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30 years ago...

C

channelsurf

Guest
January 20, 1976-1550-WNTN dropped its long run of programming Progressive Rock, on the AM band, as "Your AM Alternative". It began programming Progressive Rock, full time, in the spring of 1970. During much of its run, I found it to be a better, and more listenable station, then either WBCN or WAAF, its main rivals during those years. Its final months were troubled though, with a Newton based citizens group, that wanted the FCC to yank its liscense, an ownership change, and the emergence of still another FM competitor, WCOZ, during the summer/fall of 1975....
 
Having grown up in Newton, I listened to WNTN in their progressive days often. It was excellent. I also recall camping up in Maine near the White Mountains in 1972, and hearing WNTN drift in on skywave playing "Darkness, Darkness" by The Youngbloods just before they had to sign off at sunset.

I dropped by WNTN as a kid a few times in summer and fall of 1970 when they were playing progressive rock. The afternoon DJ at the time was Denny (last name may have been Lightfoot??).

I also recall a couple of years later that the same DJ, Bill Lichtenstein, was on late afternoon/early evening summer hours on WNTN as "Captain Steamboat Willie", and also overnights on WBCN as "Little Bill" at the same time, all while he was still a high school student in Newton. (Lichtenstein is now producer of the Public Radio syndicated program "The Infinite Mind", aired locally on WBUR).

I wonder what happened to the Newton "citizens group", and what their opinion would be about the station currently being almost all brokered time?



> January 20, 1976-1550-WNTN dropped its long run of
> programming Progressive Rock, on the AM band, as "Your AM
> Alternative". It began programming Progressive Rock, full
> time, in the spring of 1970. During much of its run, I found
> it to be a better, and more listenable station, then either
> WBCN or WAAF, its main rivals during those years. Its final
> months were troubled though, with a Newton based citizens
> group, that wanted the FCC to yank its liscense, an
> ownership change, and the emergence of still another FM
> competitor, WCOZ, during the summer/fall of 1975....
>
 
> January 20, 1976-1550-WNTN dropped its long run of
> programming Progressive Rock, on the AM band, as "Your AM
> Alternative". It began programming Progressive Rock, full
> time, in the spring of 1970. During much of its run, I found
> it to be a better, and more listenable station, then either
> WBCN or WAAF, its main rivals during those years. Its final
> months were troubled though, with a Newton based citizens
> group, that wanted the FCC to yank its liscense, an
> ownership change, and the emergence of still another FM
> competitor, WCOZ, during the summer/fall of 1975....

What were the grounds this "citizen's group" used to attempt to revoke the license of WNTN? Were they legitimate or was it just a bunch of kooks?
 
Didn't some guy named Howard Stern work there briefly?

I believe he mentions it in his book.
 
> I dropped by WNTN as a kid a few times in summer and fall of
> 1970 when they were playing progressive rock. The afternoon
> DJ at the time was Denny (last name may have been
> Lightfoot??).


That was Denny Sanders, who, a short time later, went to Cleveland to help establish WMMS along with another WNTN alumni, John Gorman.

WNTN at the time (circa 1970) was the best thing on Boston radio. Amazing music selection. And the coverage was quite good. I used to listen on the Cape in the summer.
 
Howard absolutely once worked at 'NTN. I think it was right before the change to brokered programming.

> Didn't some guy named Howard Stern work there briefly?
>
> I believe he mentions it in his book.
>
 
> Howard absolutely once worked at 'NTN. I think it was right
> before the change to brokered programming.

Actually, WNTN tried a couple of other formats between progressive rock and eventually going brokered. They were very briefly disco before any FM disco stations (WBOS, then WXKS-FM) came on and blew them away. I think the late Vinnie Peruzzi was involved, one of his early gigs.

They also briefly tried 50's/60's oldies in the late 70's/early 80's. I think Bob Bittner (WJIB) was involved with that.

I seem to remember them also going back to generic suburban MOR/AC as their very last music format in the early/mid 80's, and that eventually got taken over block by block by brokered programming. For a little while, tapes of gold-heavy MOR/AC sometimes ran when they didn't have a brokered program in a slot.
 
> Didn't some guy named Howard Stern work there briefly?

I'm sure I must've heard him, but I don't think he sounded like anything special doing that in those days! Just another AOR jock!
 
> > January 20, 1976-1550-WNTN dropped its long run of
> > programming Progressive Rock, on the AM band, as "Your AM
> > Alternative". It began programming Progressive Rock, full
> > time, in the spring of 1970. During much of its run, I found
> > it to be a better, and more listenable station, then either
> > WBCN or WAAF, its main rivals during those years. Its final
> > months were troubled though, with a Newton based citizens
> > group, that wanted the FCC to yank its liscense, an
> > ownership change, and the emergence of still another FM
> > competitor, WCOZ, during the summer/fall of 1975....
>
> What were the grounds this "citizen's group" used to attempt
> to revoke the license of WNTN? Were they legitimate or was
> it just a bunch of kooks?

