VO-BB - 20 YEARS OLD!

scooter2 · Guest

I guess it's time for me to join the fray.
I started in radio waaaay back in 1952. A 250 watter in the town of Ware, Mssachusetts. My heroes were the voices from WABC in New York and WBZ in Boston.

We had to have that 3rd class ticket so we could record the output stuff from the transmitter.

The records were hard vinyl 78's and the commercials were cut into acetate covered aluminum discs.

I ended my radio career working with the likes of Jim Ladd, Dick Whittinghill, Gary Owens, Robert W. Morgan and a host of others. I bowed out in 1979..just before talk radio wiped out the "good old days."

And never a moment spent on FM radio.

Ah yes..THOSE were the days...daze...

scooter

Audiogal · Posted: Fri Mar 24, 2006 9:25 pm Post subject:

I haven't thought about sec & tersh tones in years. Smile

As a teenager, I scanned the dial for faraway stations. WLS & John Records Landecker!
_________________
Mary

allensco · Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 5:29 am Post subject:

Old radio guy here too! I'll take a look. Thanks Doc!

Drew · Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 6:22 am Post subject:

Yeah, I bet I got my "1st Phone" in a box filled with ree-to-reel tapes, a couple of carts, and a splicing bar.
_________________
www.voiceoverdrew.com
Skype: andrew.hadwal1
Although I have a full head of hair, I'm quite ribald.

billelder · Guest

Two words...Element Nine". <g>

Doc · Guest

Allen - my pleasure! Smile

Drew - "1st Phone In A Box"? I actually had mine framed and it hangs right here in my office. I worked WAY too hard not to be able to look at it once in a while.

Bill - oh, geez... Element 9 is one of the reasons I actually took the electronics theory course. You think 1st Class Ticket was tough? Try element 9 some time.

Am I right or am I right?

Bailey · Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 6:13 pm Post subject:

I lived in Baltimore as a kid, and spent many nights in bed with my ear glued to the speaker of my GE transistor radio. I would turn the dial ever so slowly to see what distant stations I could get. I think WLS was the most distant. Lots of stations in the South. One that to this day sticks in my head is WWVA. Every night I heard the same guy selling prayer cloths on the airwaves. "..send your money to... Prayer Cloths... WWVA... Wheeling... West Virginia... That's Prayer Cloths...WWVA... Wheeling... West Virginia..."
_________________
"Bailey"
a.k.a. Jim Sutton
Retired... Every day is Saturday, except Sunday.
VO-BB Member #00044 W00T

.gif" alt="W00T" border="0" />
AOVA Graduate 02/2004 ;
"Be a Voice, not an Echo." Ninja

Drew · Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 6:24 pm Post subject:

It's called...here's an old one...DX'ing. Scanning the old AM dial to pick up those 50 thousand watt clear channel blow torches. WOWO in Ft. Wayne, Indiana and CKLW in Windsor/Detroit come to mind for me.

And Doc, I took a crash course one summer to get that 1st Phone. I passed, but I didn't know what the hell it was all about. And in real life, I could never phase those damn AM sticks come sundown. Could always tell when I was spinning the disks at night, because I'd get a call from some pissed off program manager in Mexico flaming me for stepping all over his signal.
_________________
www.voiceoverdrew.com
Skype: andrew.hadwal1
Although I have a full head of hair, I'm quite ribald.

Doc · Guest

Drew,

LMAO - boy, do I remember those. Early on in my career our AM tower array contained 5 towers. OUCH!!

BTW, mine was all paper theory, too. I could solder 2 wires together before I began the course. Now, I can solder 2 wires together.

But, dammit - WE HAD OUR 1ST TICKET!!!

P.S. How about KOMA, Oklahoma City? Boy, that station was fun to listen to "back in the day".

Gregory Best · Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 9:17 pm Post subject: first radio gig ...

