Massachusetts led the nation in the number of applicants for seats on local draft boards, and Cambridge had a particularly high number of volunteers, a state Selective Service spokesman said yesterday.

Cambridge's tradition of community involvement may explain the large number of volunteers, Robert J. Fee, head of recruitments for eastern Massachusetts, said.

The boards, which will classify men who are inducted if a draft is passed, are needed now "to protect the rights of the people who say they don't want to go," Fee said.

He added that draft boards take a long time to establish and that pressure would be put on a newly formed board to find people to serve.

Names of nominees were sent from the governor's office to Washington three weeks ago, and President Reagan will make appointments to the draft boards sometime next week, Fee said.

Fee declined to release the names of nominees, saying they are protected under the Privacy Act until the appointments are made.

Earlier in the week, a WHRB public service announcement asked for volunteers to serve on draft boards in Massachusetts, but Fee said that the announcement was obsolete, since Selective Service began asking for volunteers in late July.

Huh

WHRB station manager Nancy Kalow '82 said yesterday that she had not heard the announcement and that records are not kept of public service messages.

Individual disc jockeys decide which of the announcements to read over the air, Kalow said, adding that one of them could have made a mistake.