XM Radio's 40's channel, which is devoted to popular music of the decade, will broadcast the historic NBC News bulletin about the D-Day attack on June 6 at 12:41 a.m. ET, 60 years to the day after its original broadcast.
Archival news updates will continue in real time in between songs for the next 40 hours. The program was produced by Marlin Taylor, XM program director for the 40's channel.
In this era before satellites and television, Americans got their news from radio, which relied on Associated Press teletype reports and shortwave radio for live broadcasts by journalists on the scene. The information was then delivered to those on the homefront by network newscasters and commentators who were trusted household names, such as H. V. Kaltenborn, Morgan Beatty, Merrill Mueller, Richard Harkness and Robert St. John with NBC.
These same names will again provide on-going reporting and analysis as details of what's taking place on the northern coast of France come in to the NBC newsrooms in New York and Washington on June 6th and 7th, 1944, along with along with narration by XM's own Savoy Express reporter, Ed Baxter.
In addition to this special, XM's old-time radio channel Radio Classics is airing World War II-era programs this week in honor of the D-Day anniversary.
- Portions from the XM Satellite Radio website, reprinted with permission
