Ben Franklin, Oral History (part 03)
Title
Ben Franklin, Oral History (part 03)
Description
Engineer Ben Franklin (Ben) continues in this November 4th, 1993 interview recounting his stories of early Birmingham radio.
Creator
Ben Franklin
Bob Friedman
Publisher
Birmingham Black Radio Museum
Date
November 04, 1993
Contributor
Hannah Moore
Emily Bibb
Format
JPG
MP3
PDF
Language
English
Interviewer
Bob Friedman
Interviewee
Ben Franklin
Transcription
Transcript of audio snippet:
Ben: There was some kind of legal angle that Johnston left that building down yonder on that Super Highway vacant and didn’t even try to rent it for 4 or 5 years.
Bob- mmhm.
Ben- They said that he made money on it.
Bob- mmhm.
Ben- Some way or another. It..
Bob- he declared a loss or whatever..
Ben- Yeah. The loss was, anyhow, Uh but Gaston is the same way. Mmhm. And
um. They bought an old transmitter from Memphis and um, WQBC the one on
560, It was an old transmitter, shouldn’t have bought it…Claude Gray talked him
into it because he liked it and he thought was the thing to do, he was honest, but
um when um Kirkwood Balton found out it was so big and wouldn’t go in the
building they had it out there and he didn’t want to put up a bigger building. So he
bought a new transmitter. And made the building just a little bit larger. And um
The old transmitter is sitting back there and I knew it was sitting back there and I
knew, I knew some people that had a transmitter lie that…
Bob- mmhm.
Ben- And I thought Well I’m gonna talk Balton to see how much he wants for it.
And uh, cause I knew some people that buy parts.
Bob- sure.
Be- You couldn’t get parts. So I called Balton up and I told him, I said, you got
that old RCA transmitter out there and uh He said yeah it’s out there - had coffins
piled up on top of it - right there in warehouse where the coffins are. And I said, I
tell you what Ill give you 100 dollars for it.
Ben: There was some kind of legal angle that Johnston left that building down yonder on that Super Highway vacant and didn’t even try to rent it for 4 or 5 years.
Bob- mmhm.
Ben- They said that he made money on it.
Bob- mmhm.
Ben- Some way or another. It..
Bob- he declared a loss or whatever..
Ben- Yeah. The loss was, anyhow, Uh but Gaston is the same way. Mmhm. And
um. They bought an old transmitter from Memphis and um, WQBC the one on
560, It was an old transmitter, shouldn’t have bought it…Claude Gray talked him
into it because he liked it and he thought was the thing to do, he was honest, but
um when um Kirkwood Balton found out it was so big and wouldn’t go in the
building they had it out there and he didn’t want to put up a bigger building. So he
bought a new transmitter. And made the building just a little bit larger. And um
The old transmitter is sitting back there and I knew it was sitting back there and I
knew, I knew some people that had a transmitter lie that…
Bob- mmhm.
Ben- And I thought Well I’m gonna talk Balton to see how much he wants for it.
And uh, cause I knew some people that buy parts.
Bob- sure.
Be- You couldn’t get parts. So I called Balton up and I told him, I said, you got
that old RCA transmitter out there and uh He said yeah it’s out there - had coffins
piled up on top of it - right there in warehouse where the coffins are. And I said, I
tell you what Ill give you 100 dollars for it.
Duration
Full Interview: 32 minutes
Audio Snippet: 2 minutes
Audio Snippet: 2 minutes
Files
Collection
Citation
Ben Franklin and Bob Friedman, “Ben Franklin, Oral History (part 03),” The Birmingham Black Radio Museum, accessed September 7, 2026, https://thebbrm.org/item/96.
Item Relations
| This Item | dcterms:relation | Item: Ben Franklin, Oral History (part 01) |
| This Item | dcterms:relation | Item: Ben Franklin, Oral History (part 02) |
| Item: Ben Franklin, Oral History (part 04) | dcterms:relation | This Item |
| Item: Ben Franklin, Oral History (part 05) | dcterms:relation | This Item |
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