Thank you for dropping in. I am Don Aston and I have been around the Old Time Radio world for over 40 years now. I began making Yesterday's Radio available to collectors under the name of ASTON'S ADVENTURES in 1971. I joined SPERDVAC (Society to Preserve and Encourage Radio Drama, Variety and Comedy) . I have served on the SPERDVAC Board of Directors twice.  I am also the CEO of AVPRO.

AVPRO was established in 1991. The Archive of Radio material belonging to AVPRO was begun in 1967, just 5 years after radio made its historic transition from comedy, drama, mystery, and adventure to the music, news, and talk shows of today. The AVPRO archive may have well over 200,000 broadcasts from YESTERDAY'S RADIO with the majority being or coming from original sources. This collection is continuing to grow.

We have been the source of several movie and television productions that needed old time radio. We have provided material to the TV series "Winds of War", "The ABC 50th Anniversary for the end of W.W.II", the movies "The Margaret Bourke White Story", "The Devil in a Blue Dress" and most recently "Project 20th Century".
Yesterday's Radio had its own show for over seven years on KRTM-FM in Temecula, California, every Sunday night at 8:00 PM for two hours. You may now hear YESTERDAY'S RADIO on the Yesterday USA Satellite Station and on the Internet at: www.yesterdayusa.com.

Our catalog has been used by many collectors as a guide to establishing their own collections. I began listing shows in chronological order by date and program number very early in the business. We strive for quality in recorded sound. Our motto in this business was and still is "quality sound and reliable service." The Old Time Radio programs are provided to the customer for their listening pleasure and no rights are implied or given.

AVPRO has been engaged in the Old Time Radio business since 1967.  We first began by preserving radio programs on reel to reel tape at 7 1/2 inches per second  1/2 track on 1/4 inch tape. Then stereo reel to reel tape recorders came on the market.  We then began to place 6 hours of material on a 7 inch reel of 1/4 inch tape recorded  at 3 3/4 ips.  Others attempted a record speed of 1 7/8 ips.  At this slow speed, the quality of the recorded sound began to be compromised.  To much was being  recorded on less tape area.  The sound was being compressed.  Reel to Reel recordings are still obtainable and used.  However, Reel to Reel machines for the home market have not been produced for several years.

Cassettes became the basis for collecting OTR following the demise of reel to reel decks.  Cassettes were not considered a good medium for preservation due to the slow speed and very thin tape used.  C-60 cassettes had  30 minutes of recorded material in one direction and 30 minutes in the other direction.  The actual recordable area was very small.  AVPRO followed the market place and began offering recorded material on cassette.  But the cassette , like reel to reel tape before it, is fading away.

CD discs began to appear a decade ago thanks to the development of the Laser Disc that contained video material on  10 and 12 inch discs.  The Audio CD came about as a result of isolating the movie sound tracks on a 5 inch diameter CD.  AVPRO now offers its Old Time Radio on CD.  This change in the market place is due partly to the  development of computer technology, a recordable CD, and CD players being available in the home and automobile.

Now the market place is changing again.  MP3 is now becoming the medium of choice along with iPods and downloading from the internet.  MP3 is not an archival medium.  MP3 can be very good and it can also be extremely bad.  It all depends on the source and the equipment being used.  We stress caution in converting collections recorded in  REAL TIME into a  compressed medium such as MP3.  Media Storage should be secondary to quality.
The change to MP3 is not something AVPRO wants to do.  As with the change to cassette,  MP3   compresses recorded sound and can reduce the quality of the sound recorded.   In an attempt to reduce the degradation of the sound quality, we are only placing approximately 6 hours of recorded sound on a 80 real time minute CD.  This matches 6 CD Bookshelf set.  We have no plans to put 50, 75, or 100 shows on a CD recorded in MP3.  Some customers might think that  recording a lot of shows on one CD is desirable.  AVPRO  is not of that persuasion.

Old Time Radio existed for only a brief time, approximately between 1925 and September 30, 1962.   The best years of Old Time Radio were the 1940’s.  With a few exceptions, there has been no more OTR produced.  The preservation of what has survived and  making it available  in  a quality  medium is still  AVPRO’s   principal direction.  We have always stood for QUALITY SOUND and RELIABLE SERVICE.