• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Retro DX from the early 1960s.

cyberdad said:
I could be mistaken, but I think all of the Westinghouse O&O stations were at least "dabbling" in top 40 during the late 50s and early 60s. When I was growing up, my parents' favorite station was WIND, which was basically what Billboard magazine called "Adult Contemporary" during the day, but rocked a little harder at night. I think WOWO, KDKA, and WBZ were variations of the same formula. I listened to WBZ quite a bit during the early and mid '60s, and they were definitely rockin' at night with the likes of Bruce Bradley and Dick Summer. And I always considered WOWO a top 40 station. OTOH, by the mid 60s, WIND was basically the same "Adult Contemporary" day
Click to expand...
You're right. Before WLS went Top 40, WJJD was the daytime option. At night we could hear some Top 40 on WIND especially
on Sunday nights when Milo Hamilton played the "Top 21".
 
cyberdad said:
WIND flipped to "Number One Music" in 1970 or early 1971. I worked at a station that copied it with great success (right after I left the place, of course....LOL). As you say the format was essentially oldies, but with a current top ten record every half hour....roughly at :15 and :45. The concept of the oldies formats was new at the time, and WIND did quite well at it for several years.

(For those unfamiliar with WIND, their 5kw directional signal held its own with Chicago's blowtorches. The nulls were (are) to the west southwest and east northeast, and not an issue until you got outside of the metro. The bottom line was that the signal was good enough for WIND to hold its own with its 50kw competitors in both market coverage and ratings.)

As for Bob DelGiorno, as SC and some others of you reading this may already know, he went on to become a longtime fixture as talk show host in New Orleans at WWL.
Click to expand...
I think it was late 70 when WIND went to "Number One Music". They brought in Robert W Morgan for mornings, but he wasn't too successful going up against Wally Phllips and Larry Lujack. He went back to LA a little over a year later. However, WIND continued with the music and brought Bob Dell, later DelGiorno in soon after. In the early and mid 60s I also listened to WBZ and Bruce Bradley and Dick Summer.
 
radioman148 said:
You're right. Before WLS went Top 40, WJJD was the daytime option.
Click to expand...
Remember, WJJD signed off at sunset Salt Lake City time, so in summer it could be on as late as 10 PM.
 
radioman148 said:
I think it was late 70 when WIND went to "Number One Music". They brought in Robert W Morgan for mornings, but he wasn't too successful going up against Wally Phllips and Larry Lujack. He went back to LA a little over a year later. However, WIND continued with the music and brought Bob Dell, later DelGiorno in soon after. In the early and mid 60s I also listened to WBZ and Bruce Bradley and Dick Summer.
Click to expand...
WIND seemed to be straddling the line between WLS and WCFL on one hand, and the stodgy WGN on the other. Ron Brittain went there after his late 60s WCFL gig
 
radioman148 said:
You're right. Before WLS went Top 40, WJJD was the daytime option. At night we could hear some Top 40 on WIND especially
on Sunday nights when Milo Hamilton played the "Top 21".
Click to expand...
I never heard this in person, but legend has it that WIND played "The Whiffenpoof Song" at 1:06am from the 1940s through the sale and flip to Spanish in the 80s.
 
gr8oldies said:
WIND seemed to be straddling the line between WLS and WCFL on one hand, and the stodgy WGN on the other. Ron Brittain went there after his late 60s WCFL gig
Click to expand...
They were staddling the line in the 60s, but in the 70s they played a mixture of current Top 40 and oldies.
 
I don't know what all the changes were when WIND moved about a quarter of a mile away and went from top loaded towers to taller monopoles, but I never heard WIND except Post SE Michigan Sunset and Pre WIND Sunset, usually 15 minutes. At the time, 560 in Monroe, MI was WHND, a 500 watt strict Daytimer. But I never heard WIND at Night until they moved. Were the old top loaded towers self supporting? WIND may have changed their pattern at Night to one with a shallower null toward CFOS Owen Sound, ON.
 
This was a very cool video. A step back in time. Good luck picking up KTAR anywhere east of New Mexico today, let alone in Washington DC!
 
