A visit to KTAO 95.3 FM radio station in Los Gatos (1971)

KRON-TV news footage from June 12, featuring a visit to KTAO 95.3 FM radio station in Los Gatos including an interview with owner Lorenzo Milam, views of disc jockeys (Indi Higham and Bill Wade) playing music and of Jeff Smith and helping a woman to make a public announcement on-air. Milam talks about: the station's sponsors; their "infamous be-a-DJ program" and other wide ranging programming; just how bad he believes popular radio to be; the real need to provide public access to the airwaves and how KTAO relies on volunteers to operate. He ends on an optimistic note by stating: "I think the most exciting days of radio are right now. And that's because of the technological change: the fact that FM came on the scene and is now at last succeeding. In the Bay Area alone you have 70, or 80, or 90 stations that can be heard on both AM and FM. And this is fantastically important because it means that instead of competing with each other on, you know, just to do rock, stations have to branch out, do some other creative things. These are the golden days of radio, right now!" Opening graphic designed by Carrie Hawks.

Thanks to former KTAO staffer Geoff Alexander for positively identifying Lorenzo Milam and other KTAO team members for us.

This 16mm film print was remastered in 4K (4096 x 2970) using a Lasergraphics ScanStation film scanner, in June 2022.