Doc,

My first full-time radio gig in small town Illinois paid about $75/week and I had to do part time sales for commission too. Luckily it was in my home town and my expenses were low since I moved back in with my parents at the time. That was 1974 and I had worked part-time at radio since 1967 while I finished high school and went to college.
I had a blast though. On my first job we even were spinning platters, had to fight old gates cart machines, a Wollensack tape deck until we moved up to Ampex. Gary Gears (formerly of WLS) who was at WIND at the time, did some imaging for the station.

We wound up rocking the town so well John Gehron wo was Hobo Laughing

at WLS at the time sent someone down to meet with us. We (this small 3000W mono FM'r) was showing up in the Chicago ARBITRON book.

Those were the days...we ran with it by the seat of our pants making it up as we went. I took what I learned and latter applied it to programming. Of course we spent time especially at nigh listing to CKLW, WLS, WCFL...to see what they were doing. What an education in radio.

It is so different know. Clear Channel now owns my old station and it sounds automated.

Greg

COURVO · Posted: Sun Mar 26, 2006 7:44 pm Post subject:

Geez, 'Can't stand not being on this thread....

Grew up with Johhny Rabbit on KXOK in St. Louis in the 50's, which makes me as old, well, maybe not as old, well...probably older.... hey anyway... first job at KC-Double-C...the Golden Country Sound of Carlsbad, NM, where they give the school lunch menu in the morning, and the teletype is still one of those old mechanical marvels. The radio station was inside a furniture store, and the owner's son would frequently just grab the live mic and wander the store selling furniture for minutes on end....

courvo
_________________
Dave Courvoisier - Las Vegas, NV
http://www.CourVO.com
CourVO@CourVO.com
Courvo's "Voice Acting in Vegas" Blog: http://www.CourVO.biz
on your phone at courvo.mobi
702.610.6288
"I'm not a news anchor, but I play one on TV."

Frank F · Posted: Sun Mar 26, 2006 8:40 pm Post subject:

Got my 1st when I was 15. Even took a college level electronics theory class so I could obtain it and got college credit for it too. Where my 'ticket' is today, couldn't say... probably in a box somewhere aside other memories of those times when radio was FUN!

Do you remember "Ekes Eh Erre Oh Ka - XROCK 80, Juarez, Mexico, the worlds most powerful rock-and-roll radio station" and the Wolfman? Listening to KOMA and catching the 'skip' from all over the country at night as I hugged the radio under the covers just to catch a glimmer of the sound of CKLW and other great radio stations.... Oh, boy does that date me. I dreamed of working for the "great's", and after a time I did...

Anyone remember the "Drake-Chenault" format? The REAL Top 40?

My first job in radio was at a station which becme so 'HOT", articles were written about us in Billboard and R&R. I was just in High School and had an ego that couldn't be beat. I was the guy on the radio that EVERYONE listened to...boy, did I learn the hard way about ego...

Just the mention of my on-air name and the station's call letters got me a gig in San Francisco at the hottest radio station of my time.

Thanks for the stroll down memory lane...

Frank F

Bruce · Posted: Mon Mar 27, 2006 7:27 am Post subject:

You gents are familiar with 440.com I imagine? The listing of radio people's histories and airchecks and memories. I keep swearing I'll get my history into them for inclusion. I worked some very nice stations in Phoenix and San Diego throughout the 70's and was lucky enough to meet or work with some legends on their way up (and down). Even worked with Mighty Mike Mitchell who many of us listened to late at night on KOMA.

My first job was a winner too: Winslow, AZ in 1970 for 90 a week.

Pardon us all you non-radio board members while we have fun doing all this memory flogging.

B

donrandall · Guest

Bruce - you started at $90 a week in 1970? Man, I'm pissed now. I started in 1970 - and only got $80!

I lived up hill from the radio station. I was so broke sometimes, that I used to push the car out of the driveway and coast it down the hill - so I'd have enough gas to get back up the hill to go home!