Last edited:
Schroedingers Cat said:
Further East in Mecosta County, the signals from Grand Rapids, Milwaukee, and Chicago were much weaker than in Newaygo County. WMAQ was the second strongest AM signal, though probably in the 250 uV/m range. It quickly increased as you went West toward Lake Michigan. However, with a short vertical antenna, a 300 Ohm Twin Lead from a TV antenna with the conductors twisted together, a modified Tom Kneitel designed preamp, and inductively coupled to my Sony portable with cassette player, at least 60-100 signals could be heard in the Daytime. The Grand Rapids and Muskegon stations were still quite weak from traveling across just sandy soil, but WIND, WMAQ, WGN, WBBM, WAIT, WLS, WCFL, WJJD from Chicago, and WTMJ and WOKY from Milwaukee were quite a bit stronger, traveling a good part of the way across Lake Michigan. They were very listenable. I mentioned before that surprisingly, 950 WKTS Sheboygan, WI with 500 watts DA came in, but not WGRT or WWJ in the Daytime. Again, the antenna was a short vertical, but WKTS was far stronger on the antenna. Without the antenna and tuned preamp, almost all those signals were nearly absent.
Click to expand...
Those weeks (one week at a time every year for 3 years) in Fremont gave me some time to tune around, but I was more interested in finding some top 40 to listen to. I know I heard WLS and WCFL but I don't remember them being much of a factor in the day....bear in mind I didn't have DX quality equipment. WOKY was a little noisy but very listenable on the portable, and the third year I was there I heard WGRD on 1410, with jingles seemingly mimicking CKLW (which had just pared down their jingles in June 1969). Once WGRD signed off, I had a reasonable signal from WING, Dayton...better than home around 60 miles north of Dayton.

I have mentioned that my CKLW situation was the opposite of home. At home I had a strong daytime signal but twas in the null toward XEROK; in Fremont MI almost nothing in the day but I had a chance to hear the night jocks. The last breath of WOWO made it there during the day; and it was also strong at night. Driving home, my parents (hardly top 40 fans) had WLS on for awhile one of the years for awhile. I also remember a billboard that said "For the next 300 miles....WKZO 590"
 
I think WKZO revised that 300 miles downward over the years. WJR had a similar one. When you had all the 250 watt Class IVs, it would have been no more than the next 40 miles in many areas, if that. I remember that WLAV 1340 barely came in in a county park we had a picnic in near Cedar Springs. Over on the Lake Huron side though, I would hear people listening to 1000 watt WTAC 600 and CKLW 800 in Harrisville State Park, in their cars and on the beach.
 
gr8oldies said:
I also remember a billboard that said "For the next 300 miles....WKZO 590"
Click to expand...
I remember WJR's on I-94 eastbound near Benton Harbor. It was pretty accurate. Going east, WJR's day signal was/is listenable via I-94 and the 401/402 freeways in Canada nearly all the way to Toronto.
 
cyberdad said:
I remember WJR's on I-94 eastbound near Benton Harbor. It was pretty accurate. Going east, WJR's day signal was/is listenable via I-94 and the 401/402 freeways in Canada nearly all the way to Toronto.
Click to expand...
No billboard, but in one of those trips we listened to CKLW (again in a departure from my parents' respective musical tastes) for quite a bit of the trip to Fremont, losing it around Kalamazoo or so.
 
Schroedingers Cat said:
I think WKZO revised that 300 miles downward over the years. WJR had a similar one. When you had all the 250 watt Class IVs, it would have been no more than the next 40 miles in many areas, if that. I remember that WLAV 1340 barely came in in a county park we had a picnic in near Cedar Springs. Over on the Lake Huron side though, I would hear people listening to 1000 watt WTAC 600 and CKLW 800 in Harrisville State Park, in their cars and on the beach.
Click to expand...
I remember being at the beach in Pokagan State Park, Angola, IN. Every radio (except one) was blasting The Big 8.

I don't remember exactly where the WKZO billboard was, but suspect it might have been US 131, which continued on into Indiana.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom