Actual Radio Broadcast, Dempsey - Tunney 2

Don't miss the interview of Billy Petrolle in the Duluth stuff which begins at 4:15 of that segment. Particularly interesting when he says fighters don't win fights backing up. An insight into his philosophy as a fighter. Also all the Duluth people interviewed in the segment furnish a great window into the past demonstrating how closely ordinary citizens in the 1940s (and up until boxing became a niche sport in the 1980s or so) followed and understood boxing, unlike the situation today. Thanks for these interviews in particular!

 

I wonder how Tunney - Dempsey was captured? Magnetic tape was invented in Germany in the 1930's and came into widespread use in the late 1940's after WWII. So were pre-war fights captured with wire recorders, which were not very high quality? Or recorded direct-to-disc? Are there fight broadcasts preserved prior to Tunney-Dempsey 2?

 

They were recorded off the air on 78rpm discs and issued in a five-record set of 10 inch records by the Paramount Record Company. Each side of a disc has one round. From the sound quality I would judge that the recording was not done in-line, but rather recorded directly onto a disc with a single mike set next to the radio speaker. There were no prior radio broadcasts recorded to my knowledge. I purchased a complete set of the recordings about 20 years ago from a Kurt Nauck record auction. The sound quality is poor even for the era in which it was recorded. The Paramount company was notorious for its use of low-end equipment. Had the fight been recorded by Okeh, Columbia, Victor, or Brunswick the sound likely would have been much clearer. But we have to be grateful to the Paramount people for doing what they did since nobody else stepped forward.

 

Thanks so much for the information!