ABSTRACT
American radio and television executive, born in Chicago. He graduated in 1922 from the Wharton School of Finance, University of Pennsylvania, and went into his father’s cigar business. Attracted to the new radio field, in 1928 he acquired a small chain of stations that had been set up in 1927 by Arthur Judson as the United Independent Broadcasters, Inc. (UIB). UIB had been in immediate financial difficulty, and had sold its operating rights to the Columbia Phonograph Co., which had renamed it the Columbia Phonograph Broadcasting System. In 1928 Columbia Phonograph sold UIB’s operating rights back to it, and it changed itself to the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) in time for Paley to invest $400,000 in it and take over as president. By 1930 CBS had expanded from 16 to 70 stations across the U.S. CBS began its weekly broadcasts of the New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra concerts in 1930. Important popular artists like Kate Smith and Bing Crosby were also featured.
