940 WINE sold flips to Portuguese language programming

[CTListener]

Portuguese, yes, and largely Azorean. Plus a lot from Cape Verde. It was fishermen going where the fishing was the best. Big wave, and then it ended and the next generations did what they all do.

When I worked alongside Gil Santos at WBZ in the 1990s, he could speak Portuguese, but I'll bet his kids can't/don't.

Is Gil (former voice of the New England Patriots, for the benefit of David, who may not be familiar with him) second-generation Portuguese?

 

[davideduardo]

Portuguese, yes, and largely Azorean. Plus a lot from Cape Verde. It was fishermen going where the fishing was the best. Big wave, and then it ended and the next generations did what they all do.

One of my daughters did a year of high school in Portugal, and then a year of undergrad work in international law and, finally, a year of postgrad in Portugal. She obviously is totally fluent in Portuguese. She took trips with her Lisboa family to the Azores and said that, while there is an accent, it is more like a comparison of New England with Chicago English.

Then she went for several months on a project in Brasil. She said it took the first two months to get into the swing of it, as the language, inflections, vocabulary and even word meanings differ a lot. She's fluent in five languages and "gets by" in a couple of others, so she is normally a quick learner... but she said the "illogical differences" were very confusing.

When I worked alongside Gil Santos at WBZ in the 1990s, he could speak Portuguese, but I'll bet his kids can't/don't.

Sounds like the issue of Spanish language radio. First generation often / usually spend most time with Spanish media. Second generation spends more time with English, and after that it is all English media. Obviously, there are exceptions on either side, but the very vast majority behave this way.

 

[Marcos_C]

So the stations that started decades ago were aimed at Portuguese immigrants, while the more recent are all Brazilian? That explains the severe language differences.

The differences between Brazilian Portuguese and European Portuguese began to develop much further back in time than that.

My primary Portuguese accent is Brazilian. I can speak the European accent, but with more difficulty due to differences in grammar and vocabulary. The short video below illustrates some of the many differences between the two accents. What the video doesn't mention is the word for excellent. In Brazil, "excelente" is pronouced "eh-seh-LEHN-chee," while in Portugal, it is pronounced "shlent."

 

[RadioGuy1864]

They got robbed. That station is worthless.

I was shocked when I saw the purchase price. Unfortunately, the full APA is not online yet. Unless they got some tower land, they did, in fact, get robbed.

 

[fybush]

I'm always amused at the "experts" on station valuation here.

A station is always, in the end, worth what a willing buyer will pay to a willing seller. In this case, based on the APA (which is, in fact, online and has been from the moment this was filed), the church is paying $50,000 in cash and crediting Townsquare with a $100,000 donation for tax purposes. There's no land changing hands, because WINE runs off the same tower that will remain in use for WRKI.

For about the price of a decent new car these days, the church gets on the air in one of the more heavily Portuguese-speaking parts of the country and can reach the audience there and raise money. I'd guess it's well worth $50,000 for them, and that they don't think they got robbed - and so who are any of us to say otherwise?

 

[RadioGuy1864]

I'm always amused at the "experts" on station valuation here.

A station is always, in the end, worth what a willing buyer will pay to a willing seller. In this case, based on the APA (which is, in fact, online and has been from the moment this was filed), the church is paying $50,000 in cash and crediting Townsquare with a $100,000 donation for tax purposes. There's no land changing hands, because WINE runs off the same tower that will remain in use for WRKI.

For about the price of a decent new car these days, the church gets on the air in one of the more heavily Portuguese-speaking parts of the country and can reach the audience there and raise money. I'd guess it's well worth $50,000 for them, and that they don't think they got robbed - and so who are any of us to say otherwise?

That makes sense. $50K is about what that signal is worth. The donation is what it is. I did not see the full APA online.

 

[Steve Green NEPA]

(Merely some comments here, from the perspective of a DXer and, later, a radio employee for 28 years.)
Naturally, it's not 1964 anymore. Heck -- it's not even yesterday anymore. But '64 was the year WINE signed on 940 as, iIrc, a Beautiful Music station. With WPAT 930 a convenient 90-degree null by us back in Queens, WINE was considered a 'regular' to us. The afternoon jock I remember as being Ben (?) Alexander.
Even as a rock and roll punk teen I enjoyed B/M and still do. And my first full-time job / first-ever paid vacation was from a B/M station itself. Evidently, in that era there were enough elevators to go around to support daytime stations.
FM killed the AM B/M star big time. At one point there were three huge NYC Class B FM's simultaneously playing Chacksfield, Gleason, Mauriat, Montovani, The Billion and One Cellos, and the rest of the known library culled from the wee daytimers.
WINE was through. So were we. Other daytime-only B/M stations come to mind, such as WWBA St. Pete, WGAY from DC WBOF Virginia Beach -- you folks can add to those.
Well, the point here is 'Shrug'. If a religious outfit or ethnic entity thinks that WINE Vintage 59 years ago still has some use during services or celebrations, that's their judgement.