Richard Field Lewis Jr. (May 18, 1907 – October 18, 1957) was an American

radio network There are two types of radio network currently in use around the world: the one-to-many (simplex communication) broadcast network commonly used for public information and mass-media entertainment, and the two-way radio ( duplex communication) type ...

owner of Richard Field Lewis Jr. Stations (later Mid Atlantic Network Inc.) in the mid-20th Century.

Background

Richard Field Lewis Jr. was born on May 18, 1907, in Winchester, Virginia. He had a sister, later known as Mrs. E.L. Anderson.

Career

In 1941, Lewis built the station for and licensed

WINC Winc is a workplace support company operating in Australia supplying office essentials, furniture, safety equipment and IT solutions. The company is focused on supporting businesses through the delivery of everything a workplace needs to work - s ...

, an ABC affiliate, in

Winchester, Virginia Winchester is the most north western independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is the county seat of Frederick County, although the two are separate jurisdictions. The Bureau of Economic Analysis combines the city of Winchester wit ...

. In 1946, he licensed WRFL (FM), also in Winchester. In the early 1950s, Richard F. Lewis, Jr., hired

Whittaker Chambers Whittaker Chambers (born Jay Vivian Chambers; April 1, 1901 – July 9, 1961) was an American writer-editor, who, after early years as a Communist Party member (1925) and Soviet spy (1932–1938), defected from the Soviet underground (1938), ...

briefly at WINC—the first work Chambers got after he had left ''

TIME Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...

'' magazine in December 1948 (as the

Hiss Hiss or Hissing may refer to: * Hiss (electromagnetic), a wave generated in the plasma of the Earth's ionosphere or magnetosphere * Hiss (surname) * ''Hissing'' (manhwa), a Korean manhwa series by Kang EunYoung * Noise (electronics) or electroni ...

Case turned from

HUAC The House Committee on Un-American Activities (HCUA), popularly dubbed the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives, created in 1938 to investigate alleged disloy ...

hearings in Washington, a slander suit in Baltimore, and a grand jury investigation in New York into a federal case against

Alger Hiss Alger Hiss (November 11, 1904 – November 15, 1996) was an American government official accused in 1948 of having spied for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Statutes of limitations had expired for espionage, but he was convicted of perjury in con ...

). In September 1952, Lewis licensed WLXW (AM) in

Carlisle, Pennsylvania Carlisle is a Borough (Pennsylvania), borough in and the county seat of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, United States. Carlisle is located within the Cumberland Valley, a highly productive agricultural region. As of the 2020 United States census, ...

for $70,000. By 1956-7, according to ''Telecasting Yearbook'', Lewis owned a Mid-Atlantic network that comprised: * Wincheser, VA:

, WRFL (FM) * Mt. Jackson, VA:

WSIG WSIG is a Classic Country formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Mount Jackson, Virginia, serving the Central and Northern Shenandoah Valley. WSIG is owned and operated by Saga Communications, through licensee Tidewater Communications, LLC ...

(AM) * Fredericksburg, VA:

WFVA WFVA (1230 kHz) is a commercial AM radio station in Fredericksburg, Virginia. WFVA is owned and operated by Centennial Broadcasting. It airs a talk radio format. The studios, offices and transmitter are on Mimosa Street in Fredericksburg. T ...

(AM) (60%) * Waynesboro, PA: WAYZ (AM) (now WLIN) * Carlisle, PA:

WHYL WHYL (960 kHz) is a commercial AM radio station licensed to Carlisle, Pennsylvania and serving the Harrisburg metropolitan area. The station is owned by Harold Z. Swidler, with the license held by WHYL, Inc. It broadcasts an oldies radio forma ...

(AM) * Fisher, WV: WELD (AM) At his death in 1957, his network had added WAGE (AM) (now WTSD) in

Leesburg, VA Leesburg is a town in the state of Virginia, and the county seat of Loudoun County. Settlement in the area began around 1740, which is named for the Lee family, early leaders of the town and ancestors of Robert E. Lee. Located in the far northea ...

. Upon his death, his wife Marion Park Lewis took over the business, renamed it "Mid Atlantic Network Inc.," and ran it from 1957 to 1971.

Personal life and death

Lewis married Marion Park Lewis; they had three sons—John, David, and Howard. Lewis died age 50 on October 18, 1957, in Washington, DC, of natural causes while on a visit there from Winchester.

Legacy

In addition to surviving radio stations, in 1992 his wife founded the Marion Park Lewis Foundation for the Arts, which offers scholarships for Northern Shenandoah Valley students.

References

External sources