In the depths of the bottom floor of the Campus Center, tucked into a corner, lies the WOZQ station for Smith College Radio. Lined floor to floor with disks, records, polaroids, drawings, letters and posters (specifically, a four-foot-tall poster of 2010-era Kevin Jonas, red-lipstick-kissed on his cheek), over eighty Smithie DJs come to broadcast their shows seven days a week.
For 32 years, this student run radio has been putting out sounds which fluctuate from morning news to self proclaimed “dad jams” over the 91.9FM air waves. With an audience as wide as Hampshire County, this highly electric programming has a history of connecting its student disk jockeys with the world of radio.
At the beginning of each semester, WOZQ’s board members open up the organization to any students wishing to DJ their own show. Will Sandke ’20, station manager, says they receive between 50-60 applications. Each show has its own theme (such as “songs written about California” or “playlists based off the Northampton weather”), but all fall under one of the four categories of general, specialties, revelations or news. “Pretty much everyone gets a show,” Sam Brand ’21, the assistant station manager, said while reflecting on the application process.
In addition to broadcasting, WOZQ creates merchandise, hires out “Party DJs” and organizes concerts. Recently, they arranged their annual Fall Concert which showcased the upcoming indie rock band from Vermont, Moxie, and one of Spotify’s proclaimed “Badass Women,” Samia. Held in Davis Ballroom, 186 people from the Five Colleges and surrounding areas attended this two-act performance. Next semester, they hope to get another high number of attendees for their spring concert.
Brand spoke about possible future events just for the DJs of WOZQ. As a big organization, she expressed concern about creating more connection between students involved in WOZQ. Brand proposed playlist-making nights, pizza parties, or poster designing. She clarified, “Something to add more unity.”
But despite Brand’s concerns, Smith’s student radio has historically been a medium for creating bonds beyond campus. WCSR, the first student radio station on campus, was established in 1948. Their goal was to “broadcast as many hours of uninterrupted classical music as possible,” according to the station manager (SM), Marjorie Bosselly ’48 in a 1948 newspaper interview.
Only three months after first broadcasting the program in 1949 over the electric power line which followed the central heating system, Barbara Ungerleider, the proceeding SM, led WCSR in creating the first ever intercollegiate radio network in the United States: Pioneer Broadcasting System. They partnered with Amherst and UMass to create continuous AM radio over the following years, eventually being taken off the air in 1956 due to the destruction of the building that hosted their studio.
In the Smith College Special Collections, there are photos and reports of students from Yale coming to engage and learn radio broadcasting from Smith students. There are numerous letters back and forth from WCSR to radio stations at Radcliffe College, Princeton University, Wellesley College, and more. Students at Smith reached out to ask questions, find helpful resources and seek advice on how to run both the technical and managerial aspects of their newly formed student radio station.
In 1977, Smith brought back their broadcasting: this time with the call sign WRSC. And in 1982, student radio switched to the FM signal and 91.9FM became the WOZQ station that broadcasts Smith students now.
Although today there is some aspect of isolation due to the “alone in the booth” nature of small college radio, many students still find ways to connect to friends or the surrounding community through WOZQ.
Katherine Albert-Aranovich ’23 (DJ Rocky) and Suzanna Strauss ’23 (DJ Straussy) co-host their show “TongueTied.” Each episode they choose a different theme to make playlists and talk about, like “moving on,” “red” and “boy bands.” Albert-Aranovich wrote about her co-hosted show, “It is fun to be a host; it is fun for our families and friends (we hope); it is fun to hang out together and listen to some rockin’ tunes.”
Amrita Acharya ’22 similarly finds connection to others through her show “413 Ethnography.” Every Saturday from 4-6pm, Acharya converses with and tells the story of a Western Mass local she has become acquainted with over the past months. Her subjects include musicians, skaters, mail men/women, house painters and more.
She describes “413 Ethnography” not as an interview, “but a culmination of a series of interviews woven into a live conversation. I narrate the collection of experiences I’ve shared with my guests by talking directly to my audience, but then I also converse with my guest. A listener gets a firsthand perspective on the person being interviewed but also a lens into my perception of them.”
Recently, WOZQ has been live streaming and archiving their broadcasts through the website Mixlr.com. Here, anyone with internet access can tune in live, or listen to the shows they missed. Needless to say, this further opens WOZQ to connections worldwide.
For over seventy years, Smithies have been proving their student-run radio stations lead to connections beyond the four walls they broadcast in. There is a rich history of independence, hard work and creativity that can’t help but captivate a larger audience. The future for WOZQ is bright, but beyond that, the future for Smithies and their relationship to those beyond the campus is even brighter.
