
lesser man would have snapped. I wonder what kind of coffee kept him
going.

A monument to his vocal chords and determination should be erected NOW.

He must have done his newscasting *in between* the minute
announcements, cleverly disguising his breaks every sixty seconds as
'breathing intervals'.

There are rumours his identical twin has already taken over, without
missing a beat.



mike

"m II" wrote in message
news:KCfBd.35801$KO5.18237@clgrps13...
Mike Terry wrote:

The Voice of time signal station WWV has passed away. Marty Edwards, a
newscaster who doubled as the voice of WWV, died on Friday, December
10th.
Edwards did the speech transcripts for the time checks provided by the
U.S.
Navy Bureau of Standards and broadcast on WWV from Ft. Collins,
Colorado.

(Published news reports via ARNewsline December 31 via John Norfolk,
dxldyg)



The job obviously killed him. Twenty four hours a day for decades..A
lesser man would have snapped. I wonder what kind of coffee kept him
going.

A monument to his vocal chords and determination should be erected NOW.

He must have done his newscasting *in between* the minute
announcements, cleverly disguising his breaks every sixty seconds as
'breathing intervals'.

There are rumours his identical twin has already taken over, without
missing a beat.



mike


Penance!!! Penance!!!

Mike Terry wrote:

The Voice of time signal station WWV has passed away. Marty Edwards, a
newscaster who doubled as the voice of WWV, died on Friday, December 10th.
Edwards did the speech transcripts for the time checks provided by the U.S.
Navy Bureau of Standards and broadcast on WWV from Ft. Collins, Colorado.

(Published news reports via ARNewsline December 31 via John Norfolk,
dxldyg)



The job obviously killed him. Twenty four hours a day for decades..A
lesser man would have snapped. I wonder what kind of coffee kept him
going.

A monument to his vocal chords and determination should be erected NOW.

He must have done his newscasting *in between* the minute
announcements, cleverly disguising his breaks every sixty seconds as
'breathing intervals'.

There are rumours his identical twin has already taken over, without
missing a beat.


Actually, there were seven on air announcers to cover the 168 hours a week WWV
broadcasts.

I was told this by someone who worked at WWV when it was in Greenbelt, MD
(outside Washington, DC). The shifts varied in length, but lasted about 3 or 4
hours. Since there was an overlap, they could break for lunch. The occasional
5-minute breaks (which had no tone or voice) allowed an extended visit to the
potty.
Literally, it was potty, a porta-potty placed right outside the studio door,
and vented to the outside. WWV had the first US prototypes of these in the
mid-50s, and the experiment was closely watched by the military and the Park
service.

In addition to the announcers, there were two engineers (really, technicians),
one to turn the mike on and off, the other to take transmitter readings. There
were actually fifteen engineers on staff, plus supervisors, office staff, and
an accountant to handle payroll and billings. "Billings?," you ask. Yes. The
Bureau of Standards billed other government agencies for "using" WWV, whether
or not they actually did. Us civilians got a free ride. There was also an
advisory board which met monthly to oversee operations and to guide WWV into
the 21st century. Their meetings were held at the WWVH site, although most
lived in Washington. The WWV budget was about $25 million (in 1953 dollars)
which is equivalent to $2.7 Billion today.

The move to Boulder Colorado was a problem, since propagation would be
affected. The station would be far away from the population center of the
mid-Atlantic states.

Of course, a change of call-sign was required, since "W" was for
East-of-the-Mississippi stations, and "K" for Western stations. The next
available call sign with "K" was "KKK" but it was decided not to use it. KKL
didn't sound right either, and KWV was nixxed. Senator Dirksen introduced a
bill in Congress to allow the continued use of WWV in Colorado.

Anyway to get back to the announcers. They were hired to sound alike, and
because of the repetitive precision needed , ex-military types were given
preference. I thought that everything was taped, but they were live!

To test this out I closely monitored WWV for a total of 65 hours over a one
week period, in sessions lasting up to 8 hours. Sure enough, I heard
differences in delivery,. Sometimes the voice sounded a little gruffier, other
times a little hurried, and at times the announcer sounded bored. After a while
I could hear the forced authority in the voice. The shift changes occured on
the hour, during the last five minutes (when there's no tone, only clicks). The
longer I listened the more I heard differences in inflection and rhythm.
Several times I could detect the change of announcers, but those guys were
good!! You could hardly tell them apart.

Several still draw pensions from AFTRA, the announcer's union. They were in the
Baltimore-Washington local of AFTRA, but had a no-strike contract, and were
paid Civil service GS-12 pay. Several turnovers occured as people quit or were
institutionalized. One guy actually defected to Cuba and became the voice of
Radio Reloj in Havana.

Today WWV is undergoing even more changes. See this site, and click on the
"clock" to hear audio.

http://www.grantassoc.net/wwv.html

"Radioman390" wrote in message
...
Mike Terry wrote:

The Voice of time signal station WWV has passed away. Marty Edwards, a
newscaster who doubled as the voice of WWV, died on Friday, December
10th.
Edwards did the speech transcripts for the time checks provided by the
U.S.
Navy Bureau of Standards and broadcast on WWV from Ft. Collins,
Colorado.

