Once he was established as a radio manufacturer, Powell Crosley Jr. decided to get into broadcasting, so that people would have a reason to buy a radio
By 1934 Crosley put a one-of-a-kind 500,000 watt transmitter on the air, occasionally it would go as high as 700,000 watts. With such power WLW soon became known as "the Nation's Station".
The transmitter alone was 54-feet wide, 13-feet tall and 7-feet deep with 22, 5 foot tall tubes costing $1,624 each. 700 gallons of distilled water per minute cooled the transmitter.
In 1939 the FCC ruled the station had to cut back it power to 50,000 watts due to interference with other stations. When WWII began WLW was again allowed to use its 500,000 watt transmitters and the station could be heard throughout most of the world. WLW engineers also built short-wave transmitters that were used for the "Voice of America" broadcasts. In 1943 the FCC finally made the station cut back to "only" 50,000 watts. There was a neon sign at a motel on Tylersville Road that would never go out due to the transmitter's power.
Crosley built more radios than anyone in the US:
The item below was built in 1936 by Crosley and was the largest radio receiver in the world at that time. Crosley built it in response to the Zenith Stratosphere which had been introduced, the previous year, as the world's largest radio. Powel Crosley stated, "It is fitting that the owner of the world's most powerful radio station make the world's greatest radio receiver."
The early beginnings of facsimile reproduction was begun in the late 30s. Crosley was licensed to manufacture receiving equipment that were used to capture radio signals transmitted after the station went off the air around 12;30 at night. There were 13 stations around the country that were equipped to transmit pictures using this method (called the Finch system). WLW continued radio FAX broadcasts into the early part of WWII. Powel read his Reado strip every morning for the latest news.
The WLW tower was an engineering marvel. It rose 831' (257' higher than the Carew Tower). The diamond shaped antenna was 35' wide at the center and only 30" in diameter at the base with the diameter at the base of the insulator only 6 1/4". This small base rests on a cupped-shaped piece of porcelain 1 1/2" thick. The foundation for this porcelain rests 70' beneath the ground, and supports a total stress load of 450 tons which includes 135 tons of structural steel. Eight 2 inch cables-totaling more than a mile in length hold the tower in position. Before this antenna was erected the traditional method of antenna construction consisted of copper wires stretched horizontally between two high towers. This resulted in much of the signal being radiated up into space producing a much weaker signal. The actual height of the metal structure was 708' and was augmented by a steel pole rising from the top to the 831 foot height. It is still one of the area's tallest structures surpassed only by some 1,000 foot TV towers
http://www.cincinnativiews.net/wlw_radio_tv.htm
