American Broadcasting Company - Mark Woods as company's first president

Beautifully engraved certificate from the American Broadcasting Company incorporated in 1943. This historic document was printed by the American Banknote Company and has an ornate border around it with a vignette of allegorical figures next to a microphone. This item has the signatures of the Company’s President, Mark Woods.


Certificate Vignette



In 1940 the Federal Communications Commission issued the "Report on Chain Broadcasting." The report proposed "divorcement," or the selling of either NBC Red or NBC Blue by RCA. NBC Red was the dominant NBC radio network. The report said RCA used NBC Blue to suppress competition against NBC Red. At the time, the NBC networks controlled the overwhelming majority of high-powered stations.

From 1935-1941 the Federal Communications Commission, under chairman James Fly, conducted hearings on chain broadcasting, from which the report was issued. During 1942 and 1943 NBC Red and NBC Blue divided their assets. Edward Noble, the owner of Lifesaver candy, and owner of WMCA in New York, was thought to be interested, but his initial bid was too low. Woods then talked to the investment company Dillon Reed and Company. Woods received an offer of $7,500,000 from Dillon Reed and called his boss, David Sarnoff, who had been talking to Noble and had just sold him the network for $8,000,000. The transaction involved the sale of three stations from RCA to Noble, Noble also had to sell his radio station, so Federal Communications Commission hearings were necessary. Noble as chairman and Mark Woods as president of the new company were both questioned. Fly asked Woods if the new network would sell time to the American Federation of Labor; Woods responded no. Fly questioned Noble on similar subjects; Noble responded by hiding behind the National Association of Broadcasters Code. Fly then threw his papers down and advised Noble to do some rethinking.

Noble rethought and on October 12, 1943 the sale was approved. The Blue Network Company Inc. was sold to American Broadcasting System Inc. The new network was renamed the American Broadcasting Company, ABC, and its parent the American Broadcasting Companies Inc. The new network sold time to organized labor.

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About Specimen Certificates

Specimen Certificates are actual certificates that have never been issued. They were usually kept by the printers in their permanent archives as their only example of a particular certificate. Sometimes you will see a hand stamp on the certificate that says "Do not remove from file".

Specimens were also used to show prospective clients different types of certificate designs that were available. Specimen certificates are usually much scarcer than issued certificates. In fact, many times they are the only way to get a certificate for a particular company because the issued certificates were redeemed and destroyed. In a few instances, Specimen certificates were made for a company but were never used because a different design was chosen by the company.

These certificates are normally stamped "Specimen" or they have small holes spelling the word specimen. Most of the time they don't have a serial number, or they have a serial number of 00000. This is an exciting sector of the hobby that has grown in popularity over the past several years.