Thouhgh I grew up in Newton and listened to WNTN, I only vaguely remember this happening. I think it was a group of conservative suburbanites claiming that by airing progressive rock WNTN was ignoring the tastes and needs of their mainstream suburban community of license, and accused them of instead catering to the young "hippie" population around greater Boston.
 
Wasn't Howard Stern still attending Boston University while working at 'NTN??
 
I thought that the disco music on WNTN-1550 actually came AFTER the oldies format, and was more "contemporary dance". branded as "The Daytime Nightclub", circa 1982.

I think 'NTN went to an AC with lots of suburban news after the progressive rock ended in 1976, and remained with this format until Bob Bittner et. al. came aboard to play oldies starting in 1979.

IIRC, 'NTN went back to a "suburban AC" format around 1981, then went to the "Daytime Nightclub" format around 1982, and briefly went back to AC until they became mostly brokered ethnic programming.

I also thought that 'NTN had programmed leased-time ethnic programming on Sundays until about 3 P.M. even during the years as a progressive rocker, oldies, and dance station.

Wasn't WNTN an MOR station with lots of local news and sports from the station's beginning in 1968 until the flip to rock in 1970??
 
I thought a guy named Don Cohen was with 'NTN around 1974-75, and so was a woman named Deidre O'Donahue, who I believe was the only female air personality during their five-plus years as a progressive rock station.
 
> I thought that the disco music on WNTN-1550 actually came
> AFTER the oldies format, and was more "contemporary dance".
> branded as "The Daytime Nightclub", circa 1982.
>
> I think 'NTN went to an AC with lots of suburban news after
> the progressive rock ended in 1976, and remained with this
> format until Bob Bittner et. al. came aboard to play oldies
> starting in 1979.
>
> IIRC, 'NTN went back to a "suburban AC" format around 1981,
> then went to the "Daytime Nightclub" format around 1982, and
> briefly went back to AC until they became mostly brokered
> ethnic programming.

I think you're right that they did that also, but I seem to also remember a brief disco attempt before the oldies in the late 70's pre-dating the FM disco stations.

> I also thought that 'NTN had programmed leased-time ethnic
> programming on Sundays until about 3 P.M. even during the
> years as a progressive rocker, oldies, and dance station.
>
> Wasn't WNTN an MOR station with lots of local news and
> sports from the station's beginning in 1968 until the flip
> to rock in 1970??

Yes, they were for about two years from their sign-on in spring 1968, which I remember well because in Newton a few miles from their transmitter it interfered with 1510 WMEX on my Radio Shack transistor radio. I had to get a better quality portable radio.
 
> I thought a guy named Don Cohen was with 'NTN around
> 1974-75, and so was a woman named Deidre O'Donahue, who I
> believe was the only female air personality during their
> five-plus years as a progressive rock station.

Those names sound familiar. I remember hearing Deidre now that you mention it. A female host by that name was more recently at KLSX in Los Angeles when it was a Classic Rock station, and at KCRW, a professional Public Radio music station in Santa Monica, CA. If this is indeed the same person, she unfortunately passed away at only age 52 in 2001.

Don Cohen ended up moving from WNTN to AM folk-rock station WCAS 740 Cambridge (now WJIB) in the mid-70's, and after it's demise had brief stints at then WEEI-FM "Soft Rock" 103.3, 94.5 WCOZ (AOR), and his last at WFNX 101.7 in it's "new wave" days in the early 80's shortly after flipping from WLYN-FM. He's currently in the NYC area, no longer in radio.

There were a number of others who were in and out of WNTN during their progressive years, I certainly can't recall most of them. I can't imagine that they could've possibly afforded to offer much money, so I'm sure most moved on when they found another opportunity.
 
>
> Yes, they were for about two years from their sign-on in
> spring 1968, which I remember well because in Newton a few
> miles from their transmitter it interfered with 1510 WMEX on
> my Radio Shack transistor radio. I had to get a better
> quality portable radio.
>
Here's a great WNTN trivia question--to which I don't know the answer: When the station first signed on, I believe there were three DJs, Richard S Paul (he was AWFUL--in my opinion) did AM drive. IIRC, Bill Marlowe was on in PM drive (or as much of PM drive as WNTN was on in the winter--which wasn't much; signoff was (and still is) at 4:15 in December). Who was on in middays? I don't know. Richard S Paul had worked elsewhere in greater Boston. Can anybody remember where? Boy, was he AWFUL--in my opinion!

Interesting technical side note: WNTN is a US Class D AM on a Canadian clear channel. The dominant Class A on 1550 is CBE Windsor ON (Detroit). If CBE were a US station, WNTN could stay on with usable power (maybe as much as 500W) until CBE's local sunset. Windsor/Detroit sunset is about an hour after Boston sunset. Would the FCC grant such a PSSA to WNTN? I've heard that the FCC would allow WNTN run all night with something like 3W, but at 1550, that's barely enough to deliver a usable signal to Lexington St, which runs north and south maybe a tenth of a mile east of the WNTN tower. Hardly anone lives inside that 500-foot (or so) radius, so Rob Rudnick decided that the extra hours just weren't worth the effort. However, if WNTN could get a PSSA to use more than 3W until Windsor sunset, WJIB could get a PSSA to run more than 5W for the half hour or so between Cambridge sunset and Toronto sunset. If that were allowed, my guess is that WJIB could run at least 50W for that half hour. That WOULD be worthwhile!
 
