Charles David Herrold grew up in San Jose. On January 1, 1909, he opened the Herrold College of Wireless and Engineering in the Garden City Bank Building at 50 West San Fernando Street, with a large umbrella-style antenna on the roof. That year he began experimental audio transmissions, and from about 1912 he appears to have been the first person to make entertainment broadcasts on a regular schedule, introducing them with “San Jose calling.” His wife, Sybil Herrold, is credited as the first woman disc jockey.
The station was licensed as KQW in December 1921. It later moved to San Francisco and became KCBS in 1949, which still dates its founding to Herrold’s work in 1909.