Walter Damm

A Wisconsin broadcast pioneer whose career began in 1922 with Milwaukee’s first radio station WAAK. Headed broadcast operations for the Milwaukee Journal Company for thirty-six years, putting Wisconsin’s first television station, WTMJ-TV, Milwaukee, on the air in 1947. He was the first President of the National Association of Broadcasters in 1930 and later served as President of national Television Broadcasters Association.

Walter Damm passed away in 1962.

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The Wisconsin Broadcasters Hall of Fame was created in 1989 to honor those broadcasters who have devoted their careers to broadcasting and its development in Wisconsin, to recognize their outstanding service to broadcasting, their communities, and their state, over at least a fifteen-year career in the industry, at least ten of which were served in Wisconsin.The first twelve members of the Hall of Fame were inducted during the 1989 WBA Summer Conference. Inductees are chosen each year from among nominations by WBA members. Broadcasters who have been inducted into the Hall of Fame include managers, personalities, engineers, reporters and those broadcasting pioneers who were at once all of the above.

In October, 1989, Alfred C. Sykes, then Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, came to Wisconsin to formally dedicate a Hall of Fame display, including plaques honoring the inductees, at the State Historical Society of Wisconsin Library in Madison. In 2010, due to remodeling of the SHSW facility, the display was removed. The Hall of Fame exhibit was relocated to the Hilton Milwaukee City Center in 2015 and enhanced with a touchscreen display featuring all inductee commemorative videos.