(Published news reports via ARNewsline December 31 via John Norfolk,
dxldyg)



The job obviously killed him. Twenty four hours a day for decades..A
lesser man would have snapped. I wonder what kind of coffee kept him
going.

A monument to his vocal chords and determination should be erected NOW.

He must have done his newscasting *in between* the minute
announcements, cleverly disguising his breaks every sixty seconds as
'breathing intervals'.

There are rumours his identical twin has already taken over, without
missing a beat.


Actually, there were seven on air announcers to cover the 168 hours a week
WWV
broadcasts.

I was told this by someone who worked at WWV when it was in Greenbelt, MD
(outside Washington, DC). The shifts varied in length, but lasted about 3
or 4
hours. Since there was an overlap, they could break for lunch. The
occasional
5-minute breaks (which had no tone or voice) allowed an extended visit to
the
potty.
Literally, it was potty, a porta-potty placed right outside the studio
door,
and vented to the outside. WWV had the first US prototypes of these in the
mid-50s, and the experiment was closely watched by the military and the
Park
service.

In addition to the announcers, there were two engineers (really,
technicians),
one to turn the mike on and off, the other to take transmitter readings.
There
were actually fifteen engineers on staff, plus supervisors, office staff,
and
an accountant to handle payroll and billings. "Billings?," you ask. Yes.
The
Bureau of Standards billed other government agencies for "using" WWV,
whether
or not they actually did. Us civilians got a free ride. There was also an
advisory board which met monthly to oversee operations and to guide WWV
into
the 21st century. Their meetings were held at the WWVH site, although most
lived in Washington. The WWV budget was about $25 million (in 1953
dollars)
which is equivalent to $2.7 Billion today.

The move to Boulder Colorado was a problem, since propagation would be
affected. The station would be far away from the population center of the
mid-Atlantic states.

Of course, a change of call-sign was required, since "W" was for
East-of-the-Mississippi stations, and "K" for Western stations. The next
available call sign with "K" was "KKK" but it was decided not to use it.
KKL
didn't sound right either, and KWV was nixxed. Senator Dirksen introduced
a
bill in Congress to allow the continued use of WWV in Colorado.

Anyway to get back to the announcers. They were hired to sound alike, and
because of the repetitive precision needed , ex-military types were given
preference. I thought that everything was taped, but they were live!

To test this out I closely monitored WWV for a total of 65 hours over a
one
week period, in sessions lasting up to 8 hours. Sure enough, I heard
differences in delivery,. Sometimes the voice sounded a little gruffier,
other
times a little hurried, and at times the announcer sounded bored. After a
while
I could hear the forced authority in the voice. The shift changes occured
on
the hour, during the last five minutes (when there's no tone, only
clicks). The
longer I listened the more I heard differences in inflection and rhythm.
Several times I could detect the change of announcers, but those guys were
good!! You could hardly tell them apart.

Several still draw pensions from AFTRA, the announcer's union. They were
in the
Baltimore-Washington local of AFTRA, but had a no-strike contract, and
were
paid Civil service GS-12 pay. Several turnovers occured as people quit or
were
institutionalized. One guy actually defected to Cuba and became the voice
of
Radio Reloj in Havana.

Today WWV is undergoing even more changes. See this site, and click on the
"clock" to hear audio.

http://www.grantassoc.net/wwv.html

Good story, but that's all it is. See the NIST website for the history of
WWV he

http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq...wwvhistory.htm

There is a lot of other information on the website, including a list of all
employees.

I found this in addition:

2.6.2 Voice Time Announcement, once per minute

(1) The internally generated voice time announcements should
consist of appropriate words and phrases which have been
digitized and stored in ROM chips within the time code
generators. Professional announcers (male for WWV;
female for WWVH) should be used as the sources for these
digitized recordings in ROM. The digitizing and other
related processes must provide broadcast-quality in the
output announcements.

http://www.nic.funet.fi/index/unix/p...xntp/radio.txt

And this as well:

About the announcers

The station identification and time-of-day announcements are
pre-recorded --- not "live." The regular announcer for WWV is Mr. Don
Elliot of Atlanta, Georgia. Mrs. Jane Barbe, also of Atlanta, is the
announcer for WWVH.

(qoute from page 23 of 23 of the following pdf document from the NIST
website)

http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq...l/pdf/1600.pdf

Brenda Ann wrote:

Today WWV is undergoing even more changes. See this site, and click on the
"clock" to hear audio.

http://www.grantassoc.net/wwv.html


Good story, but that's all it is. See the NIST website for the history of
WWV he

http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq...wwvhistory.htm


All Lies and prevarications. Radioman had it right, but I was very
close to the truth.

Pre recorded SEGMENTS of time announcements. Ha!



mike