NOW-HE'S OFF.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 20, 25 January 1939, Page 14

NOW-HE'S OFF.

IZM RACING SESSION. "SUFFICIENTLY COVERED." MR. J. SHAW'S BROADCASTS. Mr. J. Shaw, who for the past three years has been "conducting racing broadcasts from station IZM Auckland, has been advised by the station director, Mr. W. Rodgcrs, that his services will no longer be required. The broadcasts are being discontinued. The reason given is that the sport is sufficiently covered by IYA. The session conducted by Mr. Shaw was not a weekly feature, but was conducted every night when there was a race meeting in the city. Mr. Shaw used to review the running on the day, with comments on the form of the horses. The IYA broadcast is merely a running commentary from the course while the races are in progress. With the termination of this session practically all the features of the old privately owned IZM have be?n eliminated. Mr. Shaw was on the air from IZM before it was taken over by the (Government, and was one of the most popular personalities on' the air. His

racing sessions had a big public, and his mail came from as far afield as the Bluff. His broadcasting- experience dated back much .further than three years. Mr. Shaw was the first announcer to broadcast racing in New Zealand. That was when radio was in its infancy in this country, and IYA was situated in a small building in France Street, Newton. The Takapuna Racing Club was the first club in Auckland to allow its race meetings to be broadcast, and Mr. Shaw did the running commentary from the course for IYA. The microphone used then to be established in a a little box, adjoining the judges' box, on the old Takapuna course. Later all the clubs permitted their meetings to be broadcast. For the past three years Mr. Shaw has broadcast the progress of races over a loud-speaker system on the courses at Ellerslie and Avondale. It is believed that his first broadcasts in this way at Ellerslie were also the first broadcasts on any course in the world.