I seem to think that Richard S. Paul was at the old WCOP-1150 just prior to 'NTN. His time at 'COP was probably just before or just after the format change to country. If his time at 'COP began before the flip to country and ended afterwards, I could understand why he might have left. Maybe he loved MOR (which I believe WCOP was for awhile in the 1960's and what "NTN was when it started) but didn't like country.

Since he was on mornings at 'NTN, he may also have been the station's first program director.

Also, wasn't Fred B. Cole one of the original owners of the station?? I don't know if he ever was on-the-air there, though.

I didn't know Bill Marlowe was at WNTN when it first went on the air. I do recall that he briefly did a brokered-time big-bands/standards show on Saturday mornings years later (I thought it was around 1978 or so, after the old WHET-1330, at which he worked, dropped their standards format).

Marlowe had a great set of pipes; given how he did those Giant Glass commercials in the last years of his life, it seems to me that had he liked rock 'n roll, he could have become one of the great Top-40 DJ's of all-time.
 
Hey Dan,

Here's a question for you.

Could WNTN ever get a real night license by going tight directional with a deep null toward CBE? I am thinking that the diplex WUNR site (which is right in city of license) as the night site, or maybe even 24/7. 1550 is prety close to 1600 in terms of tower height.
 
> Hey Dan,
>
> Here's a question for you.
>
> Could WNTN ever get a real night license by going tight
> directional with a deep null toward CBE? I am thinking that
> the diplex WUNR site (which is right in city of license) as
> the night site, or maybe even 24/7. 1550 is prety close to
> 1600 in terms of tower height.
>
The closest-frequency AM diplex in the US (and probably anywhere) is an ex-bander on 1650 diplexed with a 1600 station. Such small frequency separation is generally thought to be impractical. Percentage-wise it's just a skosh tighter than 1600 with 1550. The ex-bander in the 1650/1600 diplex is, of course, nondirectional, whereas what you are asking about is for 1550 to operate directionally. I'm sure it would be doubly impractical to change the Sawmill Brook Parkway five-tower site into a directional quadriplex. Many people are wondering whether it will work as a triplex. I don't think there has ever been such a complex AM multiplex of such high-power stations. Moreover, to get the the proposal through the Newton powers that be, WKOX/WRCA/WUNR had to agree that no more stations would use the site and that there would be no power increases, so even if your proposal were technically feasible, which I question, it is politically out of the question. It would also cost a bloody fortune--not something that WNTN would be likely to contemplate for more than a nanosecond.
 
>
> Also, wasn't Fred B. Cole one of the original owners of the
> station?? I don't know if he ever was on-the-air there,
> though.
>
The only original owner of WNTN that I know about was a guy named Charlie Bell. I met him briefly when I visited the site while the station was under construction. He was in his 60s and I believe he said he was a Mormon. Today, our governor is a Mormon and there is a large Mormon temple in Belmont across Route 2 from where I live, but back in 1967, Mormons were kind of a rarity in Massachusetts.
 
> > Hey Dan,
> >
> > Here's a question for you.
> >
> > Could WNTN ever get a real night license by going tight
> > directional with a deep null toward CBE? I am thinking that
> > the diplex WUNR site (which is right in city of license) as
> > the night site, or maybe even 24/7. 1550 is prety close to
> > 1600 in terms of tower height.
> >
> The closest-frequency AM diplex in the US (and probably
> anywhere) is an ex-bander on 1650 diplexed with a 1600
> station. Such small frequency separation is generally
> thought to be impractical. Percentage-wise it's just a skosh
> tighter than 1600 with 1550. The ex-bander in the 1650/1600
> diplex is, of course, nondirectional, whereas what you are
> asking about is for 1550 to operate directionally. I'm sure
> it would be doubly impractical to change the Sawmill Brook
> Parkway five-tower site into a directional quadriplex. Many
> people are wondering whether it will work as a triplex. I
> don't think there has ever been such a complex AM multiplex
> of such high-power stations. Moreover, to get the the
> proposal through the Newton powers that be, WKOX/WRCA/WUNR
> had to agree that no more stations would use the site and
> that there would be no power increases, so even if your
> proposal were technically feasible, which I question, it is
> politically out of the question. It would also cost a bloody
> fortune--not something that WNTN would be likely to
> contemplate for more than a nanosecond.

In addition to all that, WNTN would have more than just co-channel CBE to deal with at night. They would have first adjacents on both sides of their signal with very powerful skywaves in the area at night. 1540 from Albany, and 1560 from NYC.
 
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