Harrison Boyd Summers (1894-1980) was a broadcast historian and educator who conducted audience surveys of radio listeners. After several years as an advance man for the

Chautauqua Chautauqua ( ) was an adult education and social movement in the United States, highly popular in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Chautauqua assemblies expanded and spread throughout rural America until the mid-1920s. The Chautauqua bro ...

circuit, Summers was awarded a Ph.D. in economics from the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Universit ...

in 1931. His first academic post was at

Kansas State College Kansas State University (KSU, Kansas State, or K-State) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Manhattan, Kansas, United States. It was opened as the state's land-grant college in 1863 and was the first public instit ...

(now University) where in 1937 he began conducting large-scale radio audience surveys. He soon joined the industry he had been studying, holding positions in New York City radio and serving as a member of the Radio Research Council (1937–46). He was director of public service programs for

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...

's Eastern Division from 1939 to 1942 and manager of the public service division of the Blue Network (later

American Broadcasting Company The American Broadcasting Company (ABC) is an American commercial broadcast television network. It is the flagship property of the ABC Entertainment Group division of The Walt Disney Company. The network is headquartered in Burbank, Cali ...

) from 1942 to 1946. In 1946, Summers joined

Ohio State University The Ohio State University, commonly called Ohio State or OSU, is a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. A member of the University System of Ohio, it has been ranked by major institutional rankings among the best publ ...

's speech communication program where his teaching and research centered on station and network programming, policy and regulation of broadcasting, and audience research.

Works

* ''Radio Censorship'' (H.W. Wilson, 1939, reprinted by Arno Press, 1971) * ''A Thirty-Year History of Programs Carried on National Radio Networks in the United States, 1926-1956'' (Ohio State University, 1958; reprinted by Arno Press, 1971). * ''Broadcasting and the Public'' (Wadsworth, 1966), an introductory survey text, with his son, Robert. * ''Unicameralism in Practice: The Nebraska Legislative System'' (The H. W. Wilson Co., 1937) * ''The Railroad problem''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Summers, Harrison Boyd 1894 births 1980 deaths 20th-century American historians American male non-fiction writers American radio personalities Radio pioneers 20th-century American male writers