KGEI Transmitter Building, Redwood City, CA, 2024
All the pixels, but none of the signal, at https://www.flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/54131707918/
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@mattblaze Gone are the days when utility buildings such as this were more than simple boxes...
Captured with the Rodenstock 50mm/4.0 HR Digaron-W lens (@ f/6.3), Phase One IQ4-150 digital back, Cambo 1250 camera (vertically shifted -5mm).
This modest but handsome, art-deco-accented building was built in 1941 to house the transmitter for "KGEI", a commercial shortwave radio broadcast station whose programming could be heard across the Pacific. It shut down for good in 1994.
KGEI was a 250KW commercial shortwave radio international broadcast station. Originally constructed, owned and operated by General Electric, the station opened in 1939 on San Francisco's Treasure Island. In 1941, it moved to a permanent site in Redwood City. This building housed the transmitter and control facilities; the exterior walls are three feet thick, to better resist any WW II enemy bombings. At the time, KGEI was the only US broadcast station that reliably reached across the Pacific.
In 1960, the station was sold to the "Far East Broadcasting Company", which changed the format to chiefly Christian religious programming. The station ceased operation in 1994, and its antenna field was razed soon afterward.
Fortunately, the transmitter house survives and remains in excellent condition. It currently belongs to a wastewater treatment plant located adjacent to the site. I believe the building is now leased out as office space.
The Bay Area has some handsome broadcast transmitter shacks. Another that I've been meaning to photograph is the former KRE transmitter (now KVTO) in Berkeley Aquatic Park. The site was featured in George Lucas's American Graffiti as the (fictional) studio hosting the (nonfictional) DJ Wolfman Jack's "border blaster" broadcasts.
Part of my "boring pictures of interesting places" series.
@mattblaze They just don’t make transmitter buildings like they used to!