Allerton House Conferences

Administrative History/Information:

• Hosted by the University of Illinois at the Allerton House Conference Center in 1949 and 1950
• Underwritten by the Rockefeller Foundation
• Chance for thirty educational broadcasters to organize, define mission and to attract funding
• 1949 conference:
  • Proposed permanent headquarters on campus of the National Association of Educational Broadcasters (NAEB)
  • Proposed program production and distribution center - later to become the National Educational Radio Network (NERN)
  • Examined six areas in regards to education and broadcasting:
    • Purpose
    • Audience
    • Nature of noncommercial radio
    • Relation of broadcasting to educational institutions
    • The New Media
    • Future programs
  • Participants included:
    • Franklin Dunham
    • Donald Horton
    • Robert B. Hudson
    • Wilbur Schramm (chair)
    • Charles Siepmann
    • Ralph Steetle
    • George D. Stoddard
  • Defined philosophy: "educational broadcasting in a democracy is an essential part of and a supplement necessary to both education and public communications" (Blakely, Robert. To Serve the Public Interest: p. 11)
• 1950 Conference:
  • Followup to the 1949 conference
  • Focused on program content:
    • Length of programs
    • New production opportunities in poetry, dance, drama, etc.?
    • Chose three radio concepts to be produced by the NAEB with money from the Ford Foundation's Fund for Adult Education:
      • The Ways of Mankind
      • People Under Communism
      • The Jeffersonian Heritage

Collection(s):

• Jim Robertson Papers - Interviews:
  • William G. Harley
  • Robert Hudson
  • Harold B. McCarty
  • Morris S. Novik
  • Ralph Steetle

Reference Shelf Materials

Reading Room

Hudson, Robert B.. "Allerton House: Twenty Years After." Educational Broadcasting Review, Vol. 4, No. 1 (February 1970): 35-38. Periodicals

By Request

"Educational Broadcasting: Its Aims and Responsibilities," Allerton House Seminar, 1949. Folder: 132

Horton, Donald. "Remarks." Allerton House Seminar on Educational Radio, University of Illinois, 1949. Folder: 521

Landay, Jerry. "The Cradle of PBS." Illinois Quarterly, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Winter 1991): 34-41. Folder: 47

Lazarsfield, Paul. "Remarks." Allerton House Seminar on Educational Radio, University of Illinois, 1949. Folder: 529

Siepmann, Charles A. "Remarks." Allerton House Seminar, July 2, 1949. Folder: 411

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